The federal government has been accused of underspending towards vocational education and training programs, potentially exacerbating the skills shortage already felt by the rail industry.
The education department, this week, released its 2018-19 annual report in which it revealed it had spent less than was budgeted for key programs including trade support loans (-$68m), Australian Apprenticeships Centres (-$51m) and apprenticeship incentives (-$35m).
The government underspent $214m in vocational education and training programs in the last financial year, contributing to a total $919m underspend since 2014.
In fact, there are 150,000 fewer Australians in apprenticeships now than in 2013. With a significant skills shortage already affecting the rail industry, an underspend on TAFE training is likely an unwelcome result when the pipeline for new work has never been bigger.
Shadow education minister Tanya Plibersek accused the government of “[shortchanging] TAFE and training by $1bn despite the fact Australia is suffering a national shortage of tradies”.
The skills and employment minister Michaelia Cash rejected this, arguing that the figures “represent underspends which come from demand-driven programs in vocational education and training”.
According to Labor’s analysis of annual reports, the underspend has been persistent: with the government spending $138m less than promised in 2014-15, $247m less in 2015-16, $118m in 2016-17 and $202m in 2017-18.
The Victorian and NSW governments this week both announced programs which were aimed at boosting TAFE figures.
The NSW government announced a new program to incentivise study at TAFE, by allowing students to receive recognition for what they have already learnt in high school.
“We are incentivising high-achieving HSC students into our vocational education sector by giving them a head-start at TAFE NSW,” said Minister for Skills and Tertiary Education Geoff Lee.
“We will do this by mapping HSC units to vocational competencies and allowing eligible students to proceed straight to assessments.”
HSC subjects that could qualify for these new TAFE pathways include mathematics, engineering studies, industrial technology and, software design and development.
Victoria, in turn, announced it would inject $500,000 for its Free TAFE courses to develop educational products and resources for Free TAFE students to have access to. The funding will also go towards additional modules for Free TAFE students to build their literacy, numeracy, digital and employability skills.
In the 2019 budget, the federal government announced a $525m skills package – including towards the creation of 80,000 new apprenticeships – but it contained just $55m of new money and $463m in reallocations from the Skilling Australians Fund.