Hon Steven Joyce
Minister for Tertiary Education, Skills & Employment
1 November 2012 Media Statement

Further $28m approved for Skills for Canterbury

The Government is committing an extra $28 million to maintain the expanded training pipeline for trades people for the Canterbury rebuild, Tertiary Education, Skills and Employment Minister Steven Joyce announced today.
“Over the next few years, Christchurch will need thousands of builders, plumbers, landscapers, electricians and engineers. The Government’s funding of trades training under the Skills for Canterbury programme is helping meet this demand,” Mr Joyce says.

In 2011 under the $42 million Skills for Canterbury contingency, the Government drew down $8 million for trades training initiatives including the Māori and Pasifika programmes nationwide.

In addition to this, $16.7 million of additional funding was sourced from TEC baselines, and $11.7 million was reprioritised by ITPs to trades training from other programmes.

“The total $36.4 million in funding to date has provided 1187 additional training places in 2011 and 2660 in 2012.

“The extra $28 million will ensure that additional trades training and student support provided in 2011 and 2012 can be maintained in 2013,” Mr Joyce says.

“In total $36.8 million has now been committed from the $42 million Skills for Canterbury contingency.

“It is crucial that we have sufficient skilled trades people trained and available to help in the rebuilding of Christchurch and this funding is an important means of increasing these numbers.

“The Government’s infrastructure programme detailed in the Building Infrastructure progress report underlines the contribution the Government is making to the training sector and to supporting jobs.

“Investing in quality infrastructure and in skills training will benefit New Zealand now and in the future.

“I strongly encourage anyone who is interested in learning one of these trades, or up skilling in their existing trade, to contact their local training provider and find out what opportunities are available to them.”

List of significant jobs from Government’s public infrastructure programme
• Nearly 2000 in roll-out of ultra-fast broadband
• 2700 in the construction of hospitals in Auckland and the Waikato
• An estimated 1000 over the next four years on the Waterview Motorway connection
• 1000 on the Waikato Expressway
• Up to 240 on the Tauranga Eastern Link
• 1585 on the Transpower grid upgrade
• 255 on electrification of Auckland rail
• An expected 1300 for the horizontal infrastructure rebuild in Christchurch


ENDS

© Scoop Media

Public Address Link:
A (Sweary) Analysis Of Urgency Abuse And
The Consititution

Keith Ng: You’re looking at the Regulatory Impact Statement (RIS) for the Public Health and Disability Amendment Bill. Basically, the courts said that the Government had to pay family members who looked after people with disabilities (because not doing so was discriminatory), so the Government passed this law to say: “Yeah nah.”

The RIS isn’t just redacted for the public – it was redacted for MPs. *Parliament* voted on this, with all the relevant facts blacked out.

Sure, it’s understandable, right? If you’re passing a law that’s really dodgy, you don’t want advice from civil servants saying “uh, this is pretty illegal” to be public. But actually, that’s not really a problem here, because in the same piece of legislation, THEY SAID THEY CAN’T BE TAKEN TO COURT. More>>