Maria Vamvakinou (Calwell, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Earlier this month I hosted a delegation of representatives from the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, the Australian Workers Union and the Electrical Trades Union, who were lobbying pretty much for their members' jobs as well as generally to protect industry skills in the form of aircraft maintenance capabilities and, in particular, the high-skill jobs in Australia.

They were here campaigning on behalf of the non-licensed aircraft engineers and aircraft workers to ensure that Qantas provided a long-term commitment to the future of Qantas engineering in Australia. At the time, the delegation was particularly concerned about impending job cuts by Qantas at Tullamarine airport, which is in my electorate, and at Avalon Airport. Of course, we all know what has happened since when on 21 May Qantas announced it was closing its Tullamarine heavy maintenance base and scaling back its Avalon facility with, in total, a loss of 452 jobs. Of course I was very disappointed, but my constituents were devastated. In the words of one of the workers who lost his job on that day, 'Even though I knew it was coming, it was very different when it happened.'

In a written statement the Qantas Engineering Alliance expressed major concerns over the Australian maintenance repair organisation's ability to provide for Australia's future skills requirements in this area of heavy maintenance. Qantas employs over 60 per cent of the total industry workforce and trains over 52 per cent of the industry's apprentices and trainers. So the question needs to be asked: will Qantas, in light of its recently announced agenda for consolidation as opposed to maximising existing jobs, have the capacity in future to ensure the long-term viability of its apprenticeship and training program for the benefit of future young Australians and also for Australia's capacity?

With so many people in my electorate looking at different employment options either because of job losses or because they may be young people thinking about career paths, it is reassuring to know that creating jobs for Australians is foremost on this government's agenda. Of course, the success of the mining sector will secure massive investment in our country's economy by helping to create thousands of jobs for Australians, and in doing so give opportunities to those people in my electorate who are actually losing their jobs at this very moment. So it is very important to keep in mind that the Roy Hill project, for example, involves 8,000 jobs and 6,700 of them will go to Australians. It is very important that 2,000 of these will be training places, including 200 positions for apprentices. I just want to make sure that the mining sector is very cognisant of and committed to giving jobs to Australians first in light of those Australians who are losing their jobs virtually on a daily basis.