Skills Training

Dr HARVEY (Newland) (14:53): My question is to the Minister for Innovation and Skills. Can the minister update the house about how South Australia's training system is performing compared with previous years?

The Hon. D.G. PISONI (Unley—Minister for Innovation and Skills) (14:54): I can do that. I thank the member for Newland for his question and his interest in skills training for not just his constituents but for South Australians in general. The Marshall government took to the last election a commitment to fix South Australia's training system to ensure that South Australians are suitably skilled for the jobs in our transitioning economy.

Today, the NCVER's publication 'Government-funded students and courses: January to June 2019' was released and the data is extremely positive for South Australia. It shows that we are leading the nation, that we are getting on with the job. In the first six months to June this year, South Australia experienced a large increase in government-funded VET activity: 48,415 students, an increase of 8,790 students compared to the same time last year. That's a 22.2 per cent increase. South Australia's percentage increase was the second largest in the country. This is the state's first increase in government-funded VET student numbers for the January to June period since the NCVER started counting these figures.

Our apprentices and trainees: 10,185 apprentices and trainees, up from 7,910 this time last year. That is an increase of 28.8 per cent on last year's figures, and of course we are fixing the TAFE system. Remember the mess we inherited from those opposite? There were 31,375 enrolments delivered by TAFE institutes, compared with 24,820 this time last year. That is a 26.4 per cent increase, the second largest again in the country.

Of course, it is not just TAFE that we're seeing good results with. The non-government providers in South Australia are up 22.8 per cent to 10,420 new trainees and apprentices in that time, up from 8,480 this time last year. This was the largest increase in the country of the non-government sector. That is understandable, of course, because those opposite just decimated the non-government sector here in South Australia.

This growth has been supported by an expanded Subsidised Training List. When we came to office, 350 courses were subsidised by the government and only 30 per cent of those were available to the non-government sector. Today, 850 courses are subsidised by the government and each and every one of them is available to the private sector. So, instead of bureaucrats sitting around deciding what should be funded, we've let the industry decide what training they want to do and we will fund it to suit their needs.

Of course, remember, from those opposite there wasn't even a skills policy in the lead-up to the last election. We got to work immediately after being elected, and South Australia was the first state to sign a national partnership agreement with the commonwealth to deliver the Skilling South Australia program.

In our first full year of the Skilling South Australia program, we achieved almost 13,000 new trainee commencements, and in March, the NCVER, for the first time in seven years, reported an increase in apprenticeship and traineeship commencements. Today, there are the terrific figures of 28.8 per cent more trainees and apprentices than for the same period last year.

We are determined to modernise our workforce with higher apprenticeships, new training pathways to support industry such as applied technology, and Microsoft and cybersecurity apprenticeships all released and delivered by this government. Last year, 700 businesses took on an apprentice for the very first time.