Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announces plan to increase skills and trade training

Thursday, 2 May 2019

Some of the country's largest employers have agreed to double the time spent on employee training and reskilling to help meet the challenge posed by automation.

The Aotearoa New Zealand Skills Pledge launched by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and her Business Advisory Council (BAC) will help both the staff and the organisations they work for prepare for the rapidly changing future of work, she says.

It commits signatories to doubling investment in re-skilling and training hours by 2025, and to report annually on progress.

Ardern made the announcement at a Chamber of Commerce lunch in Nelson on Thursday.

* PM Jacinda Ardern's State of the Nation speech: Sunny, but clouds gathering

* New Zealand has 'productivity disease', says Business Council chair, Air NZ CEO Chris Luxon

* Jacinda Ardern names Prime Minister’s Business Advisory Council members**

Ardern said there was a need to re-examine the way Kiwis were educated.

She said while New Zealand's economy was faring well at the moment with solid GDP growth and low unemployment, there were significant challenges over the horizon.

Along with a predicted downturn in global growth in the next few years and increasing overseas skepticism on free trade and globalism, the issue of automation would have a major effect on the future of work in New Zealand.

Ardern said while the scope of the changes brought about by automation were hard to predict, there was a need to re-examine the way Kiwis were educated.

There would need to be an adaption to prepare young New Zealanders for a future where they don't know the kind of jobs they would be going into, and to retrain an existing workforce out of jobs that would no longer exist in 20 years, she said.

The Prime Minister and Luxon spoke on the future challenges to the New Zealand economy.

'We know the type of soft skills and competencies that will prepare our work for the future.

'Starting to think about our education system not in subject terms but skills terms, problem solving, coding, resilience, the kinds of skills we know will have universal value regardless of what direction the workforce heads in the future.'

Ardern said the government was doing what it could to support business, to train and retrain staff through programmes like Mana in Mahi and our Fees Free policy for post-secondary education.

'But achieving this is not possible in isolation so I am extremely grateful for the time and expertise of the BAC members. By working together we can build a productive, sustainable economy that works for everyone and is fit for the 21st century,' she said.

BAC chair and Air New Zealand chief executive Christopher Luxon said those organisations who took on the pledge would be committed to two things: publicly disclose their annual on-the-job training and reskilling hours, and make a commitment to double those hours by 2025.

Luxon said while there was 'a world of automation coming at us incredibly quickly', but there were opportunities as well as challenges for New Zealand.

These included a chance to 'turbocharge' the economy's productivity and to lift competitiveness internationally.

He said the main challenge with the automated economy was the new skills that would be required in the workforce, estimating that up to 54 per cent of New Zealanders would need to be retrained in order to retain employment.

'[Jobs of the future will need] people who can work well with machines, people who can apply that expertise really well with cognitive skills, people with great collaboration and emotional skills in terms of how they deliver service.'

Most BAC companies have agreed to sign the pledge as have some of the country's largest employers including Fonterra, Foodstuffs, Bunnings and Auckland International Airport.

The Prime Minister has also asked State Services Commission to see which Government departments are best placed to sign up.

'The report is unique in that you can see automation's impacts from a task, job, sector and region perspective which is invaluable knowledge for policy makers and businesses,' Luxon said.

The Pledge is the first recommendation from the A Future that Works: Harnessing Automation for a More Productive and Skilled New Zealand report, also released on Thursday, developed by BAC and consulting firm McKinsey & Company.

Many of the other recommendations are relevant to Government work already under way.

Organisations can sign up to the Aotearoa New Zealand Skills Pledge and download the BAC report at www.pmbac.co.nz.