Mr RANDALL (9:54 AM) —One of the most significant and popular commitments of the Howard government in the run-up to the 9 October election last year was to build technical colleges all around Australia. In Western Australia we are to receive two of these magnificent innovations on behalf of the government. I, along with the member for Hasluck, will be fighting for one of these technical colleges to be located within our region. To put it into perspective, every one of the 15 federal electorates in Western Australia wants one of these technical colleges placed within their electorate, because they are very popular ways of providing training and further skilling the work force. That is why all members, of every political persuasion, look forward to having a technical college located in their electorate.

The electorate that I serve, Canning, is very short on tertiary education and training skills. This puts into perspective much of the criticism by the Australia Labor Party about education. Both at state and federal levels, the area that I represent has been very poorly served in terms of training and education facilities, yet in a bipartisan way we are now working strongly to achieve a technical college for our locality. The Armadale City Council and the Armadale Redevelopment Authority have approached me in the most positive way to get behind this initiative for the Armadale region. The Gosnells City Council—whose area I share with the member for Hasluck, Stuart Henry—is also working cooperatively to endeavour to have one of these technical colleges located in this region.

The fact is that the eastern and south-eastern corridors of Perth have been poorly served. There is the Swan TAFE in our region; it is a small TAFE and it does not cover the skills that we are talking about. The region is crying out for this sort of facility and we can provide an early walk-up start towards the infrastructure for a technical college. There are schools which are under capacity which could be converted into such a facility. I am putting on record today that I will be working hard, along with the member for Hasluck, to see the delivery of such a fine federal government initiative for the people of Canning and surrounding localities. (Time expired)

The DEPUTY SPEAKER (Hon. IR Causley)—Order! In accordance with standing order 193 the time for members’ statements has concluded.