I begin by acknowledging the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation, the traditional custodians of this land, and pay my respects to the Elders both past and present.

I would also like to pay my respects to any First Nations people in the audience today.

Hello all and thanks for the opportunity to speak today. Can I point out that I’m one of only two federal ministers allowed to wear sneakers at work, the other being the sports minister. It’s good to be out of a suit from time to time.

Any of you who have followed my statements over the years will know the importance I place on technology and the skills that underpin them.

Skills have been needed across the economy through all phases of industrial development in this country, starting in terms of agriculture moving on to resources, manufacturing, [indistinct] in the 50s and 60s. And that profoundly changed the way the labour market existed then and jobs went out massively. 

We saw the opening up of the economy through the 80s and 90s, and that put huge pressure again, particularly on traditional manufacturing to compete against others. And then we’ve seen the rise of technology, and we’ve also seen, weirdly, a new focus on manufacturing as well and developing sovereign capability, because we had that impact of the pandemic which forced us to rethink, you know, when we wanted things and we wanted them quickly and they weren’t there. Why is that and how do we fix that?

And that’s really, those questions, have driven a lot of our thinking as a new government about the way we shape industry policy. And there’s that whole issue of geopolitics as well and the fact that we’ve been dependent on just a few countries for the things that we need. And we’re going, “Well, what do we do differently? How do we make the things that we need and have that value-add?” 

So, we’ve got that as a country. And then you look outside in terms of the broader world and there’s this global race that’s happening around technology. And it’s not just the stuff that we’re doing right now. 

I mean, I was really uptight for years about how slow Australia took to get its act together on artificial intelligence, thinking about the profound impact that this could have. This overnight success – AI – that started being developed in the 40s. And women drove the development of that technology as well. And then we saw what happened – and I’ll come back to this point as well – but then you saw what happened in the course of the last 10 years and the fact that AI and the ability of computing and processing ability, that all changed. So we took too long on that as a country. We’ve seen other countries get it, put investment programs together and steal the march on us there. 

But there are things that we can get involved in, like quantum where we do lead the pack. And when you look proportionately in terms of the size of our country and you look at the ideas that are here and the fact that we are well and truly punching above our weight and that we have historical tradition on our side, many of you would not be aware that this country in the 40s, there were only four countries on the planet that developed their own computer – four – no, five, sorry. And we were one of them.

Trevor Pearsey and CSIRO at that point in time – it had another name way back when – the guy who invented it – the guy – had always regretted that we missed the chance to actually manufacture computers in this country. And we can do it with quantum now with the people we have. And we need that. 

But what are the ingredients in terms of quantum, in terms of robotics? What do we need to make it happen? And the ingredients that increasingly you’ll hear come out of our mouths as a Government, they flow around ideas, skill, capital. And all designed with outcome – lifting national wellbeing both economic and social. Very important. It is not just about making a buck; it’s about making a difference as well.

This in terms of what I’m explaining to you now is really important for us. It’s why we’ve now committed to a National Robotics Strategy, a National Quantum Strategy, looking at all we do at AI, putting together a $15 billion National Reconstruction Fund so when Australian ideas - which we should value more – when Australian ideas are applied to creating new firms then we’ve got the skills there to allow for that growth, that people will know that they’ve got the capital here instead of having to leave our shores to chase their dreams because they didn’t think people believed in them on Australian soil. And we’ll make that happens as well. 

But the skill part is the really big part – making sure we’ve got people talented to enable that growth either as founders or as employees. And just as we’ve been on a path about the way that the economy has evolved – and, by the way, things like manufacturing will make a comeback and, really, one of the reasons why I’ve set up the National Robotics Strategy is to help that – because automation will actually lead a revival of manufacturing in this country. 

But the other element to it is skill. And for too long as a country we’ve not recognised that the pathway on skill development, that is altering as well. Because there are a lot of us here that went through primary school, high school and then we go through TAFE or university, that was it. Your learning finished at around 25 and then you were out into the workforce. 

That model, like, largely exists but has fundamentally changed. And now, particularly when it comes to digital skills, we are seeing something phenomenal, because the hunger for those skills – and just to give you a sense of the demand for those skills, we’ve got demand for software automation skills has grown almost 30 times in five years. 30 times in five years. Demand for artificial intelligence skills almost 20 times. So you’ve got all that demand there. 

