Member of the Legislative Council Paul Green was visiting Wollongong with Mr Barilaro on Tuesday, and admitted there were many problems with the TAFE NSW system as it stood though will come out in the Upper House report to be tabled mid-December. 

However Mr Green agreed with Mr Barilaro that the issues were a “legacy” left behind by the previous politician in charge.

One such issue was numerous students across TAFE Illawarra campuses continue to have problems with enrollment - no records of their tuition fees being paid and administration staff refusing to hand out academic transcripts so students can graduate because there were no records of enrollment.

The case study of Mechanical and Mining student Jay* was put forward to Mr Barilaro, as he’d been battling with staff from the North Wollongong campus for months to try and get his transcript so he could enroll in university.

The minister promised to personally look at Jay’s* case as soon as possible, however couldn’t promise anything for the other countless numbers of students in the Illawarra and across the state who were in a similar predicament. Last week TAFE’s annual report revealed a black hole of $525 million left in its accounts from fees and course revenue - $47.6 million in student fees believed to have been paid but with no records to account for.

“I’m confident that by June 30 next year and the next round of reports are tabled we would have resolved these issues,” said Minister Barilaro.

“What I can promise is we’ll put every effort and every resource in place to make sure we can guarantee as best as we can that this would be as seamless as possible. To ask me to guarantee beyond that is impossible.

“I’m committed to making sure we support the students, the teachers, the admin staff and we’ve put in resources in place to just do that.”

*The student mentioned wished to stay anonymous in media reports.

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