Gillard’s training reform hit by blowoutPUBLISHED: 02 Jul 2012 00:05:36 | UPDATED: 02 Jul 2012 02:55:16PUBLISHED: 26 Jun 2012 PRINT EDITION: 02 Jul 2012
Personal trainer Martine McKee says most graduates in her field are poorly trained and most leave the industry very quickly. Photo: Arsineh Houspian
Mathew Dunckley and Joanna Mather
Ted Baillieu has warned other premiers that vocational training reforms Prime Minister Julia Gillard has hailed as a model for the rest of Australia have blown out Victoria’s spending by nearly $500 million and produced an avalanche of graduates from “soft” courses that have lured students with free iPads.
In a staunch defence of his government’s unpopular cuts and reshaping of the state’s training budget, the Victorian Premier said that the system was fraught with problems.
“Some of the games that get played are amazing,” Mr Baillieu told The Australian Financial Review.
“There are . . . kids being paid cash to do a course, kids being given an iPad to do a course, sporting clubs being given cash if they sent up team members to do a course.”
The basis of Victoria’s Australia-first voucher system, established in 2009, was that taxpayer funding follows students wherever they choose to undertake study in the public or private sector, and that anyone seeking to skill up is guaranteed access to vocational training.
Every other state signed up to essentially the same model at the March meeting of the Council of Australian Governments. Ms Gillard has publicly supported the concept since her time as Education and Skills minister.
Mr Baillieu backed the principle, but in a warning strongly endorsed by the teachers’ union, said implementation was treacherous.
“We have warned all of our colleagues and we warned at COAG . . . given you’re rolling out the Victorian position, be careful,” he said.
“If you don’t cap the subsidy for the service and it’s demand driven, there is bound to be a problem in a pure financial sense.”
Enrolments have exploded in Victoria, particularly in the private sector, prompting the Baillieu government to cut subsidies to a large number of courses as well as funding set aside for public TAFEs in the May state budget.
Enrolments in private courses have surged 308 per cent since 2008 to 220,608 at the end of 2011, according to official figures. This compares with just 4 per cent growth in the public TAFE system.
That growth continued in the first quarter of 2012 as private sector enrolments rose 97 per cent on the same period last year. The private sector now has greater market share than TAFE.
The surge has produced a huge blowout in the state’s training budget. Labor, which designed the system, budgeted to spend $855 million in 2011-12, but now the Baillieu government expects to spend $1.33 billion.
After the cuts, termed “savage” in some quarters, the government will spend $1.2 billion on the sector in the coming financial year.
In defence of his politically unpopular cuts, Mr Baillieu is adamant the new system would better service industry demands but would also require students to consider whether there were real job prospects after the training.
“It comes with the need for the cultural adjustment that people need to focus on training for work,” he said.
“At the base level, there are courses where there is huge demand but not much need, so there is less subsidy.”
Mr Baillieu said costly courses that were highly valued, such as apprenticeships, got increased funding under the new model and TAFEs hold the dominant position in the provision of those higher-funded courses.
Australian Education Union federal TAFE secretary Pat Forward puts the blame for the disaster in Victoria at the feet of Ms Gillard, for her key role as education minister, and the state Labor government.
“That is why it’s impossible for the Labor government to turn around and say what is going on in Victoria is nothing to do with them,” she said.
“It’s ridiculous. The structure of this system was established by [Steve] Bracks, Brumby and Gillard. The reform process has been driven absolutely by the Labor government federally.”
Ms Forward said South Australia’s system officially began operation this week, while Queensland and NSW were “poised” to unveil their schemes.
“I don’t think that any of the other states have learned anything really much from what has happened in Victoria,” she said. “That isn’t to say that they aren’t alarmed. In fact, there is a growing sense of alarm about how events have unfolded in Victoria.”
While the union had opposed the shift to private VET provision and warned of the potential for budget blowouts, Ms Forward said it was lack of regulation that had produced a crisis. TAFEs would flourish in a fair competitive environment because of the quality of their product, she said.
Victorian TAFE Association chief executive David Williams said TAFEs were being punished for the sins in the private sector.
“We agree it was necessary to pull it back, it is how they have pulled it back we are angry about,” he said.
Mr Williams said the previous government was warned that its system would lead to the exact problems now encountered.
“What they did is they went to a complete open-slather market, thinking that people would go and take up their entitlement in areas of skills shortage in order to get jobs,” he said
“What they didn’t factor in is the niche market providers . . . would go for the easy-to-deliver, cheaper courses, or those where it was very easy to attract students.”
Fitness courses are one area that has boomed. Melbourne-based personal trainer Martine McKee said most graduates were poorly trained and most left the industry swiftly.
“I have tried to hire several trainers . . . and find it very difficult to find people who are competent,” she said.
She said the advertising from course providers was misleading.
“They sell a fabulous lifestyle and easy money in a short space of time,” she said. “Do eight weeks at whatever college and earn $80 or $100 an hour. It doesn’t work like that.”
Mr Williams said the savings should have come solely through course subsidies rather than cutting base funding to TAFEs.
He said both the Brumby and Baillieu governments had been too slow to react to what was unfolding.
Australian Council of Private Education and Training chief executive Claire Field said up to 24,000 jobs would be lost in the private sector.
“Approximately half of all ACPET Victorian members teach business courses, one-quarter of them teach hospitality, and a further 10 to 15 per cent teach other courses, such as finance, where big reductions are going to be felt in terms of government funding,” Ms Field said.
Federal Skills Minister Chris Evans said it was up to states to decide how to structure their systems, but repeatedly warned the Victorian government to rein in low quality courses.
Several sources supportive of the system said other states had taken note of the issues and had attempted to address them when designing their implementation.
NSW Education Minister Adrian Piccoli said the state was still developing its response to the COAG agreement. “During this process, we have asked about the role and function of TAFE NSW as the public provider, and sought people’s opinions about loans, entitlements and competition,” he said.
The Australian Financial Review