Tyson Hubbard's plumbing career began with an ultimatum. In his early twenties, with footy fading and police trouble mounting, his cousin Wayne Dargan and close family friend Rowan Tobler were running the Koori Job Ready program and had plumbing apprenticeships on offer.

"If I don't take that apprenticeship on, I was probably going to be looking at getting incarcerated," he said.

"I ended up taking it on and never looked back. Construction was really good for me. It got me out of the house and cleared my head."

Today Hubbard owns Allpro Plumbing Solutions, a Liverpool company specialising in siphonic stormwater and pressurised and hybrid rainwater systems, with 19 full-time staff and jobs ranging from $1,000 school repairs to million-dollar contracts. All nine apprentices are Aboriginal, most of them local lads.

A proud Wiradjuri man from southwest Sydney with family connections to the south coast and inland New South Wales, Hubbard grew up in public housing in Miller and was the first tradesman in his family.

"I can't change the way we grew up. It honestly got me to where I am today," he said. "Everyone just sort of stayed close because we didn't have a whole heap."

Hubbard was foreman on the Parramatta stadium build when his employer went under, and Lendlease asked him to stay on and sign the job off. Allpro followed, with his wife leaving teaching to run the office.

"She's like the second mum for all the apprentices," he said.

This year the company will qualify its first home-grown tradesman. Rowan junior is the grandson of the late Les Tobler, who started Koori Job Ready, and the son of the man who helped get Hubbard his own start.

"That's four generations of people being together and creating opportunities, with many more to come," he said.

Eight of his apprentices were once expelled from schools they now service.

"The same kid that was sitting in a detention centre, no one wanted a bar of him, is now back there fixing the toilets," he said. One first-year nearly cried when a former teacher walked up and hugged him.

His advice to kids eyeing a trade: "Don't be scared to put your hand up and get out there and try. A trade's just a platform. AI will never replace a trade."

Hubbard left school early and has completed four university courses since starting the company.

"There's nothing wrong with learning, nothing wrong with bettering yourself," he said. "I want to see our people build this place."