Mundine seeks national rollout for school-based jobs program

GENERATIONONE boss Warren Mundine wants to roll out a school-based employment program nationally

GENERATIONONE boss Warren Mundine wants to roll out a school-based employment program nationally to link schoolchildren with 60,061 jobs he has to fill, in a plan to prioritise indigenous children in his Aboriginal economic strategy.

Mr Mundine says over the next 12 months GenerationOne will document the success of the "P Plate model" and look to expand into other states across the nation.

The P Plate Program is designed for high school students and aims to build career aspirations. The school nominates a P Plate ambassador, a teacher on staff who supports the students through the P Plate curriculum.

"In particular we would like to see the program rolled out in Western Australia," Mr Mundine said.

The program runs only in NSW and Queensland.

"We hear a lot of indigenous adults say they are in a cycle of despair because they can't get a job and have been unemployed for so long. We don't want young Aboriginal people to fall into that despair too."

GenerationOne is in a unique position, because it has 60,061 jobs to fill, he said.

"We can link the P Plate students and teachers up with the employers to fill the jobs. Obviously there is a time lag in this process because the kids are still in school."

One of the main barriers to employment for some indigenous people had been the lack of work experience, he said. "P Plate really addresses this by supporting and facilitating school-based traineeships, school-based apprenticeships, structured workplace learning and work experience."

Mr Mundine said 2013 was going to be a huge year for GenerationOne, with three chief policy priorities -- pushing for the Vocational Training and Employment model, which links training with identified jobs, to be embraced by the Gillard government, overhauling the juvenile justice system, and the P Plate school aspiration program. These would be the "main campaign drivers for this year".

"We have the jobs, we have the employers and now it's about getting bums on seats. Getting people into the jobs and supporting their success. Give the person the job, train them for the job -- it's pretty straightforward really.

"We are at a point now where we are calling on the government to live up to their end of the deal, which was to train indigenous people to the specifications of employers," he said.

On juvenile justice, Mr Mundine expressed concern indigenous young people were returning to prison at a higher rate than they could be retained at high school or university.

"Juvenile justice is the beginnings of people screened out of employment," he said.

"In the coming year we will be calling on governments and stakeholders to partner with us to take urgent action. We need to prevent the kids from entering the system and we need to be diverting young people out of the juvenile justice system into jobs and meaningful careers."