Labour Party - Speeches

Skills Strategy and Action Plan Launch

22.07.2008

Speech notes for opening address at Industry Training Federation Conference. Soundings Theatre, Te Papa, Wellington

It's a pleasure for me to speak at this opening session of the Industry Training Federation Conference and to have the privilege of launching the new Skills Strategy Action Plan here.

This Federation, along with Business New Zealand, the Council of Trade Unions, and Government ministers and officials, played a critical role in the development of the Strategy and the Action Plan.

The role of skills development in lifting the value of our economy and thereby the returns to our workforce and firms and organisations is well understood.

But where the Strategy and Action Plan seem to me to break new ground is in explicitly linking skills development with productivity.

The point is made in the Strategy that while we have been significantly increasing our investments in our education and skills training system, we have yet to see a commensurate leap in productivity.

So this skills strategy with its focus on productivity enhancement is very timely.

I can say without a shadow of doubt that our government has a passion for skills training and has invested heavily in it.

With the commitments already made up to and including this year's Budget, the amount invested by 2010 per annum will be more than three times as great as that invested in 2000. Some time ago we passed the milestone of the number of trainees having more than doubled during our time in office.

In this year's Budget we provided for annual CPI indexation of the Industry Training Fund over four years - the first time the Fund has been adjusted by forecast CPI.

And we provided funding over four years to support development of the strategic leadership role of the ITOs - something I know this Federation is very committed to.

Together, our government, the Industry Training Federation, and our social partners - the Council of Trade Unions and Business New Zealand - share a vision for transforming our economy through innovation and higher productivity. Lifting our skills base is critical to that.

By working together, we have lifted the number of trainees in industry by more than 100,000 a year - from a little over 81,000 in 2000 to over 185,000 last year.

In that same period, the number of National Certificates achieved by trainees has grown by 371 per cent - from over 6,000 a year to over 29,000.

And just as government's investment in skills training has risen sharply, so has industry's - up from $24 million in 2000 to $65.5 million last year.

From the outset our government has seen attracting young people into skills training as a high priority.

That's why Modern Apprenticeships was developed as a flagship policy. With over 4,500 graduates, and over 11,500 Modern Apprentices currently in training, this popular scheme has exceeded our expectations.

All this investment must continue, but it's also time to take a more strategic approach to skills development, both in terms of enabling more young people to be in a position to access it, and through upskilling the existing workforce. After all, eighty per cent of those working now will still be in the workforce in 2020.

Parallel to the consultation on the Skills Strategy which this Federation has been so involved in driving forward, another strategy has also been developed and consulted on.

It is Schools Plus - a bold plan to lift the education and skills attainment of teenagers and ensure their involvement in the system for longer.

The long tail of teenage underachievement in education fails not only the young people concerned, but also limits the potential of our economy and society.

With close to thirty per cent of teenagers leaving school before the age of seventeen; around forty per cent not achieving NCEA Level Two; around 25 per cent not achieving NCEA Level One; and some ten per cent having no qualification at all to show for their time at school, our country has a problem.

The young people who make up those statistics generally lack the entry level skills which mark them out for apprenticeship training. With motivation and support for remedial work in the foundation skills, they may get a second chance later, but we need to support them to do better the first time round.

Doing so will require us to use all the flexibility which exists in our qualifications system and the new New Zealand Curriculum for schools - and to draw on the many examples of best practice in doing so which can be found in our school system.

We can learn from the many positive Gateway programmes, where schools and businesses have worked together to give senior school students opportunities to work and gain qualifications.

A youth apprenticeship pilot for younger high school students is being piloted this year for its potential to make the school experience more positive and relevant to students who would otherwise tune out.

Our aim is to see our young people in education and skills training of some kind until the age of eighteen, in order to build a stronger base for ongoing learning, including through the many opportunities Industry Training Organisations work to provide.

The new Skills Strategy and Action Plan picks up from where Schools Plus ends, with its focus on upskilling those already in the workforce.

It sets out five key goals and ten key actions to guide the way we use skills to transform the economy.

These goals and the Action Plan which will advance them have been refined and developed by an extensive consultation process which achieved a broad consensus on the way ahead.

Members of this Federation were part of the independently facilitated public meetings which took part in 23 locations across New Zealand.

