No boat to float on naval-build training

The Commonwealth has created a Naval Shipbuilding College – which does not actually teach anybody to build ships

Back in 2017 some bloke called Christopher Pyne announced a federal technical college to train workers for the navy’s building programme (CMM March 27 2017).

So how’s it going, the Senate Economics Reference Committee asked last week, as part of its inquiry into naval shipbuilding.  Really well, an official replied – it’s generated “a very granular view of workforce demand projections.” And it’s working with VET and HE “on the supply side strategies about how we can coordinate the generation of that workforce into the future.”

But what about specific skills, say welding?  Last year the college “played a key-role” in creating a training kit on welding (CMM February 18 2019) and Senator Rex Patrick (Centre Alliance-SA) wanted to know about the proposed Hull Material and Welding Centre of Excellence. “Have you established that centre,” he asked. “No, not at this point in time,” was the reply.

In fact, there is not a whole lot of training going on. When Senator Patrick asked about the Naval Shipbuilding College’s role overall, he was told, “the name perhaps is a slight misnomer.”

Less slight than sunk.