Portfolio — 28 May 2026

Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations Amanda Rishworth used both a ministerial media release and the previous day's Question Time to advance what she framed as the most significant restructure of Australia's employment services system in 30 years, while simultaneously confirming the foundational governance appointments for the new Australian Tertiary Education Commission.

On the employment services side, Rishworth announced the dismantling of the existing single-track Workforce Australia model in favour of three distinct service streams with differentiated incentives and mutual-obligation requirements calibrated to each jobseeker's distance from the labour market [TA-260528-dewr-824414a486af]. The reform package includes a revamped assessment and triage process designed to identify employment barriers early, a new individual employment planning process, and a $312 million down-payment to stand up the key elements of the new system.

The Minister grounded her case for change in the system's own performance data: approximately one in five Workforce Australia participants have remained in the system for five years or more — nearly double the proportion from a decade ago — a figure she presented as evidence that the current model fails those most in need and rewards providers for selecting job-ready clients over harder-to-place ones.

She described the reform explicitly as ending "creaming" practices among employment service providers.

In Question Time, Rishworth anchored the reform argument in the government's broader employment record, citing the lowest average unemployment rate of any Australian government in 50 years and more than 1.2 million jobs created, including 128,000 in the past 12 months alone. The strong headline figures allowed her to frame the structural overhaul not as crisis management but as a deliberate quality upgrade — the system can now absorb deeper reform because the macro-labour-market position is strong.

On tertiary education governance, Rishworth announced the appointment of Professor Barney Glover as inaugural Chief Commissioner of the Australian Tertiary Education Commission for a five-year term, with statutory Commissioners Fiona Nash, David Coltman and Stephen Duckett each appointed for three years commencing 1 July 2026 [TA-260528-dewr-0dc889641a39]. The ATEC appointments give institutional form to the broader higher education architecture — encompassing the Managed Growth Funding system, Needs-based Funding within the core funding model, mission-based compacts and the Higher Education Standards Framework — that the government has been constructing over the term.

The media release also carried a cross-portfolio signal: Rishworth noted that the Treasurer and Prime Minister will finalise the remaining details of the tax legislation, framing the employment services and tax reforms as complementary elements of a single distributional agenda. Her direct quote — "the principle is to rebalance tax so workers get a fair go and more young Australians can afford a home" — places employment services reform within the same political frame as housing affordability and tax equity, suggesting deliberate cross-portfolio message coordination with Treasury.