Here in NSW, manufacturing workers build everything from passenger train carriages through to massive naval air warfare destroyers.Support the campaign: www.buildthemhere.com.au

But in recent years, more and more of our transport manufacturing contracts have gone to low-cost overseas competitors. 
 


Buses and rail rolling stock, along with all sorts of other heavy equipment, are commonly imported from China in tube or flat-pack form. After they’re shipped over, the skilled NSW tradespeople who used to build these buses and trains from scratch now assemble and fit them out. 
 


This trend puts valuable jobs, skills and apprenticeship opportunities at risk.  
 


The NSW Government can turn things around. The biggest player in transport infrastructure procurement, the State Government is currently in the process of ordering the buses, trains and ferries that will service NSW’s metropolitan areas for the next decade. 
 


In the months ahead the Government will kick off the tendering process for some the buses, trains and ferries committed to under the Metropolitan Transport Plan. 



Premier Kristina Keneally and Treasurer Eric Roozendaal have a clear choice to make.  
 


They can continue down the course the State Government set in 2005, where it drastically cut the local content requirement for an order of rail carriages from 70 to 20%, to the great dismay of local manufacturers who immediately understood the impact the decision would have – loss of jobs and contraction of the industry. 
 


They can choose to simply buy the stock off the rack in China and ship it over. 
 
At first glance, it seems an economical option. It saves some dollars up front, but it robs NSW of an investment that would drive jobs and economic growth over the next decade – particularly in manufacturing heartlands like the Hunter, Illawarra and Western Sydney. 
 


The AMWU commissioned an independent study that shows building the current order of trains, buses and ferries in NSW will reap significant benefits. 
 


First, jobs. Building locally would support some 1200 direct jobs in design and manufacturing every year for a decade. These are good jobs – skilled, decently paid and positive for the local community.
 


The direct result of those 1200 jobs is $1.3 billion in wages and salaries into manufacturing communities over that decade.

There are flow-on effects as well. Estimates suggest that for every direct job created, there would be at least three indirect jobs associated with the project. 
 


When I talk to local manufacturing workers they tell me they can’t believe the logic in sending this kind of work overseas. They see first-hand the web of productivity building a train or bus creates – it’s not just the manufacturing workers, there are truck drivers and crane operators involved, suppliers of the various fittings, right through to staff at the local sandwich shop. 
 


Furthermore, as they rightly point out, NSW manufacturing workers do a world-class job.


Manufacturing can offer a solid and satisfying career path, from apprentice through to engineer. But at the moment, there aren’t enough opportunities for young people in NSW to take this path. 



Youth unemployment is a serious issue and training is an important part of the solution.  
 


Building our buses, trains and ferries locally would provide the means to train our next generation of welders, boilermakers, electricians and panel-beaters. 
 


To ensure decision made this year on public transport procurement produce the best possible outcomes for NSW, the AMWU has launched the Build Them Here campaign.  
 


Build Them Here asks the NSW Government to commit to three measures:
 


-      Insist tenderers submit a local industry participation plan;
-      Build locally to maximise local content; and
-      Specify a one to three apprentice to tradesmen ratio for work on the contracts, to build our skills base and replenish the industry. 
 


NSW has the local know-how – the capacity, the people, the skills and the supply chain – to get our state’s critical transport infrastructure built. In doing that, we could add thousands of jobs and over a billion dollars to local communities. 
 


All we need now is for the State Government to show its confidence in local manufacturers and build them here.