Don’t risk Dutton on TAFE

15 April 2025

The 2025 Federal Election will set the path for many aspects of the lives of TAFE students, teachers and educators, but none more pressing than the future of TAFE.

We have seen landmark improvements to the sector since Anthony Albanese’s Labor government took office. TAFE once again holds its rightful place as the pre-eminent provider of vocational education in Australia. TAFE as a public institution must be supported and fully funded by state, territory and federal governments.

In the three years since the election of the Albanese government, significant elements of the AEU’s Rebuild with TAFE campaign have been realised:

• Major new sources of guaranteed funding for TAFE have been delivered realising that at least 70 per cent of total government vocational education funding is allocated to TAFE.

• The contestable funding model that had marketised vocational education funding for more than a decade is being dismantled.

• The mammoth task of restoring and investing in the TAFE workforce has begun with new workers employed across Australia and VET Workforce Blueprint projects underway.

• Hundreds of thousands of students now have access to TAFE because of Free TAFE, many of whom would have been excluded from vocational education due to cost.

• TAFE is once again recognised as the anchor of the vocational education system.

• The creation of TAFE Centres of Excellence has recognised the outstanding quality of vocational education provided through TAFE and creates a mechanism for this to be coordinated and shared across Australia.

• In a further recognition of the quality of TAFE, pilot programs are underway to empower TAFE to self-accredit qualifications at AQF level 5 and above.

• TAFE workers are more central to decision making about government policy and actively involved.

• Thousands of TAFE workers have security of employment through industrial relations reform and legislation restricting the indiscriminate use of fixed-term employment.

• New collective bargaining laws have ensured that TAFE workers in several jurisdictions are the beneficiaries of long-overdue salary increases that have begun to address the imbalance between income and the cost of living.

• The AEU has been elevated to a primary role as the voice of teachers and educators in TAFE, with critical roles on major new government bodies charged with setting policy and implementing change in vocational education, including Jobs and Skills Australia and the 10 Jobs and Skills Councils.

The importance of the next government

We have seen strong support in Parliament from the Australian Greens and members of the crossbench for Free TAFE and for progressive policies. But there’s more to be achieved, especially in terms of staff retention and attraction, boosting infrastructure funding, facilities and resources, and strengthening student support, and to achieve this and ensure that all the gains are not dismantled, the next federal government is key.

Labor wants to legislate Free TAFE, recognising the value of TAFE and cementing its long-term future. Hundreds of thousands of people in Australia are enrolling in Free TAFE, they are getting the flexibility they need to study, work and raise families without a financial penalty.

Already, Free TAFE has had a disproportionately positive impact for priority cohorts such as Aboriginal People and Torres Strait Islander People, women, people with disability, young people and those from low socio-economic backgrounds.

Impact and reach of Free TAFE

Data provided by the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations to the Senate inquiry indicates that more than 568,000 students have so far enrolled in Free TAFE courses, and many of these enrolments have been in national priority industry areas.

In 2023:

• Aboriginal Students and Torres Strait Islander Students represented 6.7 per cent of students in Free TAFE compared with 3.5 per cent in the wider VET sector.

• Students with disability were 7.6 per cent compared with 3.8 per cent.

• Women were 61.8 per cent compared with 46.2 per cent.

• Regional and remote students were 35.9 per cent compared with 26.8 per cent.

This demonstrates that Free TAFE is assisting those that need it most.

Beyond just these cohorts, Free TAFE programs have also enabled many parents and older Australians to re-enter the workforce, or to make a change in their careers towards an in-demand area.

Risks of a Coalition government

Peter Dutton has threatened to end Free TAFE if he’s elected prime minister.

The Coalition cut $3 billion from TAFE last time they were in government and almost 10,000 jobs were lost. When the current Liberal deputy leader Sussan Ley says: “TAFE is just the state-government-run trainer, just like public schools. The Liberal Party believes that you do not value something unless you pay for it” and Liberal MP Luke Howarth says: “We’ve said we won’t do Free TAFE, that’s another $1.5bn saved”, the same cuts are again expected.

Dutton has not yet announced any policy but is already hinting at sending more federal funds to private RTOs rather than public TAFE. Australia cannot risk the Coalition getting in and stopping its investment in TAFE like they did last time they were in government.

Also at risk is the suite of industrial reforms won under the Albanese government, which has seen swathes of the TAFE and AMEP workforce transitioned from contract to permanent positions, sector wage increases, allowed multi-employer bargaining, the right to disconnect from work after hours and strengthening workers’ rights across the board. The Coalition has already spoken of dismantling these worker-centred gains in favour of big business.

Dutton has spent the last three years attacking and undermining teachers. He wants to spend $330 billion on nuclear power stations while investing nothing in building and upgrading public schools and public TAFE.

TAFE needs a government that supports public education.