Ms LEY (Farrer—Deputy Leader of the Opposition) (09:09): It is a real privilege to be standing here as the shadow minister for skills and training. Some may know that, as Deputy Leader of the Opposition, I get to pick my portfolio, and I picked skills because I understand that skills is a critical area of policy for the future of our nation and for the future of our young people. When I finished school, I couldn't think of anything worse than sitting in an office, so I went to my local training provider and pursued a vocational qualification in flying. It changed my life. That is why I love skills. There is nothing more motivating than meeting the next generation of workers who are either on the tools on a worksite or in a TAFE or in school classrooms. National Skills Week is a reminder for the nation to focus on the status and impact of vocational learning. I have a quote I want to read to the House: For too long, success for young Australians has been equated to finishing year 12 and obtaining a university degree. As a country, we pay a significant economic and social cost for this attitude. Of all the students who go into university this year, one third will not finish their university studies. Yet we face critical skill shortages in the trades, including in building and construction, metals, manufacturing and automotive. That quote could have been lifted straight out of the pages of any newspaper today, but they are not my words. They are the words of the Howard government in 2004. Twenty years on, the stigma of vocational education and the cultural imbalance with university remains. We have to change that stigma, and National Skills Week is a part of that effort. As I've said before, the reality is that Australia will face a forever skills shortage unless we look at long-term reform that supports more Australians to get into skills earlier in their lives. With the rise of artificial intelligence, I think we need to be honest with our young people. A university degree is not the sure bet it once was. If you want real job security, a trade today is perhaps your safest bet. So, this National Skills Week, I want all Australians to think about how we make the big changes we need to get more young people to buy into vocational education. I welcome the comments made by the jobs and skills commissioner, Barney Glover, at the Press Club, highlighting that we need to have a stronger focus on post-16 training rather than just post-school training. I've been saying for some time now that I think we need to have a national conversation about getting skills back into schools. According to the official data released in recent weeks, just 19,310 students were undertaking school based apprenticeships or traineeships, and that is down seven per cent from 2022. We are going backwards. Out of the 1.6 million secondary students across Australia, just one per cent are undertaking school based apprenticeships or traineeships. The truth is that we have taken skills out of schools, and we need to look at how to bring them back in. We do not have a pipeline of skills in schools that can boost our manufacturers and construction workforce or develop the critical skills we need to support strategic efforts like AUKUS and nuclear energy. In Germany, they have skills in schools, and 50 per cent of all German school leavers undertake vocational training. In France, another global manufacturing nation, they have skills in schools, with around 23 per cent of students moving into upper secondary education entering a vocational high school. This Skills Week, I ask everyone across the sector to really look at structural ways of lifting the status of vocational training and the pipeline of skilled workers and bring them forward. I want to hear your views. I would also like to take this opportunity to formally welcome the new Minister for Skills and Training to his post, and I have wished his predecessor, the member for Gorton, well. Like his predecessor, he too chose the university route to post-school learning. That is okay, but I would just warn him to remain mindful of the fact that many on this side of the House, including me, have spent time in these training institutions as students, as trainers and as operators before he tries to throw stones at the coalition in his new role. Credibility is everything in this business, and Slater and Gordon isn't known for building houses. I've made a fair bit of commentary about the new minister for skills, and I'm pushing him because I want him to lift his game. I'm not going to allow underperformance in this vital portfolio. So this National Skills Week, the new minister has some serious questions to answer. I note he hasn't fronted the media yet but just given a few controlled speeches, like today. I would urge him to stick his head up out of the talking points and front some journalists soon. When he does, the test for this minister is to explain exactly how many of those fee-free TAFE courses have actually resulted in a qualification. Labor likes to claim they have delivered 500,000 fee-free TAFE places, but how many have delivered a skilled worker? Estimates of TAFE completions indicate the failure or non-completion rate could be as high as 55 to 60 per cent across these courses. Some in the training sector have indicated some courses could have rates as high as 70 to 90 per cent of noncompletion. In Victoria, just one per cent of those who registered for a free certificate IV in plumbing successfully completed their training. So I call on the minister to confirm exactly how many of Labor's 500,000 fee-free TAFE courses have resulted in a real qualification being completed and delivered to a newly qualified worker. I do not make these requests to talk down TAFE—I am a big supporter of TAFE—but I do it because we have invested a great deal of money in this program and Australians expect results. Given taxpayers have invested $1.5 billion in this program, Minister Giles must provide a comprehensive update on Labor's fee-free TAFE program, including how many cancellations or noncompletions there have been across the 500,000 enrolments. This National Skills Week we must also have an honest conversation about the state of Aussie skills. The latest data released by the National Centre for Vocational Education Research confirms Australia has lost over 85,300 apprentices and trainees from the national training pipeline since the Albanese government took office—a loss of one in five. Trade apprentices in training hit record highs in the final months of the coalition government, and, as of June 2022, there were 429,000 apprentices and trainees in training and 277,900 commencements. The latest data shows apprentices and trainees in training dropped to 343,640 in December 2023. The SPEAKER: I'll just say that the member's time is concluding. Ms LEY: As I understand it, the normal rules of the House allow the response to go for an unlimited time, in the same way that the minister— The SPEAKER: No, that's not the case. You may conclude your remarks, but the same time limit that the minister gets is afforded to the shadow minister. Ms LEY: In conclusion, I hope this National Skills Week we see a turning point. Who knows, this new minister may just be up for it, but time will tell. I will be watching closely. I do wish this minister well in his new role, and I want him to succeed. Australians are counting on him to step up. We all want to see the Australian skills system get back on track, and this National Skills Week I want to thank everyone who is working so hard to do just that.