It is costing taxpayers on average seven times more to educate a student at a private vocational college than a public TAFE, according to new analysis of federal government figures.
Taxpayers forked out $73,200 per graduate from private colleges on average, but only $10,500 per graduate in TAFE courses in 2014, two years after the Gillard government paved the way to marketise vocational training.
The analysis, done by the NSW Greens based on the federal Department of Education and Training's funding figures and the number of vocational graduates in 2014, comes in the wake of several scandals in the private vocational sector in which dodgy providers have been exposed allegedly recruiting vulnerable people into government-funded courses they had little hope of completing by giving them laptops or iPads.
In one case, the Sydney-based AIPE, a Senate committee heard the college received $111 million in Commonwealth funding after handing out just 117 diplomas in 2014.
The cost blowout is in part because despite deep funding cuts, TAFE maintained significantly higher completion rates than private colleges in 2014 (87 per cent compared with 44 per cent for private providers).
NSW Greens MP David Shoebridge said the privatisation of vocational training "has been a comprehensive failure" that both major parties shared responsibility for.
"In a tight fiscal environment it is criminal to see billions of tax dollars being squandered to prop up private providers who aren't even giving their students a qualification.
"The whole system needs to be scrapped and all government funding for vocational education and training returned to the public sector."
The federal opposition spokesman on higher education and skills, Kim Carr, blamed the blowout on Turnbull-Abbott mismanagement.
"The Liberals have failed to stop the waste," Mr Carr said. "The Turnbull government has paid private providers $5.4 billion of taxpayers' money without any concern about outcomes, such as how many students graduate and the quality of the training they receive.
"Other than cutting $2.75 billion from vocational education to date, their only substantive response has been to release a discussion paper."
Mr Carr said Labor's plan to rein in spiralling VET FEE-HELP debt and fix the sector involved a loan cap of $8000 a year and tougher compliance measures.
The federal Minister for Vocational Education and Skills, Senator Scott Ryan, said "the Coalition has put in place more than a dozen measures to stop the most egregious and unethical practices.
"These measures have had a dramatic effect in stopping the most appalling practices, however there is a substantial legacy caseload of problems from the original flaws in the scheme as Labor implemented it."
The ACCC is pursuing four Sydney private colleges in the Federal Court for the return of more than $300 million in federal taxpayer funding.
In NSW, the Smart and Skilled quality framework has prevented the worst rorts of the scandal-plagued federal system.
Unique International College, the subject of an ongoing federal court case, was refused accreditation in NSW but still signed up millions of dollars in student enrolments under the federal VET FEE HELP system.
The NSW Skills Minister John Barilaro said: "The VET FEE-HELP loan scheme is the responsibility of the Commonwealth government, which manages and administers the scheme. There is no place in NSW for training providers who fail to deliver for students."
But the NSW government has cut funding to TAFE, saying it is less cost-efficient at delivering skills training than the private sector, particularly industry bodies. Since 2012, some 4600 TAFE teachers and staff have been sacked and enrolment numbers have dropped by 80,000.
Prue Car, the state opposition spokeswoman for skills, said she had introduced a private member's bill to restrict public money going into the private market and to guarantee funding for TAFE NSW.
"Every other week we see an unscrupulous private training provider going to the wall – leaving students in the lurch and often forcing TAFE to pick up the pieces.
"Mike Baird's government recently held up Australian Careers Network – a company raided by the AFP and investigated by the ACCC – as a standard to which TAFE NSW should aspire."
Thursday is National TAFE Day.
Linda Simon, spokeswoman for the TAFE Alliance, said "as we talk to community and industry alike, we find people horrified at the undermining and defunding of TAFE.
"They value the work of TAFE and its teachers for over a hundred years and are appalled that governments have supported a market-based training system that has allowed the rorts from some 'for-profit' private providers."
