Peter Costello and Andrew Robb have joined John Howard to announce a major skills initiative at St Joseph's College in the critical Melbourne seat of La Trobe.
The Coalition's pledge of $2.1 billion to create 100 additional technical colleges around Australia over ten years follows the Government's $363 million increase to the cap on training rebates.
The Prime Minister announced that 30 of the 100 colleges would be federally funded, with the balance to be funded by the States or schools.
Mr Howard said any government or independent school choosing to establish a technical college would be provided direct Commonwealth funding of $10 million.
"We need to understand that technical education is a very, very important component of modern Australia," said Mr Howard.
The Prime Minister reiterated the Government's target of three per cent unemployment and stated that boosting investment in technical education would help to achieve that figure.