VET News

COAG Agrees to Urgent Set of National Actions

The Council of Australian Governments (COAG) Skills Council (the Council) held its third meeting on 3 April 2020.  

The Council agreed to move forward in actioning three key priority areas:

1. Critical skills and workforce availability.  Significant disruptions to national training has been noted by the Council, and the potential loss of capacity within the VET sector has been acknowledged.  As the COVID-19 pandemic deepens, short-term gaps will emerge in our workforce.  The Council agrees that new training will be needed for these sectors.
2. Provider viability.  The Council agreed to implement measures to support TAFE, public and private providers to remain viable during the COVID-19 pandemic.  TAFEs and some public providers have already started to transition to online delivery.  Publicly funded private providers can expect greater flexibility for delivery to support RTO viability whilst delivering critical training.  Private RTOs will additionally have access to assistance under Commonwealth and state and territory COVID-19 business support measures.
3. Supporting students.  The Council agreed that the focus should be ensuring as many VET students as possible have support to continue their training in the event that their training providers close, either temporarily or permanently.

In addition to the three key priority areas discussed, the Council also deliberated the ongoing work on the COAG VET Reform Roadmap.  The Roadmap remains central to creating a resilient and responsive national training system.

For more information, you can view the original Communique.

Date posted Apr 9, 2020