Page 4155 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 18 November 2015

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In conclusion I thank my colleague Ms Fitzharris for bringing this important motion to the Assembly today and take this opportunity to thank all of the staff at CIT for the excellent work they do in making sure that those who work in the automotive trades have up-to-date, good quality training. I commend the motion to the Assembly.

MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo) (3.54): I will be supporting Ms Fitzharris’s motion that is before us today, calling as it does on the government to continue to enhance the vocational education and training sector through reform and collaboration.

We are extremely fortunate in the ACT to have strong and robust relationships with our local VET providers, and enhancing collaboration in particular is an achievable outcome that has many benefits for both our local students and those who may come to the ACT to advance their education.

As the “Canberra-create your future” website’s “Learn” page describes it, VET courses develop specific knowledge and skills through hands-on learning across a large number of careers and industries. Qualifications range from certificate II to advanced diplomas and are provided by government institutions—for us, the CIT—as well as private institutions. There are a range of private registered training organisations in the ACT that, when considering the scope of the CIT’s offerings, combine to provide an incredible range of career-focused certificates.

The ACT Greens believe that learning is a lifelong process fostered in both formal education and informal settings, from early childhood through adult life, and VET sits well with that belief. We want to see a range of accessible education and training programs offering new opportunities to adults at all stages of their life, including those re-entering the workforce and adjusting to changed circumstances, with a particular focus on numeracy and literacy. We also want the government to support a high quality vocational education system which offers new skills or reskilling for future occupations, including those industries emerging in the green economy.

We are seeing courses offered in line with this at CIT, with certificates in conservation and land management, and environmental monitoring and technology. We are also quite lucky to have the world respected Academy of Interactive Entertainment call Canberra home.

I do believe that we can continue to enhance this approach to the green economy, and I welcome recent initiatives from the Chief Minister in this space relating to new business development support, particularly in ICT. However, there is also greater potential to take advantage of emerging industry needs in relation to energy efficient buildings and sustainable design, which stretches from trade skills right through to architecture.

Government support in this area, ranging from programs such as the recently reviewed Australian apprenticeships user choice program, which provides training for approximately 6,000 students employed as Australian apprentices, to the skilled capital funded training initiative, which is designed to be responsive to training needs and market forces, could offer increased leadership. I believe we could seek to be ahead of the game and more innovative in this area. But I do acknowledge that these


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