Mark Arbib (NSW, Australian Labor Party, Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Government Service Delivery) Share this | Hansard source

I was also saying in response to Senator McLucas that silver and bronze medals were won in the fields of manufacturing, IT, plumbing, web design, sheet metal work, welding, bricklaying, and wall and floor tiling. It is a great credit to those competitors, their coaches and the support staff but also a great credit to our TAFE institutions. It is a great credit to all the teachers in our TAFEs who put the hours and hours of work into training young apprentices and trainees. This is an extremely important part of what the government is trying to achieve at the moment. During a global recession you obviously have the effect of unemployment, but you also have the effects on skills and apprentices. We have seen apprenticeship numbers go down—there is no doubt about it—during the global recession, but the government is acting. In terms of the stimulus, we have put in place a 10 per cent figure on total contract labour hours for apprentices. (Time expired)