Greater South East Melbourne (GSEM) is Wednesday (26 June) launching the GSEM Jobs and Skills Roadmap at Parliament House in Canberra.

Senior government and senior opposition figures are attending the launch, along with Federal MPs who represent the region.

The Roadmap is being launched by The Hon. Brendan O’Connor, Minister for Skills and Training.

Mayors from across the GSEM region are being joined by industry, business, education and community leaders at the launch.

The Roadmap outlines the solutions needed to ensure the fastest growing region in Australia’s fastest growing city creates the jobs and provides the skills necessary for residents to have the well-paid and secure work they need.

The region is home to one-third of Melbourne’s population, hosts 85,000 businesses and 500,000 jobs.

The region’s population is set to grow from 1.5 million now to more than 2 million by 2036.

To accommodate this level of growth and to cater for the needs of workers and employers, the region needs well-planned investment by government, industry and the education sector.

The Jobs and Skills Roadmap flows from the GSEM Jobs and Skills Summit in early May, which brought together more than 200 community, education, government and industry leaders to discuss practical actions to address regional challenges and improve collaboration between the three levels of government, industry, business, education and the community sectors to achieve results.

The GSEM Jobs and Skills Roadmap outlines key principles, as well as short term, medium term and long-term actions that can be taken to create jobs and build the region’s skills base.

Greater South East Melbourne Chair Simon McKeon said:

“Greater South East Melbourne is a nationally significant region, its people and communities deserve to be able to contribute to, and share in, Australia’s prosperity and get every opportunity to live, and have meaningful employment closer to home.

“The roadmap sets out our ambitious agenda for what is needed in the Greater South East Melbourne region in the short, medium and long term.

“GSEM brings together industry, business, education providers, community leaders and local government to act as a unified voice for a region that has more jobs than Western Sydney or Adelaide.

“At GSEM we want to play a key role in fostering big ideas and bringing those ideas to governments to help deliver results for our communities.

“One of the main challenges facing the GSEM region is making sure growth is beneficial and shared across the community. Pockets of serious disadvantage exist across Melbourne’s southeast, but so do significant untapped pockets of opportunity and we need to link the need with the opportunities.

“That is what we are seeking to create with this GSEM Jobs and Skills Roadmap.”

Building the skills base – what the GSEM region needs:

Short term

• Funding GSEM to continue the Jobs and Skills Working Group to implement the Jobs and Skills Roadmap.
• Funding to complete a regional jobs and skills strategy that fully evaluates the skills in the region, and understands the gaps, the challenges and the opportunities.
• Immediate funding for education providers in the region to provide targeted foundation education programs for migrants and other disadvantaged groups.
• A simpler and more efficient process for recognising overseas qualifications.
• The formation of a regional task force with representation from lived experience representatives, local education institutions, community organisations and key education providers to develop a strategy to reform English competency testing to better accommodate migrants and refugees.
• An expansion of the programs that support students to earn while learning, removing barriers to providing hands-on experience.

Medium term

• Enhance educational pathways and early promotion
• Support emerging industries and innovation
• Promote Industry-Education- Community Connections

Long term

• Sustain and scale regional growth
• Promote inclusive growth and reduce disadvantage

Greater South East Melbourne by numbers

Greater South East Melbourne is the fastest growing region in Australia’s fastest growing city.

• 1.5 million residents, growing to 2 million by 2036
• $85 billion in Gross Regional Product makes GSEM one of Australia’s largest manufacturing regions, with more manufacturing jobs than greater Adelaide or Western Sydney
• 500,000 jobs in the region
• 85,000 businesses
• 320,000 workers live in the South East Economic Corridor, growing to 580,000 by 2060
• 25% of Greater Melbourne’s employment is in the GSEM region, despite it making up 30% of the city’s population
• 35% of Greater Melbourne’s manufacturing jobs are located in GSEM
• 40% of GSEM’s population was born overseas, the most common countries being China, India, England and Sri Lanka
• 60% of the population had at least one parent born overseas
• A quarter of the population is aged 19 years or younger, slightly above the figure for the state
• 100 nationalities are represented across the region

Greater South East Melbourne (GSEM) advocates for jobs, infrastructure, investment, liveability, sustainability and wellbeing for the southeast and everyone who works and lives in the region. GSEM includes the shires of Cardinia and Mornington Peninsula, and the cities of  Casey, Frankston, Greater Dandenong, Kingston, Knox and Monash