Victorian Labor to launch government-owned electricity apprentice program

Jacinta Allan will use Labor’s final state conference before the election to announce a plan for a government-owned electricity body to hire electrical apprentices to address significant workforce shortages. It will be the first time since the State Electricity Commission was privatised 30 years ago that the government has employed such apprentices.

The Victorian premier will announce the plan in a speech that will draw on her father, Peter Allan’s experience as a linesman at the SEC, which was revived by Daniel Andrews in 2023 after being privatised by former premier Jeff Kennett in the 1990s.

The two-day event will also involve signing off on the party’s election platform, a draft of which includes proposals to “consider the benefits of a reduced workweek”, introduce a minimum of 12 days’ reproductive health leave each year, and decriminalise the personal and recreational use of cannabis to free up police resources and reduce the “unnecessary criminalisation of vulnerable communities”.

In a forward copy of the speech seen by Guardian Australia, Allan describes Victoria’s former state-owned energy provider as a training ground for “thousands of apprentices” before it was shut down.

“You joined young, got trained, got qualified and built a career for life. And you were part of a community that looked out for your family. That bond that kept people together,” it says.

“Until one day when I came home, and mum said to me quietly, ‘I think your father’s lost his job.’”

Peter Allan will also be awarded life membership of the party on Saturday.

Under the proposal to be outlined on Saturday, the SEC will offer 2,000 apprenticeships over four years across two training facilities in Melbourne and regional Victoria, with the first intake in January 2027.

Apprenticeship numbers have been declining nationally even as demand for electricians rises amid the clean energy transition, prompting concern from industry and construction groups.

Research from Jobs and Skills Australia projects a shortfall of up to 42,000 electricians by 2030, thanks in part to students being steered away from apprenticeships toward higher education, employers not having a clear return on investment, and a shortage of qualified trainers.

In her speech, Allan says SEC apprentices will “build a career together”.

The state conference is a soft launch for Labor’s election campaign, with Allan’s speech characterising the November poll as a choice between her party’s reforms to “make life easier, safer and more affordable”, and Liberal “cuts”.

Rank-and-file members and unions will also get the chance to debate urgent resolutions. These include motions calling on the federal government to impose higher taxes on gas companies and to support the full recommendations of Peta Murphy’s inquiry into gambling harm.

Another, put forward by Labor Against War, calls on the state conference to strongly condemn the US and Israel’s “wars of aggression against Iran and Lebanon and the heavy losses of civilian life”.

Motions are also directed at the Victorian government, calling on it to make public transport free, permanently, to end imprisonment as a punishment for unpaid fines, abandon its plans to absorb VicHealth into the Department of Health, secure the future of cohealth and ensure public hospital patients are no longer charged up to $15 a day to watch free-to-air television.

Another urges the government to introduce a framework for datacentre development, which would include a requirement that all new datacentres “fully offset emissions and become a net contributor to renewable energy production”.

Late last year, the premier said she wanted the state to become “Australia’s datacentre capital”.

While non-binding on state or federal Labor MPs, the motions represent one of the most effective ways for members and unions to influence party policy. Last year, the Victorian conference carried a motion calling on the federal government to recognise Palestine, which it did three months later.

Anthony Albanese is expected to attend on Saturday, after missing last year’s event.

Meanwhile, the Liberal party will also gather for its annual state council, with opposition leader Angus Taylor also attending.

The state opposition leader, Jess Wilson, will use the event to revive a commitment from the 2022 election to allocate 25% of all new infrastructure spending to regional Victoria.

The Liberals’ state executive is also up for election, with the party president, Philip Davis, expected to step down and former federal director, Brian Loughnane, the sole candidate to replace him.