Mr BROUGH(11.51 a.m.) —We have heard the comments of the member for Werriwa (Mr Latham) and the member for Batman (Mr Martin Ferguson), who refers to the Minister for Schools, Vocational Education and Training (Dr Kemp), one of the most capable ministers in this portfolio this country has ever seen, as Dr Doolittle. I think it would be more accurate to refer to the member for Batman, as he is a former President of the ACTU, as Mr Job-Destroy—something which he continues to try to do today. He and his colleagues obviously do not realise that the wider sector of the youth in our community are out there looking desperately for methods to get themselves into the work force because of an education system which has been failing them.

I am a member of the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Employment, Education and Training and, as part of that committee, we have been undertaking an inquiry into the constraints of employing young people. Some of the things we have heard have been very disturbing because, as those opposite and most of the community would be aware, 70 per cent of young people going to high school do not go on to a tertiary education, do not go on to university. We have heard time and time again that they feel the school system is gearing them for only one thing—that is, university—and, if they cannot get into university, they have no hope.

I am very privileged to be involved with a group of people in Caboolture in my electorate of Longman who have an organisation up and running called CASILS, the Caboolture area school industry links scheme. This is an innovative program which has only commenced in the last few months. It has seen business working together with schools, private trainers as well as the public sector, in the form of TAFE, to ensure that we integrate vocational education into the schools and give young people the very best opportunity to progress into the work force.

The previous government—the Labor Party—left this country with apprenticeships at a 30-year low. The member for Batman, as the former President of the ACTU, stands up in this place and waxes lyrical about how we need training and how desperately we need to have a work force which is able to meet the needs of the Australian consumer and the workplace. What we find is that the very base which skilled workers come from—apprenticeships—is at a three-decade low, and the Labor Party did nothing to assist or turn the situation around.

We are not taking money from vocational education but ensuring that the money that is spent is spent wisely and to the benefit of all those students who will not be going on to university. We are ensuring that the appalling lack of apprentices right across the board is addressed. The fact is we have a lack of skilled metalworkers and skilled people in the hospitality industry as far as chefs are concerned. We have heard that in Mount Isa they cannot get apprentices. In fact, MIM have told me personally that they were only able to fill half the apprenticeships they had available in 1997. Why is that?

Mr Deputy Speaker, I put it to you that it is because the vocational education system applied by the previous government failed the young people of Australia. We need businesses, industry, industry leaders, the private and public sector training systems and the schools to work together. It will only be then that we will start to address the problem of vocational education needs in the schools.

If I can just talk briefly about the CASILS project, we have seen young people being given an opportunity to work one day a week in a workplace so that they understand both the rights and the responsibilities they have in a workplace. Some have already gone on to traineeships and apprenticeships as a result of the work that has been undergone in Caboolture in the last few months. What has impressed me is that the business community have not just supported this; they have become almost fanatical in their approach to wanting this scheme to progress so they can employ young people. This is a great turnaround, and it is a turnaround that has been fostered by a government policy which sees the need for vocational education to take a proper role in society.

One of the private schools in Brisbane—Nudgee college, which has a very long history—has also seen the need to embrace vocational education. Through its dedication, it has seen a growth in the number of young people getting jobs in that sector and not just going on to university. Nudgee is catering not just for the 30 per cent who go to university but for 100 per cent of its students, including the 70 per cent who must find jobs in the workplace.

So the picture that is painted is that we have to move away from a system that has failed young people and that has failed the wider community in not allowing us to have the skills base that we need to take the opportunities that Australia offers us. Isn't it appalling that we have to go overseas to find skilled people to fill jobs in Australia? The wider community gets very upset about that, and understandably so. But we have to do that because the system that we have had in place for many years has failed to bring through those people with the skills necessary to fill positions in the industries that Australia has. Unless we turn this around and we start to put vocational education into the schools in such a way that it meets industry needs, that it is proactive rather than reactive and that it uses the resources of the public and private sector—whether it be TAFEs or private providers—then we are not going to be able to progress.

The previous speaker, the member for Werriwa, mentioned ANTA. ANTA actually has the task at the moment of sifting through a number of trial schemes to come up with skills centres. Skills centres allow for technology to be placed into schools so they are able to increase the vocational education ability of the attending students. I am very much a supporter of this entire project. Once again, it is a demonstration of the government's commitment to vocational education and also its dedication to the knowledge that we must immerse both traditional and new skills in technology. This has been very well done by John Paul College on the south side of Brisbane, which have a success rate in placing their students approaching 100 per cent. They do not just have computers in the school; they have actually immersed every subject in technology.

Once again, CASILS have a very innovative idea. They have put up a submission which would enable six schools, each with a particu lar voc ed bent—including plastics, mechanical works, agriculture and three other groups—to allow each student in those six schools to access, through technology, much of the information that is needed to fulfil those subjects. This means we get a sixfold return on the physical equipment and industry products that we are putting into each school, rather than just allowing those few students in the immediate catchment area to benefit from them.

These are just some of the few ways in which we in the government are very deliberately addressing the needs of vocational education. We are listening to business. We are trying to respond to the fact that we do not have enough apprentices and that we have a skills base which has deteriorated under Labor and has not been assisted by their policy of quick turnaround courses. We are embedding technology, training and vocational education in the combined industry, schools and training providers so we have a coordinated approach to overcoming the problem.

Only through the innovative ideas that this government is putting in place—supported by the increase in finances in this budget and the redirection of some of those funds into the more needy areas of vocational education such as apprenticeships, and by allowing both traineeships and apprenticeships to involve education and training at the one time—will we start to address the long-term problems of Australia's lack of a skills base.

I commend the minister for the fabulous work that he is doing in a very difficult area. This area requires more than just rhetoric; it requires answers. Very shortly, a report will be tabled from the inquiry of the employment, education and training committee. I believe that many of the messages that come from the report will support what the government has been undertaking and will continue to undertake to give young people in Australia more than just a fair go—to give them the kick-start they so desperately need to get into the work force through vocational education.