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Legislative Council - Fifty-Second Parliament, First Session (52-1)
2010-06-24 Daily Xml
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CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY TRAINING FUND

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD (15:22): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Urban Development and Planning a question regarding the Construction Industry Training Fund.

Leave granted.

The Hon. D.G.E. HOOD: It has come to my attention that there have been two reviews of the Construction Industry Training Fund, one pursuant to section 38 of the act and undertaken by KPA Consulting for the Minister for Employment, Training and Further Education back in 2004, and a further report prepared by the Economic and Finance Committee in 2005. It appears as though there was some double up; in particular that the Economic and Finance Committee was not initially aware of the KPA Consulting report when it began looking into the fund.

The Economic and Finance Committee, in particular, heard some damning evidence into the effectiveness of the fund. For example, the Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Master Builders Association of South Australia, David Callan, blamed the board in part for actually causing labour shortages. Mr Callan told the committee:

We do believe that the performance of the CITB is inextricably linked to the present labour shortages that we have. Those labour shortages, rather than being in a cyclical boom/bust situation are really to do with the systemic problems that issue from the system which training has provided, particularly entry-level training within the industry.

Further, the managing director of Home Australia complained to the committee that more had to be done for entry-level training and that every dollar the board put into upskilling tradespeople (who were already on significant wages, of course) was a dollar less that was going into recruiting young people as apprentices.

After hearing this damning evidence from across the industry regarding the effectiveness of the board, the committee recommended (in recommendation No. 4) that board policy be changed so that, as market conditions allow, the majority of the fund's training expenditure now be directed to entry-level training through group apprenticeship schemes or group prevocational schemes and individually indentured apprenticeships—including the upskilling during the term of the apprenticeship itself—and the retraining of workers who had left the industry and wished to return at some later point. My questions are:

1. Why has this recommendation not been implemented to date?

2. Will the minister confirm that none of the 10 recommendations of the report has actually been implemented?

3. What action will the government take to address South Australia's chronic shortage of apprentices?

The Hon. P. HOLLOWAY (Minister for Mineral Resources Development, Minister for Urban Development and Planning, Minister for Industrial Relations, Minister Assisting the Premier in Public Sector Management) (15:25): I thank the honourable member for his question. Following the question that he asked me about this fund the other day, I understand that these matters are the responsibility of the Minister for Employment, Training and Further Education in another place, and I will be happy to refer the questions to him for a response.

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