As my colleague Katherine has mentioned, much of the retraining is tied to EI eligibility, so a disproportionate number of people are not eligible. We hope you will seriously look at expanding the eligibility criteria for EI and make sure that training is connected to that.
Our position at CCSD is that we really need to look at a comprehensive lifelong learning strategy that targets youth, people of retirement age who must work for financial reasons, and work-aged individuals who have to shift careers. So I think a broader lifelong learning strategy is required.
On your question about new Canadians and education, I would urge the government to really look at foreign credentialling. Before coming to CCSD I was a senior vice-president at the Ottawa Hospital, and Dr. Kitts was the CEO in the former group. We recognized that there are tremendous health human resource challenges, as Pauline has outlined. There are many individuals in Canada today who could easily work in our health facilities but do not have the credentials. It's a huge barrier, and given the number of vacancies in that field it needs serious consideration.