Calls to combat Shoalhaven youth unemployment

Recent Regional Labor Force data revealed the Shoalhaven and Southern Highland youth unemployment rate had risen to 27.4 per cent, with more than a quarter of young people in the region unemployed. 

The data shows the region’s youth unemployment rate is currently the highest in the state since June 2012. It also revealed the amount of youth out of work has risen by 20 per cent in the past nine months. 

Greens MP Justin Field will invite representatives of unemployed youth and their families, local MPs, local government councillors, business representatives, employment agencies and other local service providers to a jobs forum aimed at identifying barriers and the action needed to address the “crisis”.

“Alarming levels of unemployment in the Shoalhaven and Southern Highlands rob our youth of hope for the future and the opportunity of building the best life possible for themselves and their families,” Mr Field said.

“These figures are shocking. At a time when unemployment is generally low across NSW, our young people are missing out with a long-term and chronic lack of jobs and training opportunities in the local region.”

Gilmore MP Ann Sudmalis said her focus was on getting young Australians into work through “training, education and job creation”. 

She said the “best way” to get youth employed was to build a “strong economy that enables employers to be more productive, more competitive, more innovative and to create more jobs”. 

Mr Field said everyone with an interest in the future of the region’s young people needed to work together to resolve the rising youth unemployment rate.

“We need all hands on deck to address this crisis,” he said. 

“There are many factors driving local youth unemployment. It won’t be easy to solve and there is no simple solution, but that doesn’t mean we can just throw our hands in the air and say it’s all too hard.

“We need to get everyone in a room and put together a plan of action otherwise an entire generation will be left behind.”

Mrs Sudmalis would not be drawn on if she would support the Greens’ calls for forum to address the issue. 

She said Gilmore’s Regional Jobs and Investment Package would increase business in the region and create employment. 

An apprentice challenge, which launched in January with the aim to connect 52 businesses with potential employers before March 31, attracted 398 registrations, Mrs Sudmalis said. 

Meanwhile, Gilmore Labor candidate Fiona Phillips said she would “support any positive measure” to combat the rising youth unemployment rate. 

“I am happy to work with whoever to constructively reduce youth unemployment in the Shoalhaven, and Gilmore,” she said. 

“We need good policies to reduce inequality and youth unemployment.

“We need to train our young people and grow real job opportunities.

“Between 2013 and 2016 we have seen a 21 per cent decline in apprenticeships in Gilmore.”

Mrs Phillips said a Labor government would invest in TAFE and stop cuts to penalty rates.