And what’s happening? People are getting employed with no degree. No need for a degree. In the tech sector people are being called up. You’ve seen some firms develop, particularly Australian digital firms, develop their own apprenticeship programs because they couldn’t wait. The education system and largely government leadership was not there to reshape the way that skills were developed. So you saw that. 

And then you see what Google is doing here today in terms of the way that you’ve paired with Coursera, which is one of the great - it's a huge online skills development platform – teamed up with a huge firm in Google to develop this. And so what I love about this is the fact that, one, you’re being agile in the development of skills. The other thing that I love is the fact that Google is also targeting underrepresented people in the community to train them up. Because certainly as a government what we’ve been saying is we want to call up skills from all corners of the community. The diversity should enable people – women, First Nations people, people from a migrant background, people with a disability –regardless of your gender, everyone should have an opportunity to participate because we need you. In terms of the global race we’re in, we need talent and we need firms like Google and others to contribute and work with us on it. 

But the fact of the matter is, you’ve gone out and you’ve done it. So I love that you’re doing it. I love that Google is targeting underrepresented groups. And the other thing I love is I know you’re committed to it because of Mel Silva. And here’s the reason why. I’m not just saying this because I want to get a laugh out of Mel – but, you know, tick. Here’s the thing – Mel and I grew up in the same part of Western Sydney. Mel’s a little ‘slash’ considerably younger than me, but we remember in high school there was a big difference in the number of people you were with as classmates in year 10 through to year 11. The drop-off was huge. People didn’t continue with skills development, and then the economy changed, and they were cranked out of jobs. 

For us it’s a big deal to make sure that people from areas outside of the inner city get the chance to participate in this revolution we’re living through, be able to help us in the global race for relevance and to be able to create a new, more positive vibrant future. 

So when someone from the Western Suburbs like Mel who has an opportunity being involved in a company like this to invest in a program like this, to open the doors for people that were like us or are like us and come from the outer suburbs or underrepresented groups, train them up in high demand skills and open the door for their own personal prosperity and achievement, that is massive. And that’s why I say, if Google’s doing it and Mel Silva’s doing it, you know it’s being done for the right reason and you know it’s going to open doors. And that’s what I want to see more of. 

And what we do need to do is ensure that industry isn’t having to do this on its own. I’m telling you, we will be. We’ve committed to delivering more university places – 20,000 additional places – 465,000 additional TAFE fee-free places so money will not stop people – or the lack of it – from getting trained and skilled up, and we’ve also committed to 1.2 million tech jobs in this country by 2030, not because it’s a cute metric but we need to have that skill embedded – and Jennifer [Westacott] and I have talked about this, and I’ve been grateful in terms of being able to work with BCA on it; I’ve been grateful for the urging of the Tech Council of Australia for us to adopt this – but if we get these skills embedded across industry this will improve the way we work as a nation and will ensure we’re not left behind. 

So from our point of view, lining all those things up that I’ve said, including as well, if I may add, we’re pushing the development of the Startup Year, so university students with a business idea will stay on for an extra year and we will extend to them through the HECS system a line of funding that will help them build their firm in a year where venture capital funding has contracted 75 per cent. One year. It got reported in the august Financial Review. I note [Mark] Di Stefano down the back. I’m not just saying this for your benefit. It’s a scary stat – 75 per cent contraction in venture capital funding. There have been constant contractions in angel investment funding. 

We cannot stall. If there are young people with an idea that want to create a firm and build a better country, we want to be there. And that’s why the start-up year – and we’ve started the consultations around it the other week – we want to be able to set that up. So we want to work with you. We want to make sure that we’ve got the settings right as a government when it comes to education and training. 

We commend businesses like Google and others that want to step up and invest in skills and opportunity. And, as I said, biggest thing – I’ll end on this – that I love about this is that it opens the door for people. It gives them a chance. It believes in them. And every time you do that and you demonstrate that belief, watch how people perform. They will do great things for you, but they will also, more importantly, do great things for our nation. Well done, thank you for letting me be here today. 

ENDS