The Government is offering guaranteed jobs and training to attract hundreds of people to earthquake-hit Christchurch.
A new scheme announced on Thursday will recruit 900 workers during the next year who, on completion of six to 14 weeks training, will be guaranteed a job.
The announcement was made as part of the wider Government report, Building Infrastructure, which sets out progress on infrastructure investment.
Gerry Brownlee. Photo: NATIONAL PARTY
Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Minister Gerry Brownlee said the scheme would be run by the Stronger Christchurch Infrastructure Rebuild Team in partnership with training organisation InfraTrain and provide free training for people new to the industry.
"This is particularly good news for young jobseekers who want on-the-job training to get job qualifications."
Mr Brownlee said the Christchurch rebuild team is only 12% of the way through repairing the city's roads and underground piping, which is why more workers are needed. Half of the sealed roads will need rebuilding.
A recruitment bus with information about the jobs will travel through parts of the South Island soon.
Canterbury Employers Chamber of Commerce chief executive Peter Townsend says the rebuild will need thousands of extra tradespeople and this is an important step towards securing them.
However, he is worried more workers than the Government is predicting will be needed.
Mr Townsend says every effort needs to be made to prepare for what will be an unprecedented rebuild and a problem for tradespeople coming into the city may be a lack of affordable accommodation.
Other projects
Elsewhere in the report, the Government outlined much of what it is already doing around the country, including rebuilding Christchurch, the investment in ultra-fast broadband, the upgrading of the national electricity grid and the $12 billion it is spending on roads in the next four years.
However, it also now considering building four new roads of national significance.
In another new initiative, it intends completing an economic study of the benefits of oil and gas development off the East Coast.
The Labour Party on Thursday dismissed the Government's infrastructure plan on roads of national significance, saying it is time the Auditor-General looked into their economic value.
Transport spokesperson Phil Twyford says only a couple of the seven already being funded have good cost-benefit ratios and roads such as the Kapiti Expressway and Puhoi Highway can't be justified.
Mr Twyford says it beggars belief that more are being considered.
