"We all know that this is a crisis without an immediate end. If we wait for the dust to settle we will be buried in it. We need to move and move quickly and start to secure the important things that our people and our industries need to survive,"SCLC secretary Arthur Rorris said.

Finishing the bushfire recovery, build the region's (non-physical) social and community infrastructure are required before a sustained effort to make the Illawarra the "manufacturing hub of the nation, which prides itself in developing renewable technologies of the future".

The Labor Council and unions down the South Coast have been working very hard throughout the year since the bushfires to assist all people, particularly in the Shoalhaven and Far South Coast.

"The lessons that we learned from that dreadful experience are instructive," Mr Rorris said.

"One of the most important lessons is that the recovery effort must itself be a source of economic benefit and jobs for the local communities. Let's face it, that's where the money goes.

"We need to make sure that as many carpenters, sparkies, bricklayers, the teachers and the childcare workers are locals."

Mr Rorris said the region needed government funding to survive the COVID-crisis.

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He said universities and the TAFE system needed to be boosted and so did social and community infrastructure programs.

"Clearly governments have a big responsibility to do the things that markets won't. That's why we pay our taxes."

The third part of the plan looks at the Illawarra in particular.

"We have been working with government and with industry for a decade now on developing the renewable technologies of the future," Mr Rorris said.

"We have always said that we are in a special situation in the Illawarra where we actually make our steel and we are a manufacturing centre for the nation.

"Clearly the Illawarra has got a special claim here to lead the way in renewable development and to secure the energy future of this nation.

"In so doing we will be creating the jobs of the future."

The plan has the backing of ACTU national president Michele O'Neil.

"When the ACTU launched our 5 point Jobs Plan we knew that it was regions like the South Coast of NSW and the Illawarra that needed it most," Ms O'Neil said.

"Our regional communities are organising to demand a better future, one with secure jobs, well funded public services and government investment in our reconstruction."

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NSW Teachers Federation post schools organiser Rob Long also supports the plan.

"Both the Federal and State Governments must guarantee funding for TAFE through free courses for our students," he said.

"After the bushfire crisis, federation members working with the SCLC have successfully gained free courses for students, with small class sizes, in a variety of vocations including construction, early childhood, IT and others.

"This guaranteed government funding must continue as part of this economic recovery."

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Mr Rorris added this is the plan the region needs.

"It is a plan that will require stakeholders to work together. It is not a blueprint, it is not prescriptive, this is the start of this conversation and we have put three big items on the agenda here," he said.

"We will work with the business community, local government and others to see that this region gets what we need and what we deserve but it won't happen on it s own.

"These plans need the support and funding of our governments, state and federal, and that is the missing element at this point."

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