QUALIFIED TRADESPEOPLE.

QUEENSLAND has a critical shortage of qualified tradespeople.

The Federal Coalition Government has many infrastructure projects planned (totalling $75 billion) including an upgrade of the Warrego Highway, but it needs qualified tradespeople to do the work.

It has therefore offered $250 million to the Qld Government to encourage young tradies by increasing apprenticeships and traineeships.

Our Labor Premier and her government have rejected the offer.

Why? Because the Premier and her cabinet are controlled by the CFMEU and without the unions’ money the ALP could not win an election.

So what would the CFMEU have against funding hard-working tradies? If my knowledge of industrious tradies is a representative sample, not one of them belongs to a union.

On the other hand, the left is more than happy to squander taxpayers’ money on free places at universities, now the hotbed of far-left activism and training grounds for the union movement, starting with student unions and academic unions.

Half of these so-called students drop out and leave a total unpaid HEX debt exceeding $50 billion, which we taxpayers will never recoup.

What about our shortage of qualified tradespeople? Presumably the ALP will just let them in from overseas on 457 visas.

Obviously our blue-collar tradies are not being supported by the Labor Government.

DAVID NICHOLLS, Toowoomba