Norwest. Real opportunity for mature workers

Real Insurance, at the Norwest Business Park, is making a difference to client services by employing older workers to properly reflect their client base. “From a company perspective you need a blend of employees,” said CEO, Clive Mendes. The company has 220 staff at its Norwest base and is recruiting more. He said the company welcomed people over 55 who wanted to get back into the workforce. “I personally value the experience mature workers bring us and the example they set the younger employees,” Mr Mendes said.

Parramatta Jobs growth prospects

Parramatta City Council maintains its own trend estimate, and that stated in the Department of Planning’s (DOP) Metropolitan Plan (2005), of between 30,000 and 40,000 additional workers in the city, in the next 20 years, rather than the “likely” additional figure, released in December 2009, of 11,000, by 2036, as forecast by the Department of Transport’s (DOT) Transport Data Centre (TDC). “The TDC forecasts were based on work by Access Economics which was in the middle of and took account of the GFC at a time when there was a lot of doom and gloom,” council said. The DOT said it took into account the fact that Parramatta did not grow in employment terms between the 2001 and 2006 census and plans for increased development in a range of other areas such as Olympic Park and Macquarie Park, Western Sydney Employment Area, Green Square and Barangaroo. “DOT forecasts of a likely future, and DOP’s use of targets to help stimulate development, are legitimately different,” the DOT said.