The companies behind some of the state’s biggest resource projects will discuss their future skills needs at a meeting in Perth today.

A Federal Government taskforce is hosting a series of meetings around Australia in a bid to discover what potential skills shortages could exist in the next five years, as a number of new resources projects come online.

The meeting is the latest in a string of events being held around Australia by the National Resources Sector Employment Taskforce.

The Taskforce Chairman, Gary Gray, says with about 80 major new resource projects expected in Australia by 2015, there is a real need to avoid another skills shortage.

Mr Gray says he will report back to the government mid-year.

“The government needs to look carefully at its workforce and skills planning in order to ensure that we don’t get the kind of bottlenecks that constrained growth and pushed up prices five years ago.

“We do have 600,000 unemployed Australians today and we should, through the wonderful opportunity afforded to us by the resources boom, be able to bring more people into permanent employment and to give them better skills.”

The taskforce moves to Karratha tomorrow for another hearing.

A Federal Government taskforce will meet representatives from resource companies, job services and training providers in Perth today to discuss the future resource skills needs in WA.