VET covers a wide range of careers and industries, including trade and office work, retail, hospitality, construction, plumbing and automotive.

VET subjects are available to Year 11 and 12 students and are offered as separate certificate qualifications.

In Tasmania, the public provider for VET courses is TasTAFE.

However certificate qualifications are also available through private registered training organisations or RTOs.

The management of TasTAFE and the private RTOs in Tasmania is done at a national level by the Australian Skills Quality Authority.

ASQA ensures each RTO, including TasTAFE, is providing up-to-date industry certificate courses and sets national compliance regulation for the sector.

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Funding for VET is a shared responsibility between state, territory and Commonwealth governments.

At a state level, VET falls under the Education portfolio, held by deputy premier Jeremy Rockliff.

At the federal level, the responsibility for vocational education falls jointly under Skills Minister Michaelia Cash and Assistant Minister for vocational education Steve Irons.

The state government is the primary provider of funding for the VET sector and for TasTAFE in Tasmania.

In 2019-20, $7.7 million and $5 million were allocated in 2019 to establish the water and trades and agriculture centres of excellence respectively. However, those funds were delivered in 2019 and there was no extra across forward estimates.

There is an allocation of $2.9 million for the skilled workforce to meet industry demand program, delivered by TasTAFE.

In 2019-20, funding of $92.3 million will be provided as a grant to TasTAFE to support training activity and operations. This gives effect to the Government's commitment to ensure a minimum 70 per cent of training funding is provided to TasTAFE.

At the state election in 2018, the state government committed to providing TasTAFE with a guaranteed 70 per cent of the training budget.

It also committed to invest an additional $15.5 million over the next five years into TasTAFE "to build a stronger training system that supports more jobs."

At the 2017-18 state budget, the government committed to $3.2 million over two years, in 2017-18 to improve the standards and reputation of TasTAFE's Drysdale brand through the establishment of Drysdale as a Centre for Excellence.

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The government has pledged to work with the tourism and hospitality sectors to prioritise the works required for Drysdale to operate as a hub for the training and development of staff in those sectors.

The Tasmanian Government has a target to increase the number of apprentices and trainees through small business grants and payroll tax rebates.

Funds of $17 million is provided for targeted payroll tax rebates for trainees, apprentices and youth employees. This payroll tax relief was recently extended to 2020 and will gradually be scaled back in 2021.

The state budget also has allocated $200,000 to assist TasTAFE's involvement in a new international training college at Kangaroo Bay.

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The Australian Government funds its own programs, which will amount to $1.2 billion in 2017-18.

The government also provides funding to state and territories for the operation of their training via agreements such as the national skills and workforce specific purpose payment (NSWSPP) and the national partnership agreements.

The national partnership agreement expired in June 2017 and has been replaced by the Skilling Australians Fund.

The Skilling Australians Fund is a four-year agreement. Tasmania signed up to this agreement in in 2017.

The NSWSPP is about $1.5 billion per year and is associated with the national agreement on skills and workforce development.

States must spend the NSWSPP in the skills sector but they have flexibility in how they spend those funds.