Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Skills and Training) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the remarkable member for Dunkley and good friend. Can I thank her for the question, because it is true to say, upon election, we were faced with a very broad and deep skills shortage across the economy and the labour market. In fact, we had many, many jobs that were in need of supply, skills and labour. The OECD had reported that we had the second-highest labour shortage, per capita, amongst OECD countries. We saw the occupations on the shortage list, in 12 months, go from 153 to 286, before election. We were bequeathed a very significant skills shortage on top of the Liberal Party debt.

For that reason, we had to respond quickly. Can I thank the Prime Minister and the Treasurer for having the foresight to convene a jobs and skills summit, with very short notice, bringing together all governments, industry, unions, universities and the VET sector in order to ensure that we had a strategic plan to supply skills to our economy. That, of course, led to the first announcement in this sector to ensure that we had 180,000 fee-free TAFE places for 2023, and, as the Prime Minister just indicated, we've exceeded that target. It's now at 215,000 places and climbing. That is 215,000 Australians enrolled in courses in areas of skills demand. That is what is most critical. We understand that, because the states and territories have such an important role in the VET sector, you have to collaborate. You have to bring them together.

What is extraordinary is that in the nine years they were in government they did not have a long-term skills agreement with—

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