- Media Release
The West Coast Council is passionate about empowering West Coasters to maximise local opportunities and contribute to the region. To support this the West Coast Council through its Education and Training Committee (E&TC) is pleased to announce an exciting new initiative.
With support from the Tasmanian Government to the tune of $150,000, the West Coast Council is establishing a $100,000 Regional Training Fund (RTF). This fund will support training to get local people into work and support local employers to get the training they need for their workforces, where no other funding sources are available. The program aims to provide targeted support to train and upskill members of the West Coast community and will bring together local businesses, training providers, jobseekers, and employees. It is all about providing support for locally directed training that meets our needs as a region.
Chair of E&TC, Deputy Mayor Shane Pitt said, “The RTF is an exciting opportunity that will create a real difference in the West Coast Community. It will create avenues for training, upskilling, economic benefits and will support jobseekers, employees, and employers who reside and have businesses here on the West Coast. E&TC see this as one of many exciting programs supporting our community and business sectors to create and develop long term futures in the region.”
The RTF will provide the local economy with skilled workers and support industries such as tourism, mining, renewable energies, aquaculture, and education. Specifically, it aims to support:
· Nationally recognised entry-level training to support new workers and jobseekers into local employment opportunities such as fishing, aquaculture, hospitality, tourism, healthcare, mining and renewable energy.
· Skills to develop business plans and business cases (particularly to access grant funding or finance).
· Support to access Compulsory Professional Development training opportunities in the region (for tradespeople to maintain their Practitioner and Contractor licences).
· Any other training or workforce development activity that the E&TC determines useful to engage local people with local jobs or build employer capability and capacity.
The management of the RTF including funding decisions will be overseen by an E&TC subcommittee. The E&TC is currently seeking expressions of interest for people who wish to join the committee and contribute to the exciting education projects on the West Coast. While guidelines will be finalised by the E&TC over coming months it is expected that the fund will operate on a co-contribution model supporting the investments made by local employers and employees in training.
In the coming weeks, the West Coast Council will be appointing a part-time administrative assistant from the funding allocation to support delivery of this program and other education initiatives that we will be announcing soon.