Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Australian Technical Colleges (Flexibility in Achieving Australia’s Skills Needs) Amendment Bill (No. 2) 2006. This bill amends the Australian Technical Colleges (Flexibility in Achieving Australia’s Skills Needs) Act 2005, which originally provided for the establishment and operation of Australian technical colleges. The act provides funding for the operation of the colleges from 2005 to 2009. This bill will increase the funding for Australian technical colleges for the 2006-2009 period, increasing the total funding provided for under the act by $112.6 million, from $343.6 million to $456.2 million until 2009. Labor supports this increase in funding to the Australian technical colleges as a welcome turnaround from the government’s record when it comes to funding in the skills sector.

As we all know, the Australian technical colleges were hastily introduced by the Howard government during the 2004 election campaign as an attempt at a quick fix for Australia’s skilled labour crisis. Let me be clear: I am not opposed to those involved in the Australian technical colleges; however, senators opposite have tried to imply that in some of the comments they have made in the chamber today. My view is: why reinvent the wheel? Why not invest? Why didn’t the government reinvest in the TAFE system that has, in broad terms, the runs on the board and has proved, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that it has the skills, the experience and the expertise to ensure that things do not end up like now, where we have a skills crisis in this country under the leadership of the Howard government following the last 11 long and difficult years? As usual, though, we see government senators trying to rewrite history and gloss over the facts. If you talk to people within the community, it is very evident that there is a massive skills shortage and that people in everyday rural communities and in the cities are really struggling.

The introduction of technical colleges followed successive cuts in federal funding since 1997 for the TAFE sector. But it was a clear-cut case of too little too late, as the limited interest in enrolments and the repeated delays in implementation did little to address the problem. However, the government’s attempt to at least appear to be doing something about the skills crisis is encouraging.

Labor has repeatedly argued that funding for these colleges will have little or no impact on the current skills crisis because students currently attending these colleges will not graduate until 2010. While the money that this bill will direct towards additional funding for these colleges is welcome as a step forward, the money could be redirected to much more productive areas, including traditional apprenticeships and additional funding for the TAFE sector. We all know, as I said before, that these are outstanding educational institutions that already have the runs on the board.

Over the 10 or so long years of the Howard government, 300,000 Australians have been turned away from TAFE. The Prime Minister’s answer, when faced with a shortage of skills, has not been to look to training Australians and towards the future but to import hundreds of thousands of extra skilled migrants. Australia’s economy cannot be reliant upon imported labour for the future. Australia needs a government that will invest in our TAFEs and universities to produce the tradespeople, engineers, scientists, doctors and nurses that Australia so desperately needs.

Australian communities are already suffering as a result of the Howard government’s trade policies. The recently announced closure of the Blundstone factory in Hobart is yet another casualty of the Prime Minister’s tariff reductions and active encouragement of business to head offshore to look for cheaper labour. It seems that the newspapers in Tasmania have a story every other day about the latest factory closure and the latest slashing of jobs in unavoidable ‘restructures’. Yet at the same time I hear stories from constituents who are finding it very difficult to acquire tradespeople to build their homes or to do renovations. In Launceston only last week we saw 30 long-term employees of ACL Bearing made redundant, with another 60 to go over the next couple of months.

Not only is this government doing nothing to encourage Australians to train in the skills sector; it is also encouraging Australian companies to use offshore labour, thus slowly eating away at our already depleted skills base. The Howard government offers Australians a wealth of contradictions but no fresh solutions to Australia’s skills crisis, despite the fact that it has admitted the failure in its approach to the skills sector.

In November last year the Reserve Bank warned that, because skills ‘shortages are widespread across most industries and skill levels’, core inflation in the Australian economy will remain high for several years. The Australian Industry Group says Australia will need an extra 100,000 tradespeople by 2010, and a recent audit by the Department of Education, Science and Training found Australia will also need an extra 20,000 scientists and engineers in the next six years.

While Labor welcomes any additional funding that will benefit Australia’s skills shortage, the Howard government should be questioning whether its tech colleges are the best possible use of the money it has available. You would think figures like those that the Australian Industry Group has quoted and the warning of the Reserve Bank would be enough to make the Prime Minister and his government act.

Labor’s priority is to turn around the skills crisis by training Australians—first, by redirecting funding to the TAFE sector and vocational education initiatives. Australia’s future is reliant on investment in the skills sector today. Australia needs a government that understands that our skilled workers are our most valuable asset. The Howard government will never understand that concept, as it has proven over the last 10 or so long years. (Quorum formed)