Page 1609 - Week 06 - Tuesday, 17 May 1994
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The other reason why this Bill has missed its time is that their mates across the other side of the lake have pulled the rug out from under them. Only this month they annulled, at least temporarily, the training levy that has been imposed on industry up until now. So, they have missed their time. They should have recognised that and pulled the Bill. They would have been occupying the high ground. They are occupying the low ground at the moment.
Mrs Grassby and then Mr Lamont defended this Bill on the basis that this is going to increase quality in apprenticeship training. The point has been made by my colleagues already that there has been plenty of money for this purpose. There is $500,000 sitting there unused. The reason why it has not been used is that there is no opportunity for additional apprentice training in the ACT. The training of apprentices has been taken over by the industry because individual corporations could not sustain it, for a number of reasons. One reason is that some of them went out of business and their apprentices were left bereft; so the industry itself took over the training of apprentices, and they are spending all the money they can spend right now. Then along comes this Government and it says, "We are going to take some more money from the employers and we are going to improve quality".
How are we going to improve quality? Mr Lamont gave the game away. Mr Lamont says, "We are going to take first year apprentices and train them to sit in the boardroom. We are going to give them all the management skills. We do not want them to be trained as apprentice chippies; we want them to be trained to move immediately into the boardroom. That is what apprenticeship training is about". What codswallop! What rubbish! We can easily see how members of the Labor Party get to sit here as Ministers. The party takes them on as first year apprentices and pushes them straight into the board job. That is how they get to sit here. They are neither qualified to be apprentices nor qualified to be board members. That is why we have the calibre of government that we have.
Mr Berry, in his usual 1930s debate fashion, said, "The Liberal Party thinks that all taxes are bad". The corollary of that is that Mr Berry thinks that all taxes are good. I do not agree with that. I would say any time that a dollar in my pocket is better than five dollars in Rosemary Follett's pocket. Mr Berry did not put forward any argument to suggest that taxation is good. He just said, "The Liberal Party says that taxation is bad - QED; the Liberal Party is bad". It does not follow.
Madam Speaker, we do not need this particular Bill. It is past its time. The Government should have given up the debate before it even began. There are some very interesting quirks about it. For example, under the present arrangements, decisions about how the money that is available is spent are made by the Minister. The Minister, under this Bill, will abdicate that responsibility. He will hand over this responsibility to an organisation that does not exist yet which is to be called the Construction Industry Training Fund Board. This money will be spent by that board in accordance with the funding framework, which does not exist either. We are setting aside a perfectly good system that exists now, where accountability - - -
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