Ross Vasta (Bonner, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Minister for Vocational and Technical Education. Would the minister advise the House on how school based apprenticeships are providing increased choice and opportunities for young Australians, particularly in my electorate of Bonner?

Gary Hardgrave (Moreton, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Bonner for his commitment to Australian school based apprenticeships, particularly in his electorate, where schools such as Clairvaux MacKillop College are providing hundreds of students with opportunities to learn a trade while they are completing their year 11 and 12 studies. They are doing this through employers like Zupps, at Mount Gravatt, who have a fantastic commitment to taking on kids and giving them those opportunities.

There are currently some 18,000 Australian school based apprenticeships, as at the end of March of this year, hundreds of them in Bonner alone. Commencements in Australian school based apprenticeships have increased by 23 per cent in the 12 months to March of this year, to 16,100 commencements. This compares with just 2,410 commencements in Australian school based apprenticeships in 1999 and, of course, zero when the Australian Labor Party was in government. Last year this government paid $14.6 million in financial incentives to Australian employers for school based apprenticeships. We are providing real choice—there is that word again: choice—for young Australians, giving them the opportunity to progress towards nationally recognised trade qualifications and work experience while they are at school.

Mr Speaker, as you would know, being the member for Wannon, just last week we announced more funding for more of the Australian technical college program. All up, there will be $343.6 million for Australian technical colleges, which will provide opportunities for 7,500 students to take up Australian school based apprenticeships in years 11 and 12. We have announced 23 of the 25 Australian technical colleges and funding arrangements for 19. In the last few weeks alone, some $40 million in commitments have been announced in the upper Spencer Gulf in South Australia, in Darwin, and in Warrnambool in the electorate of Wannon. What we need is for state governments to reform the industrial relations impediments—

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Gary Hardgrave (Moreton, Liberal Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Oh yes, here he goes. The state of New South Wales, the biggest state and the biggest economy but, as the Prime Minister rightly acknowledged last week, the state with the most lethargic economy in Australia, has the worst set of circumstances when it comes to school based apprenticeships. It is disgraceful to think that, in the state of New South Wales, no student is studying in the trades at certificate level I, II, III or IV in years 11 and 12. There are no school based apprenticeships.

I noticed that the member for Rankin hopped on the bandwagon for school based apprenticeships a few weeks ago. About eight weeks ago he was mouthing the words of the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, bagging Australian school based apprenticeships through the Australian technical college program. Last week he was on the bandwagon promoting them. We welcome his latter-day conversion on the road to wherever it was, but what I want him, the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition to do is to get onto the Western Australian government and, particularly, the New South Wales government to allow school based apprenticeships across all trades for year 11 and 12 students in those states. Without that it is a disgrace.

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper.