Get your Basics (while you have time)and Don't rely on the B1/B2 stuff provided by Tafe's etc etc..Most employers prefer to see some-one who steps forward and uses their own inititive to get the ball rolling..
This is the attitude that needs to change! Basics are all but dead. Come Monday 27/06, if you haven't already begun your basics you will not be able to start. If you have started you have only a short window to complete it and still come out with a restricted licence. The B1/B2 is what is the "normal" way of gaining a licence in Australia now. Like it or not, agree with it or not, it is the law. Forget the past, it wont help to comiserate about it, in other words GET OVER IT!
As for the lady getting an apprenticeship, what better initiative can she show than to get all her apprenticeship theory out of the way first so that when you do get the apprenticeship, you dont lose any work time by going away to school.
I have heard so much S#!+ about how terrible the new system is from so many LAMEs and employers (GA mostly). If they would spend all that energy on learning how it works, what advantages it has and learn to make it work for them instead of whinging ceaselesly about it, they might find that it's not so bad.
Nobody likes change, but that's life, get on with it.
