Join the conversation for stronger states

The portfolio is dedicated to developing the skills, vocational training pathways, and workforce capability needed to support Victoria's businesses, industries, communities, and essential public services. Its key goal is to ensure a job-ready, adaptable workforce that drives economic growth and community resilience.

TAFE and vocational education deliver practical, industry-aligned training directly linked to employment. Through institutions like TAFE Victoria, Chisholm Institute, Bendigo Kangan Institute, Melbourne Polytechnic, and Federation TAFE partnerships, students gain hands-on trade qualifications and clear pathways into in-demand careers.

Apprenticeships combine formal training with structured on-the-job experience. Key Victorian programs include traditional trade apprenticeships in electrical, plumbing, carpentry, and automotive sectors, alongside modern traineeships in advanced manufacturing and emerging industries.

Regional skills programs improve training access outside metropolitan Melbourne. Initiatives include supporting regional TAFE campuses, delivering tailored agricultural and food production skills, and expanding regional apprenticeships to meet local industry and community requirements.

Victoria is actively building capabilities for rapid technological and environmental shifts. Focus areas include digital skills training, clean energy workforce programs, advanced manufacturing, and modern construction methods like modular building, supported by lifelong learning models.

Victoria currently faces challenges such as trade shortages, skills gaps, an ageing workforce, regional labour shortages, and rapid technological disruption. The state addresses these by expanding apprenticeships, strengthening TAFE participation, deepening industry partnerships, and building future-ready workforce capability.

The Skills and Workforce Portfolio coordinates closely across government sectors: supplying workforce capability for Industry; supporting building trades for Housing; training technicians for the evolving Energy market; connecting pathways with Education; and fostering decentralised jobs with Regional Development.

The portfolio is designed to build an adaptable, skilled, and job-ready workforce that underpins Victoria’s industries, essential services, regional communities, and long-term economic growth. It coordinates training systems, apprenticeship pipelines, and strategic industry partnerships to address trade shortages and prepare workers for emerging technologies.

Through institutions including Chisholm Institute, Melbourne Polytechnic, Bendigo Kangan Institute, GOTAFE, and Federation TAFE, Victoria provides practical, career-focused learning. These programs align training directly with employer demands across construction, manufacturing, healthcare, automotive, and electrical trades, providing accessible routes straight into reliable careers.

Apprenticeships combine certified vocational training with paid on-the-job experience. Priority areas include electrical, plumbing, carpentry, automotive, and manufacturing trades. These programs enable businesses to mentor the next generation of tradespeople while meeting housing and infrastructure construction milestones.

Regional skills development targets agriculture, local food production, regional manufacturing, and essential services outside Melbourne. By improving regional TAFE campus access and funding local community skill programs, we ensure regional Victoria maintains strong employment participation and economic resilience.

Workforce planning is adapting to clean energy transition, digital capabilities, automation, and modern modular construction. Dedicated programs upskill and reskill current workers while creating pathways for school leavers into renewable energy technology and advanced manufacturing.

The workforce portfolio works directly alongside housing, industry, energy, education, and regional development portfolios. By aligning apprentice training with residential building targets and clean power grid projects, we ensure major state initiatives have the qualified workers needed for on-time delivery.

Victoria's Child Safety Portfolio focuses on protecting children from harm, supporting vulnerable families, improving early intervention services, and promoting the overall safety, wellbeing, and development of children and young people. The overarching aim is to identify concerns early, strengthen family capabilities, and intervene decisively when risks cannot be safely managed at home.

Child Protection services intervene when a child’s safety, stability, or physical and emotional wellbeing is at significant risk of abuse or neglect. Victorian services carry out formal child safety investigations, apply for protective intervention orders where necessary, facilitate protective placements, and coordinate structured family reunification programs.

Family services provide early support programs to assist households experiencing hardship or chronic stress. Focus areas include practical parenting support, fostering stable domestic environments, family wellbeing coaching, and proactive community assistance to help families resolve issues before formal statutory intervention is required.

Early intervention targets critical developmental stages to prevent escalation into crises. Victoria delivers kindergarten and early years support, school-based identification programs, behavioural and developmental therapies, and community-based family support hubs to address emerging challenges as soon as they arise.

When children cannot safely stay at home, out-of-home care delivers stable living arrangements. Foster care offers temporary homes with accredited foster carers while long-term decisions or reunification plans are made. When longer-term care is needed, options include kinship care with extended family members, youth residential facilities, and structured residential care with continuous education and health support.

Children exposed to domestic and family violence receive dedicated protection through specialised child safety planning, emergency accommodation pathways, and trauma recovery programs. Coordinated networks such as The Orange Door connect families with integrated multi-agency services to secure immediate safety and long-term recovery.

Youth support services assist young people facing educational, behavioural, or personal challenges through education re-engagement, vocational employment pathways, mental health initiatives, and outreach networks. Broader child wellbeing frameworks actively promote physical health, mental resilience, and community belonging across all Victorian municipalities.