Federal Labor is bringing together leaders and experts from business, industry, unions and education to discuss solutions to tackle Australia's jobs and skills challenges.
Labor's jobs and skills summit in Canberra comes the day after new figures showed the unemployment rate jumping to 5.9 per cent, and the number of people underemployed and looking for extra work rising to a record high.
"Labor is leading the push for the kind of reform we need to create and maintain high wage, high skilled jobs in Australia," Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said in a statement.
The opposition says Australians should have access to the skills and training needed for a job that "enriches their lives, their families and their communities".
Mr Shorten says it is clear the present vocational education and training system is not fit for future needs, and the summit will look at bold reforms to produce a highly skilled and productive workforce.
"Australia will never have the biggest workforce in our region, but Labor believes we can have the best."
Labor workplace spokesman Brendan O'Connor said the country was failing to anticipate areas of jobs growth - a problem which needed more targeted investment by business and government.
"Too often people are actually undergoing training for training's sake, they're not acquiring skills in areas of emerging demand," he told ABC radio on Friday.
"We are not currently being able to ensure when people go through vocational training, they can find a sustainable and good quality job at the end of it."
But Labor won't buy into the debate about whether slashing penalty rates could increase small business employment.
"We're not really interested in cutting the wages of the lowest paid in Australia to solve problems," Mr O'Connor said.
