Stärke Advanced Manufacturing Group acquire Gadac Plastics Stärke-AMG has added plastics to its strengths in precision metals manufacturing through its acquisition of GADAC Plastic Injection, a long-standing Australian family-owned plastic specialist business. GADAC provides a ‘design to finished product’ service for the manufacture of plastic product, specialising in plastic injection-moulding, product design and assembly. The…
By Pi-Shen Seet, Edith Cowan University and Janice Jones, Flinders University Australia continues to grapple with acute skills shortages. Businesses are struggling to find workers with the skills they need. Meanwhile, workers struggle to get jobs because of the mismatch between available training and occupations. There is currently a high-profile debate about the university sector’s…
NSW’s first hydrogen bus trial underway on Central Coast NSW’s first hydrogen-powered electric bus hit the streets of the Central Coast on Monday. “These hydrogen buses are the first step in growing our green hydrogen industry which is estimated to grow the NSW economy by an extra $600 million each year from 2030 onwards and…
The federal government is calling for feedback from state and territory governments, employer bodies, unions, tertiary providers and community organisations on the shape of the permanent Jobs and Skills Australia (JSA) body. The Minister for Skills and Training, Brendan O’Connor MP, released a discussion paper today, saying that Jobs and Skills Australia was a key…
Federal and State and Territory Skills and Training Ministers met last week to progress a range of key vocational education and training reform and workforce matters. The Ministers issued a joint statement, below, which sets out their priorities and aspirations for vocational education and training. Skills Ministers’ Priorities Skills Ministers discussed the continued imperative for…
The extent of the Australian and state and territory governments’ boost in spending on vocational education and training (VET) during the Covid-19 pandemic has become clear in new figures released by the National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER). Governments spent $10.4 billion on VET in 2021, according to the report Government funding of VET…
Apprenticeship numbers are continuing to increase in Australia as industry recovers from the extraordinary effects on business operations and investment in training through the Covid-19 pandemic. According to the National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER), there were 387,830 apprentices and trainees in-training as at 31 March 2022, an increase of 17.1 percent from 31…
Days taken off work by employees for mental health reasons have jumped 19 per cent in the past three years as the covid pandemic continues to take its toll on workplaces, according to a new study. The research by leading Workers’ Compensation insurer, Allianz Australia also found that 42 per cent of surveyed employees and…
Australia needs a renewed effort to address the systematic barriers preventing greater diversity in our science and technology sectors, something made clear from the 2022 edition of the Australian Government’s STEM Equity Monitor The data shows women as a proportion of those working in STEM-qualified jobs grew by two percent to 15 percent in 2021,…
The completion rate for apprentices and trainees who commenced training in 2017 decreased to 55.7 percent, down by 1.2 percentage points from those commencing in 2016, according to the latest data from the National Centre for Vocational Education Research (NCVER). Completion and attrition rates for apprentices and trainees 2021 reports on the completion rates for…
