The ambition currently surging through South Australia is palpable.

Wherever you look, there is construction and progress. From the recent opening of the Eurimbla Way Bridge, a key milestone in the monumental task of building nuclear-powered submarines, to the massive equipment that adorns kilometres of our largest ever road project on South Road. Nor can we forget the new Women’s and Children’s Hospital, which is emerging from the ground.

It is clear as day, our state’s demand for skilled labour is the biggest it has been in our 189-year history.

Last week, Premier Peter Malinauskas highlighted that “well calibrated skilled migration programs are more urgent than ever before” and went on to say “AUKUS is going to draw people out of both white- and blue-collar jobs from Australian citizens, and we do not have the people to backfill that work”.

That work includes work on your car.

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During the COVID-19 pandemic, vehicle repair and maintenance was declared an essential service. Simply put, it is an enabler for our lives. It delivers food to our supermarkets, our kids to school, it drives utes to building sites far and wide, and it supports our emergency services to respond.

At present, we just don’t have enough people to keep the wheels turning. No matter how many apprentices we attract, no matter how many technicians push out their retirement, we just need more.

We simply cannot afford a scenario where the AUKUS ramp-up further depletes the technical workforce that keeps South Australia moving.

Don’t get me wrong, we will always focus on homegrown talent first. An apprenticeship is the gold standard of skills training, but we must also complement this local talent with skilled workers from overseas.

To make skilled migration work, it must first work for the public. The public is right to be frustrated by a system that has for too long, failed both the migrant and the industry. Agents selling shortcuts to residency with little interest in sovereign need, and more concerningly of late, private institutional training providers who offer expensive qualifications to migrants, which result in underqualified tradespeople.

Tradespeople who could potentially work on your car.

Thankfully, last year, South Australian Skills Commissioner Cameron Baker stood up and enacted section 45A of the South Australian Skills Act 2008 that training in a trade must occur under a training contract. This important change will close the door on private training providers who have taken learners on a road to nowhere.

As a state, we need to identify international talent with the right skills, then rigorously evaluate their expertise against local standards. We must bridge any gaps through targeted training to ensure they reach the same high bar we set for our local apprentices.

This is why the MTA is working with the South Australian Skills Commission and the Federal Government on a pilot program designed to bridge this gap. Working closely with partners in the Philippines and Cambodia, there exists enormous potential to bring skilled technicians to South Australia, train them to local standards and support automotive industry employers. This is one approach towards the solution; there is no doubt that there are other approaches with integrity and merit.

The scale of the opportunity before us is as exciting as it is demanding. AUKUS demands Australian Citizens, and a lot of them. Whether it is housing or health, automotive or aged care, South Australia needs all the help it can get to capitalise on this once-in-a-generation prospect.

To drive our future economic prosperity, we can’t risk idling. So as the Premier says, let’s get moving on well-calibrated skilled migration programs.