[Greens-Media] Media Release: Deal robs TAFE of inquiry voice

[John Kaye]

Deal robs TAFE of inquiry voice

Media release: 15 December 2015

Despite powerful evidence that privatisation is driving NSW TAFE to the brink of collapse, an Upper House inquiry has only recommended window dressing reforms to the Baird government's skills funding market, according to Greens NSW MP John Kaye.

(NSW Legislative Council General Purpose Standing Committee 6 'Vocational Education and Training in New South Wales", 15 December 2015, http://j.mp/GPSC6VET1512. See attached for a list of the committee's recommendations and John's dissenting statement)

Dr Kaye said: "The evidence from students, teachers, community members and unions was overwhelming.

"Unless the Baird government acts now to protect TAFE from unlimited competition with profit-focused private providers, it faces a limited future.

"Submissions and testimony made it clear that NSW was following the same disastrous path as Victoria where TAFE has become a bit player, confined to the margins of a dysfunctional and corrupted training market.

"Despite the calls for help, the Liberal and Christian Democrat dominated committee ignored the needs of TAFE for secure funding.

"Christian Democrat Upper House MP and chair Paul Green sided with the government to ensure that the Smart and Skilled training market continues to undermine TAFE without any limits on how much of the total state government training budget can be privatised.

"Each year more public funding is stripped from TAFE and put into the competitive market, where TAFE has to face up to low-cost, low-integrity private providers to survive.

"It is par for the course in NSW politics for government back-benchers to ignore evidence and run cover for their party's policy and the minister implementing.

"However, it is much harder to understand how Mr Green could have heard all that evidence without responding to the urgent needs of TAFE.

"In what looks a lot like a deal between the Christian Democrats and the Baird government, only rural and regional TAFE colleges are to be protected from unlimited competition.

"While this will bring some short term relief for communities outside Sydney, Newcastle and Wollongong, in the long term there is little future for any TAFE college in a system that is being squeezed to the edge of existence in the city.

"Paul Green might feel like he has pulled off a clever deal but he has deserted students in Western Sydney, the Illawarra and the Hunter and he has given false hope to his rural constituency.

"The Committee's recommendation of increased funding for students with disability would be welcome.

"However, as long as TAFE is denied a secure budget, there will be pressure to minimise additional support for students with special needs.

"Students with additional needs will inevitably suffer in a competitive market dominated by providers who are driven by maximising profits and who have little interest in the additional costs.

"The Committee recommended that private providers be given access to TAFE buildings and facilities.

"This would inevitably result in the wholesale deception of students who attend a course run by a private provider in a TAFE building.

"Leasing was the mechanism used by former Queensland Premier Campbell Newman to strip the public system in that state of its assets and make it even more vulnerable to marginalisation and privatisation.

"Paul Green voted to turn this inquiry into a lost opportunity for TAFE.

"He has betrayed the hundreds of TAFE teachers, students and community members who in good faith shared their experiences to this inquiry in the belief that we would take them seriously and come up with a lasting solution.

"Instead of calling the government to account for privatising skills education, he has effectively given the Liberals and Nationals a free pass to continue down the road of undermining TAFE," Dr Kaye said.

For more information: John Kaye 0407 195 455

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John Kaye
Greens NSW MP

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