The federal government is doing nothing to improve the
transition of young people from school to work and is obsessed with
creating ivy league-style universities instead of jobs for disadvantaged
youths.
Australia: Government failing young
people
That's the verdict of the chief author of a report
that has found almost half a million young people are at risk of
long-term disadvantage because of problems bridging the gap between
school and full-time work.
In a scathing assessment of the Howard government's
response to the problem, report coordinator John Spierings said the
prime minister had ignored advice he himself had asked for.
(Former youth taskforce chairman) David Eldridge, in
a report that was personally commissioned by the PM four years ago,
recommended that there be a national commitment to young people, he
said. He recommended that the state and Commonwealth governments work
together to achieve a national target for educational retainment and
that we equip young people with all the necessary means to enable them
to make a successful move into the labour market.
Now that has not happened.
Dr Spierings, from the independent, not-for-profit
body Dusseldorp Skills Forum, said this was not only hurting the youths
themselves and would for the rest of their lives it was also hurting
the country and the economy.
Those people are likely to have difficulty making
consumer choices and they often have health and justice issues
associated with their lack of capacity in the labour market, he said.
So there's a national cost to all of that and a productivity loss.
Dr Spierings said while the government was attempting
to make its universities world class through its controversial funding
shake-up, people at the other end of the spectrum could not even find
apprenticeships. It's not just about whether we can compete with
Harvard, he said. It's about whether we can get a kid from the western
suburbs into a trade apprenticeship that's going to equip them with
skills for the rest of their lives.
The report, entitled How Young People are Faring 2003,
found 15 per cent of teenagers and 23 per cent of young adults were not
in full-time education or work. An accompanying study conducted by the
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Service (ATSIS), How Young
Indigenous People are Faring, found that figure tripled for Aboriginal
youth 45 per cent of teens and 70 per cent of 20 to 25-year-olds.
ATSIS's Joann Schmider said in some areas the
situation was so dire that the most some young Aborigines aspired to was
to work for minimum wages on the ATSIC-run Community Development
Employment Project (CDEP).
19 August 2003
http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/08/07/1060145775736.html
home
|