Having been stuck in the USA for the past two and a half years due to COVID, Mr Jones came back to Tamworth a few weeks ago to find the issue had become worse than ever.

Last term the gym had 941 kids in its Learn to Swim program, and there are hundreds more sitting on the waiting list.

The problem is, they just don't have enough swimming teachers to provide the amount of required lessons, and Mr Jones said it's proving almost impossible to convince them to come to Tamworth, or regional areas in general.

"That waiting list is growing every week, so we're wondering what do we do, how do we solve it? So one of the things we're having to look at is innovation, how do you actually address these issues from a regional perspective," he said.

"Short term I want to bring attention to the issue and hopefully make it visible enough to where [Tamworth Regional] council realises that these services are crucial to actually making Tamworth attractive.

"Because families look for education, they look for healthcare and the next thing is activities, so we have a problem here and our solution has been to come up with bringing AustSwim to us, so we now have someone that we're putting through the program to be able to run the courses here in Tamworth."

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His medium and long term goals have a much broader focus though, and he believes some things need to be planned almost a decade in advance in order to be truly successful.

In an effort to attract more people, Fitness 360 is set to launch a scholarship program for those who want to get into the fitness industry.

But even then it can be difficult to keep people once they're qualified, and Mr Jones said talented staff have to be given freedom to do their own thing. He has done that with exercise physiologist Jessica Barber, who now plays a huge role in operating the 360 Health clinics in Gunnedah, Quirindi and Narrabri.

Long term, Mr Jones would like a combined voice for the numerous industries throughout the state that are struggling to cope with a lack of qualified workers.

"I would love to see some type of committee that have representations from all of the different sectors that are showing those skills shortages," he said.

"It's kind of like a think tank, and what we do is we bring the ideas we're using to address these issues."

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