Marketisation of VET: the New South Wales response 1990s-2017

This paper is one of a series of policy discussion papers presented by the LH Martin Institute. The aim is to contribute to the debate the Institute sees as necessary to reform and invigorate the tertiary education sector, in particular vocational education and TAFE. The series covers a range of topical issues, from policy settings, governance, funding, competency based training, social inequality and training markets. This paper examines the New South Wales (NSW) response to VET marketisation from the 1990s. For most of the period under review, NSW was a comparatively resistant adopter...  [+] Show more

This paper is one of a series of policy discussion papers presented by the LH Martin Institute. The aim is to contribute to the debate the Institute sees as necessary to reform and invigorate the tertiary education sector, in particular vocational education and TAFE. The series covers a range of topical issues, from policy settings, governance, funding, competency based training, social inequality and training markets.

This paper examines the New South Wales (NSW) response to VET marketisation from the 1990s. For most of the period under review, NSW was a comparatively resistant adopter of national VET market policy, particularly reforms instigated through intergovernmental funding agreements. For this resistance NSW drew criticism, largely due to perceived inefficiency, limited programs and funds open to competition, and the ongoing dominance of the public provider, TAFE NSW. This hesitance began to shift around 2005, with a series of state-initiated reviews pushing for changes in funding market arrangements and TAFE NSW governance. The year 2012 was significant, with the new Coalition Government introducing what was arguably the state's most detailed and sophisticated VET marketisation platform to that point, Smart and Skilled. The policy was implemented in 2015, and was accompanied by significant structural changes in TAFE NSW, with the 'OneTAFE' policy delivering anticipated amalgamations, staff cuts and savings, but contradicting earlier policy directions towards increased devolution of authority to local institutes. The story of the development of the training market in NSW is also a narrative of TAFE NSW and the tensions of redistributing reduced state funding among a broader range of providers. What has been clear over the period is the difficulty that successive state governments have had in letting go of the public provider as a flagship of their social justice commitment, but more pragmatically as their mechanism for timely regional funding injections and political influence.

Edited excerpts from publication and publisher's website.