Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Industry, Infrastructure and Industrial Relations) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to talk about Education City, a very important development taking place right in the heart of the fastest growing electorate in the country—namely, my electorate of Oxley. Education City is being developed by the Springfield Land Corporation, which is chaired by Mr Maha Sinnathamby. Many members of the House would be very familiar with Mr Sinnathamby’s commitment to south-east Queensland and my local community. But more importantly, those who have met Mr Sinnathamby would be inspired by his passion for education. His vision and commitment to education for future generations of Australians should be an inspiration to us all. The people of Ipswich and south-west Brisbane are indeed fortunate that this project is taking place in their local community. Heading up the Education City project is Mr Neville Smith, a well-known and respected educator in the Springfield area. Mr Smith is passionate about the power of education and has a strong record of achievement in this field.

I want to highlight the unique nature of Education City—what it does, how it works, how it is financed and what its structure is. Education City will provide career focused education for a wide range of people. It will have a state-of-the-art campus, including a 350-seat auditorium, 14 lecture theatres, 20 teaching rooms, two fully equipped computer laboratories and many other program-specific facilities. Education City has been designed to deliver lifelong learning, offering educational pathways from early childhood right through to postgraduate training.

The initial investment of $80 million to develop Education City has come from Springfield Land Corporation itself. Interestingly though, this project has come about without any support from the federal government. This is a great shame, because I believe projects such as this should be supported by the federal government.

By contrast, Labor is committed to providing the education and skills needs of the whole nation. This is among Labor’s top priorities. In fact, just last week Kim Beazley launched Labor’s first fully costed policy in the lead-up to the next federal election. In government, we will introduce a ‘skills account’, which will remove TAFE fees for traditional apprentices. Labor will make an initial contribution of $800 per year, for up to four years, to apprentices’ skills accounts. This will get rid of up-front TAFE fees for the 60,000 traditional apprentices who commence training each year. It is a very important initiative.

Labor’s new system of skills accounts will invest in young people and help them to complete their traditional apprenticeships. Under Labor’s plan, an additional 13,000 qualified tradespeople would enter our workforce every year. Like Education City, Labor is determined to build Australia into the future and build a better future for our kids. These are the sorts of policies that will promote the success of facilities like Education City and provide the skills and training desperately needed by our young people today.

With Labor’s strong tradition of nation building and its heritage of investing in people, it should come as no surprise that I and many of my colleagues on this side of the House have such high praise for the initiatives of Education City in Springfield. It is a great story, and one which I believe should be told widely. It will have enormous benefits for the people of Ipswich and south-west Brisbane and more widely for those interstate and internationally. By partnering with the University of Southern Queensland, Education City has created a unique education model for the local community. Over the next decade, Education City will provide to thousands of local people, and people from interstate and overseas, opportunities which have not previously been available to them in my region.

When the doors open for the first time in the next few weeks, it will mark the beginning of an exciting educational opportunity for many people. As the local federal member, I think having an education facility such as Education City marks a coming of age for the region I represent. For my community and for the people of south-east Queensland, Ipswich and Brisbane, education City is an educational facility which provides a range of services broader than the traditional educational services.

I am happy to acknowledge the efforts of the Springfield Land Corporation—in particular, the work of Mr Maha Sinnathamby, Mr Neville Smith and his team—and the people of the University of Southern Queensland for making this project a reality. I also want to acknowledge the support of the Mayor of Ipswich, Paul Pisasale, and the Queensland government for its continuing support of Education City and the Ipswich region. It is a great honour to represent the area, and I am even more proud of it now that we have a world-class facility. (Time expired)