Wednesday, 19 November 2025

 Peter WALSH (Murray Plains) (14:47): My question is to the Minister for Skills and TAFE. When will the agricultural courses delivered by GOTAFE at Shepparton be properly staffed and resourced? GOTAFE at Shepparton has the only government-owned working farm for teaching agriculture, and it is going to rack and ruin because so many instructors are on stress leave because agriculture courses are understaffed and there is little support for those who are at work. I am told that when these issues have been raised and there have been appeals for help, the staff are told by the department, ‘It doesn’t matter, it’s only agriculture.’ Agriculture training does matter, and it should matter to the Labor government. Just telling agricultural students, ‘You don’t need a real working farm to learn; you can do it online with AI’ is an appalling statement and shows a total lack of understanding of what is involved in teaching students how to work with large animals like stud rams with horns or cattle that can weigh up to a tonne. If the government sells the GOTAFE farm, agricultural training will suffer in northern Victoria, and there will be even less trained staff to produce the food we eat or export to the world.