Karen Andrews (McPherson, Liberal Party, Minister for Industry) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Mr Speaker. That has given me the opportunity to point out that when Labor were last in office, in their last year, they oversaw nine successive cuts to employer incentives in vocational education—$1.2 billion in cuts. Those opposite were responsible for bringing vocational education and training in this country to its knees, and we are the ones that have methodically gone about rebuilding vocational education and training in this sector, starting with the announcement of the Joyce review about 12 months ago and then announcing its recommendations just in April this year. That was on top of the investment of $585 million.

I'm about to do a Jacinda Ardern. I'm going to do a run through of our achievements, and I'm going to do it for the last seven months. Let's go. We have appointed and announced the Interim National Skills Commissioner, Adam Boynton. We've appointed and announced the National Careers Ambassador, Scott Cam. We have the review of the Australian Apprenticeships National Skills Needs List underway. We have commenced nationwide consultations with stakeholders to design the National Skills Commission, the National Careers Institute and Skills Organisation pilots. We've got agreement on and announced reforms to the Australian Skills Quality Authority. We've announced a Skills Organisation pilot in the mining sector. We've announced Industry Training Hubs—including in the member for Herbert's electorate in Townsville—so that we can build connections between local industries and schools. We've commenced the Productivity Commission's review of the National Agreement for Skills and Workforce Development. We hosted the inaugural COAG skills—

Opposition members interjecting—

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