Meryl Swanson (Paterson, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Skills and Training. What steps has the Albanese Labor government taken to reduce the cost of training and ensure Australians can get the skills they want and need for the jobs they want and need? And are there any proposals for skills and training that would leave Australians worse off?

Andrew Giles (Scullin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Skills and Training) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the member for Paterson, who is not only a champion of regional New South Wales but a champion for free TAFE. She knows—she celebrates the fact—that free TAFE has delivered enrolments for nearly 600,000 Australians. She knows that we are removing financial barriers to TAFE as part of our action on the cost of living to get inflation down and wages up and to create new jobs. She knows that this is making a difference. We've heard this through the free TAFE Senate inquiry, through dozens of submissions which have highlighted the positive impact of free TAFE. TAFE Directors Australia shared the story of Bradley Edwards. Bradley is a young father who studied for a cert III in early childhood education and care at TAFE SA. Bradley says this:

Fee Free TAFE has helped me by allowing me to study and pursue this career without the concern of whether or not I can even afford to study and change careers years after leaving high school …

We also know, and the member for Paterson knows this very well, that more than one-third of all the enrolments in free TAFE have been in regional and rural areas. That's why the Central Queensland University submission goes on to say:

Regional students face the extra costs of time, transport, distance, childcare, time away from work and other expenses … In such circumstances, education … often becomes a discretionary expense. Fee-Free TAFE has helped to alleviate this burden, enabling students to pursue their studies without having to choose between education and financial stability.

So let's look at how much students save. A student like Bradley, studying a cert II in ECEC in South Australia could save around $4,400. In the NT, a student doing a cert III in community services could save around $8,800—real savings for people, getting skills that they want in areas we need. But, of course, there is more to do to support Australians, and that's why we are making free TAFE permanent. But the Liberals continue to call it wasteful spending. The Leader of the Opposition says he's going to cut 'wasteful spending'. The last time they were in government, the coalition left Australians with the second-worst skills shortage in the OECD. They cut $3 billion from TAFE and training. They failed to land a national skills agreement with the states and territories for nearly a decade. And they haven't changed. Before they all voted against the bill today, the deputy opposition leader said:

… it's a key principle and tenet of the Liberal Party: if you don't pay for something, you don't value it.

We know it's not just free TAFE they don't value; it's all public education—Medicare, the NDIS and public hospitals. But Australians value all of these, and they know they'll be worse off under the Liberal Party and a government led by this Leader of the Opposition.