SENATOR KEMP -I ask the Minister or his officers: how many people are expected to be enrolled under the CRAFT program in the current year? And how does that compare with the previous year? Are there figures in the report on that?

MR GREER -Yes, Senator. I am just tracking them down. On page 85 we mention that there were 35,904 apprentices assisted through the ATI element of CRAFT in 1990-91 and a further 8,927 were assisted through the phased out technical education rebate element.

SENATOR KEMP -Right. That is 1989-90. Are there any forecast figures for the current year?

MR GREER -Yes, on page 89 Senator. It is estimated that 47,250 apprentices would be eligible to attract commencement completion or recommencement grants under the apprentice training incentive.

SENATOR KEMP -What is the directly comparative figure with that?

MR GREER -The comparative figure would be 35,904 plus the 8,927.

SENATOR KEMP -So that under the CRAFT scheme overall, you expect a rise in the number of apprentices training in the current year, despite the recession?

MR GREER -Provision has been made for a moderate increase.

SENATOR KEMP -Given the current recession, is that likely to occur? I think it fell the previous year, did it not?

MR GREER -It did fall. As I say, the budget provision makes provision for a modest increase.

SENATOR KEMP -I am just wondering on what basis that modest increase is predicted.

MR GREER -The potential for an increase as a result of the new prevocational courses that were announced in the March 12 statement, and the possibility of increased recommencements through funding assistance provided through the March 12 package as well.

SENATOR CALVERT -Could I ask a question on the same subject of CRAFT; about the numbers assisted? There was quite a significant reduction it seems. On page 85, under the technical education rebate scheme there were 8,900 assisted , compared with a figure of 24,500 in 1989-90. Also under the ATI, you note there it is 11 percent below the assistance in 1989-90. Could you tell me whether one of the reasons for that fall off was that it was linked to the change in the payment procedures that you mentioned?

MR GREER -Yes, Senator. The technical education rebate was a subsidy that was replaced from 1 January 1988, but within the system there were a number of apprentices still eligible, or employers, for that rebate. What you are seeing there in that TER is the transitional tail of eligibility under one system phasing out and an increased take up under the ATI provisions.

SENATOR CALVERT -Right. But even so, under the ATI, that was 11 per cent below the number assisted in 1989-90. Do you have any figures in relation to the long term retention rates for those who complete traineeships?

MR GREER -On page 87, the 1990 survey of former trainees found that 90 per cent of trainees who completed their traineeships were in employment four months after completion, and that the majority of those completers, some 68 per cent, who were employed were retained by their traineeship employer. That compares favourably with the 1988 results which had an outcome of 87 per cent. Similarly, post-program monitoring conducted by the Department in the 12 months to the end of March 1991 found that 84.8 per cent of former trainees were in employment, education or training three months after completing their traineeships.

SENATOR CALVERT -Could you tell me a little about the tradeswomen on the move projects that are mentioned on page 87. It says that there were six of them, at an average cost of $22,000 per project. What are they?

MR BREWSTER -I will start with a general statement in relation to the statement that is on page 87. Part of the difficulty that that program has faced has been deciding the age at which one should target young people when they are making career decisions. If targeting is started at the age of 16 and 17, sometimes the decisions have been made a long time before that, particularly in relation to subject choice in junior secondary school which leads on to upper secondary school. The research that was undertaken was designed to give a better view-it was, in effect, a piece of market research- of where we should be focusing the program and whether, if you focused it on people who were 17 and 18, you were in fact too late.

MR GREER -The review indicated that girls in years 8, 9 and 10 be targeted through an information campaign for that element, and all States and Territories that conducted projects in 1990-91 targeted these groups.

SENATOR KEMP -What were the projects?

SENATOR CALVERT -That is what I am getting at. When you say `tradeswoman' it conjures up for me an image of a woman running around with a hammer in her hand.

DR JOHNSTON -Perhaps I could give you an illustration. It would not be unusual for a State to arrange for outstanding young women who have participated in particular trades to come together and to visit a range of schools and speak to young women about the possibilities that can be explored in those areas. That is the sort of activity that would be undertaken. That is generally the sort of approach that is taken. If you like we could provide you with more detailed--

SENATOR CALVERT -If you could. I would like to know what the numbers are and so on.

SENATOR KEMP -Were the grants made to the teachers and not to actual trades- women?

DR JOHNSTON -They would be made to the States to meet the costs of having a small group visit a number of schools in the State or produce a video for that purpose and so on. We could provide you with a statement of the activities that have been sponsored.

SENATOR CALVERT -Are you in a position yet to assess whether the projects were successful or not?

MR BREWSTER -If you take the statistics about girls entering non-traditional trades, I think you would have to say that it is successful at a low level but there really is a need to improve the willingness of the teenage girls to look at a wider range of career options. One of the reasons why some groups of girls suffer much higher rates of youth unemployment than their counterparts who are boys is because they do not look at that set of career options. The advice we get from a number of employers, particularly the group schemes that employ apprentices, is that the problem with employing female apprentices is not that the employer will not take them but rather that they are unattractive options to young girls.

If you want to widen the career opportunities for young girls, particularly those who are not destined to go on to higher education, then entry into those sorts of areas is clearly going to be important. I accept that the economic downturn makes that a bit more difficult, but in the range of opportunities, apart from hairdressing which is a trade which is almost completely female dominated, girls do not find that attractive, and the program has been designed to try to overcome that.

Getting role models to undertake visits to schools is very important. When Kylie Minogue appeared as an apprentice mechanic on Neighbours, we got more free publicity than any of our posters for `Hand a girl a spanner' could ever have done.

SENATOR CALVERT -Yes, I was going to mention that, not particularly Kylie Minogue, but from time to time you see highlighted in the press a girl with a hammer in her hand doing something that is not normally looked upon as a feminine trade. So obviously the message is getting across.

CHAIRMAN -Evaluation would have to be long term anyway, would it not, because you are looking at changing parental attitudes, which is often the difficulty.

SENATOR CALVERT -There has certainly been a bigger movement of females into the armed forces, of course, but that is another thing.

MR BREWSTER -Yes, and we are starting to have some success with the hospitality trades, particularly cheffing, which are becoming more acceptable to young girls.