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Legislative Council - Fifty-Third Parliament, Second Session (53-2)
2015-05-05 Daily Xml
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Skills for All

The Hon. S.G. WADE (15:19): I seek leave to make a brief explanation before asking the Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills a question about the Skills for All program.

Leave granted.

The Hon. S.G. WADE: On 1 April the minister finally released ACIL Allen Consulting's independent review of the first two years of the government's 10-years Skills for All program. Amongst other things, the report found that the Skills for All program, at a cost of $195 million, had failed in its primary goal of getting people trained for work.

The review found that just 30.5 per cent of people enrolled in a Skills for All course in 2013 completed the course and that, of those who did graduate, only 70 per cent were able to report a job-related benefit or, to put it another way, almost 80 per cent of students who started a Skills for All course in 2013 either failed to graduate or, if they did graduate, were not prepared to say that the course had improved their chances of getting a job.

My question to the minister is: why did the government not heed the advice offered by employers and private training providers before the Skills for All program commenced that subsidies for training need to be linked to jobs and that the design of the program needed to incorporate direct linkages to real and recognisable employment opportunities?

The Hon. G.E. GAGO (Minister for Employment, Higher Education and Skills, Minister for Science and Information Economy, Minister for the Status of Women, Minister for Business Services and Consumers) (15:20): I thank the honourable member for his most important question. Indeed, ACIL Allen were commissioned to review Skills for All and the results have been made public in full. The report is quite comprehensive and it does outline a number of positive and negative aspects to Skills for All, but I notice that the Hon. Stephen Wade comes into this place and only mentions the negative.

He does not mention any of the positives that came out of Skills for All like the increased spending that went into it that resulted in increased participation rates in training—significantly increased participation rates in training. In fact, I believe that we led the nation for a period of time during that time. We reached and exceeded our commitment to produce our 100,000 increased trained positions, so a lot more people have come out with a lot more qualifications and with a lot more skills under their belts.

We know that job outcomes is one important aspect of training; it is not the only outcome. We know, for instance, that one of the reasons that people do not complete their qualifications is because they receive employment during their qualification or are only interested in achieving a particular skill set rather than a complete qualification. Once they have completed the subject component that they are interested in they then withdraw. We know that there are other reasons as well, such as personal reasons and suchlike.

Since becoming minister for training I have been committed to making changes to not only improve completion rates but also to improve employment outcomes. We know that under Skills for All, Skills for Jobs in Regions was a very successful program—particularly in our regions—that did link training directly with local job outcomes. It was a very small component of Skills for All but nevertheless it was highly successful.

What I have done under WorkReady is to expand that program—based on principles of that program—to the Jobs First program so that there is some increase in funding to that program. It particularly benefits regions because it links with local businesses and local employment opportunities that partner with training organisations, and those people who successfully complete that qualification are then lined up with direct jobs in their local community.

So, we have learnt a great deal from our experience with Skills for All. The ACIL Allen report was very valuable; so, too, was the work done by the TASC (Training and Skills Council). They have done a body of important work. We also conducted a red tape review, and some very valuable things fell out of that. All that information, plus the personal information I received from feedback from the industry, including students, over the last year, has been used to restructure and revamp our VET system here in South Australia, as was demonstrated by the launch of WorkReady recently.

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