There was also the opportunity for contributions to be made via the Skills Strategy website, and there was targeted consultation with a wide range of other stakeholders.

The Action Plan includes ten measures to get started on in 2008 which will support the achievement of the five overarching goals over the longer term.

Many of these actions co-ordinate what is already happening in many workplaces, and will implement these as best-practice across others. Some actions will have a longer lead-in time as we must build the capacity to implement them.

The objective here is to boost the capacity of managers to develop and use workers' skills.

But for workers to be able to participate effectively, they need the opportunity to acquire foundation skills. It's estimated that some 800,000 New Zealanders need enhanced literacy language and numeracy to be prepared for the workplaces of the future.

To support the actions in this strategy, the Government has made a major commitment in this year's Budget of $168 million over four years to support the acquisition of those basic skills.

The Action Plan includes four actions to create a better match between workers' skills and industry and regional needs. This involves getting better information across the board, from people looking for a new career opportunity to national skills plans for industries.

The tertiary reforms have provided the foundations for a lot of this work, using both ITO strategic leadership plans, and regional facilitation statements developed by Institutes of Technology and Polytechnics. Our government is pleased to see the steps taken by the tertiary education sector and other stakeholders including this Federation, to support the implementation of the tertiary reforms.

I would also like to acknowledge today the contribution to the reforms of the outgoing Chief Executive of the Tertiary Education Commission, Janice Shiner, who heads back to the shores of England at the end of this month.

Over time we will build an invaluable resource of skills information by strengthening and expanding the skills training tools of the tertiary sector and industry.

We will also seek to make them more accessible. One area which ITOs, polytechnics and other tertiary stakeholders have identified as an area for work is the qualifications system. The Action Plan recognises this need, and a review of diploma and certificate qualifications begins in October.

I understand that ITOs and Polytechnics are also discussing areas of qualification co-operation with my colleague Hon Pete Hodgson, and I encourage you to continue working together on this.

The final actions relate to something that this government has consistently focused on - our young people. Supporting them to make good career decisions and ensuring that they can continue to learn throughout their careers are critical for building the workplaces of the future.

While I have touched only briefly on the Actions included in the Strategy document we are launching today, you can be assured that thanks to your input and that of many others, it is comprehensive. There are also areas for further exploration which take into account the feedback received during the consultation process, and I envisage that these will inform future action plans as well.

A long-term and consistent commitment will be required by all social partners, and by individual firms and workers, to realise the potential of our workplaces.

I know that the Industry Training Federation and our social partners in Business New Zealand and the CTU share our government's commitment to the Skills Strategy.

That's important, because the consistent support of all of us is needed to drive this strategy forward.

Through the Skills Strategy Forum we have jointly committed to a partnership approach.

We all acknowledge that many of the changes needed to lift productivity through skill enhancement are beyond the reach of direct government intervention, and that ownership of the strategy by industry is critical to its success.

I am delighted to see that this Federation is placing the need for a high quality industry training system on the agenda for discussion during this year's election campaign.

You have identified your own top five priorities, headed by a recommendation that all political parties sign up to the Skills Strategy.

As your partner in developing it, the Labour-led Government warmly endorses that.

You recommend to all parties a review of qualifications systems, with a strong emphasis on national qualifications and standards for all government funded vocational education and training.

Work on this is beginning through the Skills Strategy's Action Plan's initiative to undertake a targeted review of the qualifications system, focusing initially on diploma and certificate levels.

You call for simplification of the skills training system, which has merit and which we should have a dialogue about.

The same applies to your proposal for ITOs to have more say on what skills development is funded. I see this as consistent with the direction of the Tertiary Education Reforms, and with our government's support for developing the strategic leadership role of ITOs.

Your final recommendation looks for a proportion of tertiary education spending to be earmarked for industry training, as well as having allocations backed by hard evidence of industry need and able to link the investment in training to productivity gains.

While I can't commit today to a fixed proportion of the overall spend being allocated, I do agree that the quality of that spend is critical and that we in government must work very closely with you to achieve that.

I believe that government and the Industry Training Federation share a high level of ambition for skills training. Lifting the numbers involved is not enough on its own - it's lifting our capacity to harness skills to drive productivity and competitiveness which is important.

I pledge the Labour-led Government's willingness to work with you towards that end.

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