Chisholm rally and ABC report highlight need to back TAFE

Rachel Power

Hundreds of staff, students and members of the local Frankston community joined together yesterday at Chisholm TAFE to rally against the TAFE cuts.

A delegation also presented a strongly worded letter to local Member for Frankston Geoff Shaw. Pinned to the outside wall of the minister's electorate office, the letter urged Shaw to support his local community by demanding that Premier Baillieu stop squandering public money on private, shonky providers and redirect it toward quality TAFE providers.

The letter noted that government spending on private training has risen by 400%, while TAFE has attracted a mere 4% in added funding over the same period.

Peter Malone, president of the AEU Chisholm sub-branch, said the event proved a "very successful lunchtime rally, with between 100 and 200 in the march to the MP's office for the letter presentation, and twice that number at the pre-march sausage sizzle."

Visit TAFE4All on facebook to see the photos from the rally.

Read the coverage in the Frankston Leader here.

Also yesterday, ABC TV's 7.30 Report screened a damning report on the extreme scams private RTOs are getting away with under the current deregulated VET system.

The program particularly focused on the dodgy practices of Skill Training Victoria — apparently Victoria's second largest training body after TAFE. And yet the Victorian Registration and Qualifications Authority claims that the level of fraud and negligence shown in the report "will not be detected through routine audit activity".

We cannot stand by and let TAFE funding be slashed while millions of taxpayer dollars are being thrown at shonky RTOs rorting the system and ripping off Victorian students. No matter what your political agenda, the current situation makes no social and economic sense.

As CFMEU national secretary Dave Noonan told the 7.30 Report, "Everybody ought to be outraged about a situation which sells our young Australians short, which puts people in a situation where they've got hopes and dreams and expectations of the future in the industry, which are shattered.