The purpose of this report is to provide national data on the technical and further education (TAFE) workforce in 2008 and, where possible, compare this with 2002 data collected for the report "Profiling the national vocational education and training workforce" (NCVER 2004). Currently, there is no regular consistent national collection of TAFE workforce data. This is because public delivery of training has predominantly been by the states and territories through their TAFE institutes and colleges, and workforce issues are seen to be an operational matter. This report is an attempt to fill in the information gap. First, the report outlines the processes used to gather data on the national TAFE workforce in 2008. Next the 2008 data are presented. They are then compared with the data gathered for 2002. The final section presents the key findings and discusses their implications, and also raises issues about the data collection itself. Data elements and state tables are included. (Contains 4 footnotes, 68 tables, and 2 figures.) [This report is complemented by two other pieces of work: "Getting the Measure of the VET Professional: An Update" (Peter Mlotkowski and Hugh Guthrie); and "VET Workforce Collection: Feasibility Report" (Katherine McGregor). The three reports are published together by NCVER in "Vocational Education and Training Workforce Data 2008: A Compendium," edited by Hugh Guthrie.]