Chris Evans (WA, Australian Labor Party, Leader of the Government in the Senate) Share this | Hansard source

The Gillard government has made serious investment in upskilling our workforce and giving young Australians an opportunity to take up an apprenticeship. As I have indicated, we have record numbers of young people in apprenticeships and traineeships. The Kickstart program, which we conducted during the global downturn, saw apprenticeship numbers remain strong for the first time ever, I think, in a downturn, and we have been able to build on that now.

But, equally, we have actually invested in building new vocational education and training facilities around Australia. We have put $700 million into building new facilities, many of which are coming on stream now, including one I opened for TAFE New South Wales last week. These are giving world-class facilities to TAFE and other providers to allow apprentices to get quality training in quality institutions to continue our tradition of having top-class tradespeople to provide the skills we are going to need. (Time expired)