WESTERN Australia’s mining and building industries are stepping up their efforts to combat a growing skills shortage.
WESTERN Australia’s mining and building industries are stepping up their efforts to combat a growing skills shortage.
Talk of a general skills shortage has gathered currency in the past year and the mining and construction industries are worried.
While skills shortages during periods of strong growth are not uncommon, both industries are enjoying boom conditions at a time when their representative bodies say fewer people are looking to work in their sector.
Speaking at a seminar discussing employment issues in the mining industry this week, WA Chamber of Minerals and Energy (CME) programs and member services director, Reg Howard-Smith, said the skills shortage in the resources sector was only going to get a lot worse if it wasn’t addressed.
Master Builders Association housing director Gavan Forster said skills shortages were not uncommon in the building industry, however this one was receiving the most attention in the 20 years he had been involved in the industry.
A recent survey commissioned by the MBA revealed a 25 per cent increase in building costs, he said, which was a direct result of labour shortages, while adverts for jobs in the building sector had increased by 60 per cent since last year.
In an effort to redress the imbalance, both industries have launched a number of initiatives and strategies designed to attract workers back into their sectors.
Two weeks ago a joint venture of building industry stake-holders launched the Building and Construction Industry Promotion Program, while the Chamber of Minerals and Energy has launched a number programs in conjunction with the State and Federal governments in recent months.
The strategies draw on a common theme, which is to target WA’s schools and education institutions in attempts to find longer-term solutions to the problem.
Both groups are also targeting the workers outside WA and overseas – a move they see as a stop-gap measure.
This strategy is not welcomed by the State’s union movement, however.
But by targeting students as well as teachers it is hoped negative connotations about jobs in each sector will be reversed and young people will want to go into mining and building jobs.
“At the moment less academically gifted students are being channelled into the building trades,” Mr Forster said. “We want to change the perceptions of not just the students, but the educators as well, so the building industry becomes a career of first choice.”
The BCIP Program has received $500,000 from the Building Construction Industry and Training Fund and aims to promote the industry to educators and parents, as well as promote the value of training to the industry.
Mr Howard-Smith said the chamber’s education focus was changing to target high school students and teachers, while increasing its activity in the Vocational Education and Training sector.
The Federal Government recently put $500,000 towards an Australian-wide study to identify the lack of skills and in what areas they exist.
The CME, in joint venture with the State Government and in collaboration with WA education institutions, also established the Minerals Institute last month. The institute has been established to facilitate the collaboration between the universities and VET sector and the industry.
Mr Howard-Smith said although the mining industry was suffering a skills shortage across the board, it was particularly lacking mining professionals such as mining engineers, geologists and metallurgists. He said there was less demand to do these courses which placed the schools that ran the courses under threat.
