A national group encouraging women into trades is moving back to the Illawarra where it all began a decade ago.
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Wollongong is the ancestral home of Supporting And Linking Tradeswomen (SALT) which is now moving into a new office at Fairy Meadow to accommodate the exponential growth over the last 12 months.
The first official office at Sutherland is now too small and SALT Australia president and founder Fiona Shewring said it was time to step things up further.
"We have closed the office in Sydney and have come back down to the Illawarra," she said.
"We have done a lot of workshops in Illawarra schools on a regular basis and we are setting up for a new workshop tour. Them hopefully in November we will be going further down the South Coast".
Ms Shewring had a vision over 10 years ago to encourage women in the trades.
It does that in a number of ways such as running workshops that teach women and girls how to use tools.
"We have now done over 260 workshops across five states," Ms Shewring said.
"We are now a registered Australian body. We are a national organisation".
Ms Shewring said there is presently a massive growth in the number women doing trades.
"Most of the companies we are currently working with are diversifying their trades because they see how well the workforce works when it is balanced and when it reflects society. Companies tell us they get much better production out of the their teams by doing this. That is why they are so keen.
"We want to get to a point where being a female in a trade doesn't put you on a pedestal. You are just another tradie. We basically want to do ourselves out of a job".
Ms Shewring said SALT has achieved many breakthroughs.
"We met with Sydney Trains in Wollongong first and have been working with them on their recruitment process for three years now," she said.
SALT has also made significant progress with its annual Tradeswomen Conference in Australia. The first one was held at the Wollongong Town Hall in 2016. The second was in Brisbane. And the next one in Sydney in October will include a 10 year celebration and gala awards night.
"We are working with organisations such as the Air Force and BlueScope Steel which is a major sponsor for the conference," Ms Shewring said.
"Bluescope are doing great things as well in terms of their trade diversity. We are hoping all the companies who have been doing really well will put themselves in for a chance to win at the national awards night.
"There are four awards and businesses can nominate now".
Ms Shewring said the plan was for Wollongong to soon host a national conference.
"SALT was run largely in the beginning as a volunteer organisation," she said.
"I worked as a volunteer for the first nine years. But last year I left my job at TAFE to run SALT full time. It is the first time I have been paid to do what I do. And now we have an office that employs people at Jardine Street, Fairy Meadow. We have seven people working here including me".
Ms Shewring said SALT also has a handy person course for women being run by a trades woman at TAFE in North Wollongong. We are working with the local state training services and working with the local TAFE to keep doing more".
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