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The new Minister for Infrastructure says addressing deficits with ports and other major facilities will create opportunities to upskil the next generation of Maori tradespeople.
Shane Jones picked up the portfolio as part of the coalition agreement between New Zealand First and Labour, and also has primary responsibility for forestry and regional economic development.
He says it's important with big projects to ensure hapu are engaged early in the planning and consent process.
Infrastructure has also been a big employer of Maori in the past.
"A lot of men and women were trained on the back of infrastructure projects. They started their apprenticeship there. I can think of lots of Maori folk of my generation and older, and those projects, because they went of for quite some time, enabled them to gain a reservoir of work experience and then they got a ticket. There's absolutely no reason why that can not happen again, and if i have anything to do with it, it will be happening again," Mr Jones says.
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