Local NSW Teachers Federation members and South Coast Labour Council Executive members met with ALP Federal candidate Fiona Phillips and local ALP member Leanne Atkinson on Tuesday 6th March.
Rob Long, Teachers Federation Organiser, told The Beagle "The NSW Governments Smart and Skilled policy continues to have negative impacts on regional and rural TAFE colleges."
"Federation members have experienced the impacts of Smart and Skilled with over 5000 permanent NSW TAFE teachers and support staff losing their jobs. On the South Coast and Riverina regions over 100 teachers and support staff have been cut."
" The Federation believes in the coming weeks Moruya TAFE will lose at least two permanent head teachers through redundancy. The Federation is concerned that there will be no Head Teachers located at Moruya on a permanent basis." "At Bega TAFE another two Head Teaching positions will be deleted. Federation is hopeful no teachers will be made redundant. Federation is not clear if any support staff will be made redundant, with the final decision will not be known until April."
Rob advised that it was reported last week that the NSW State government plans to spend over $50 million on redundancies for TAFE employees.
"The Smart and Skilled funding cuts are also having a detrimental impact on the completion rates for NSW Trainees and apprentices."
"The latest Auditor General’s Report on Industry December 2017 states that completion rates for trainees and apprentices continues to decline. The NSW course completion of apprentices and trainees within the expected timeframe has declined from 62% in 2016 to 59% in 2017.
"It is clear that the failed Smart and Skilled policy has been detrimental to student completions and to permanent jobs in rural and regional NSW." he concluded
