Debates Day 1 - Tuesday 23 May 1995
Parliamentary Record 11
Debates for 7th Assembly 1994 - 1997; ParliamentNT; Parliamentary Record; 7th Assembly 1994 - 1997
1995-05-23
Made available by the Legislative Assembly of the Northern Territory
English
Debates
Legislative Assembly of the Northern Territory
Darwin
application/pdf
Attribution International 4.0 (CC BY 4.0)
Legislative Assembly of the Northern Territory
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
https://hdl.handle.net/10070/281694
https://hdl.handle.net/10070/413979
DEBATES - Tuesday 23 May 1995 NT Rural College is provided with an allocation of $2.9m. It is expanding its programs. Certainly, it is addressing the needs of the remoter regions of the Northern Territory. Centralian College has an allocation of $11.6m for 1995-96. $700 000 has been allocated from the former NT Open College to provide for education and training in Aboriginal communities and other remote urban areas of the southern region. This will enable more cost-effective and far more appropriate use of the facilities and expertise of the college. The NT Employment and Training Authority has a budget of $53m of which $42m will go directly to buying training from the increasing number of training providers in the Northern Territory. After NTETAs first full year of operation in 1991, there were 5 public providers and 14 private providers. There are now 4 public providers and some 64 private training providers. System growth has been managed by the authority over the past 2 years, and has allowed for an additional 1810 full-time and part-time students, with 260 places being made available with the private providers. That is a trend that will continue obviously in 1995-96 as the training market grows, along with the economy of the Northern Territory, and becomes more competitive. To enhance training in regional and remote centres, the budget will provide $1.756m for the first full year of operation of the Network for Vocational Education and Training. As I heard when I visited the Jabiru network centre at the start of the month, this initiative has increased already the range of training options that are available in those smaller centres. The initiative will continue to do that. NTETAs budget makes provision also for a $lm Vocational Education and Training Centre at Nhulunbuy. There was not a peep from the member for Nhulunbuy in acknowledgment of that program. I do not know what he does there. Perhaps he is simply oblivious to what happens in his own area, but I had expected that that would gain at least some applause. Not only does it carry with it a commitment of dollars from this government, but also, and innovatively, it introduces a cooperative arrangement with Nabalco and, as I understand it, hopefully with Aboriginal interests in the form of Yirrkala Business Enterprises. While I am talking about Nhulunbuy, there was the nonsense from the local member about the lift to provide access for disabled students at Nhulunbuy Primary School. He has been advised repeatedly that, if he wants to advocate programs for his electorate, all that is required is that he does it constructively and sanely and he is will receive the same attention as any other member. However, he goes off half-cocked. He is aware that the original allocation for the lift at Nhulunbuy was based on their estimate, not the departments, of what they thought they would need for a lift. Fortunately, he has had a pretty effective CLP candidate against him who I understand took the town vote and was instrumental in ensuring that the additional funds required for the Nhulunbuy school lift will be provided. The funds will be made available before the end of this financial year to enable the school to provide that form of access for handicapped students. I understand 2 wheelchair students attend that school now and the construction of the lift will ensure that they will have access to all areas of the school. Northern Territory University continues to be a source of pride to all Territorians as it moves from strength to strength. Last years record enrolment of 10 347 students was up 16% on the previous year. We did not hear a cry from the member for Nhulunbuy when the federal government announced recently that an additional 6000 university places are to be funded by it. Those 6000 places went to Queensland, New South Wales and Western 3510