The ALP’s Future Made in Australia Skills Plan
On Sunday 5 December 2021, Labor Leader Anthony Albanese, along with Deputy Leader Richard Marles and Shadow Minister for Education Tanya Plibersek, announced Labor’s Future Made in Australia Skills Plan.
The Plan includes a $1.2 billion commitment to address skills shortages in the workforce by providing free TAFE and creating more university places to help drive future economic growth and lead Australia out of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Future Made in Australia Skills Plan includes the creation of 465,000 free TAFE places and up to 20,000 new university places.
Free TAFE
Labor’s Plan for free TAFE will target Australians studying in industries where there are skills shortages.
The Plan aligns with Labor’s commitment to deliver more secure, well-paid jobs, and will aim to provide the skills needed to drive economic growth.
If elected, Labor pledges to deliver over 465,000 free TAFE places over 4 years, which includes 45,000 new places.
The free TAFE component of the Future Made in Australia Skills Plan announced by Albanese on Sunday will aim to:
- Help rebuild industries hit hardest by the pandemic, as well as meet current and future needs in the care economy.
- Provide more opportunities for apprentices and trainees, and fill skills shortage gaps in Australian industries.
- Create more opportunities for school leavers, workers wanting to retrain or upskill, and unpaid carers – who are predominantly women – to get back into the workforce.
- Secure the future of vocational education in Australia by protecting TAFE. Labor will ensure at least 70 per cent of Commonwealth vocational education funding goes to public TAFE.
- Deliver new and upgraded IT facilities, workshops, laboratories and tele-health simulators through a $50 million TAFE Technology Fund.
More university places
If Labor win government at the upcoming federal election they will commit $481.7 million to creating up to 20,000 more university places over the next two years under the Future Made in Australia Skills Plan.
Labor’s Plan for more university places will help address skills shortages and ensure future skills needs are met by training more engineers, registered nurses, tech workers and teachers.
This commitment will ensure Year 12s, who have been significantly affected by the pandemic, will have greater opportunity to study at university.
The Future Made in Australia Skills Plan will also help universities recover from the significant impacts of the pandemic, which has included a loss of around 40,000 jobs and billions in revenue.
Funding will be prioritised for universities which offer additional courses in national priority areas like clean energy, advanced manufacturing, health and education, and which provide opportunities for under-represented groups like those who are the first in their family to go to university, and people in regional, remote and outer-suburban areas, and First Nations people.
Further Information
For further information, please contact your Hawker Britton consultant Simon Banks on +61 419 638 587.