Finance Committee on March 27th, 2014

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

I call this meeting to order. This is meeting number 25 of the Standing Committee on Finance. Pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), our orders of the day include continuing our study of youth employment in Canada.

We're very pleased to have our witnesses with us here today. First of all, from the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations, we have the national director, Mr. Jonathan Champagne. We have, from the Canadian Intern Association, the president, Claire Seaborn.

We also have with us the Director General of the Fédération de la jeunesse canadienne-française, Mr. Sylvain Groulx.

From Mitacs, we have the vice-president, Mr. Robert Annan. From Polytechnics Canada, we have back again before the committee Ms. Nobina Robinson, the CEO. Welcome back. And we are expecting the University of Toronto Students' Union. We hope to have them here during the proceedings. Welcome to all of you. Thank you for being with us here today.

You each have five minutes maximum for an opening statement. After that, we'll have questions from members.

We'll begin with the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations.

[Jonathan Champagne, National Director, Canadian Alliance of Student Associations]

Good afternoon, Mr. Chair, members of Parliament, fellow presenters, and guests.

I would like to extend the gratitude of students and youth from across the country for the action being taken to study the issue of youth employment. It is my pleasure to be here representing the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations. CASA consists of 24 member associations that represent 300,000 students at universities and colleges across Canada.

It will come as no surprise that today's students are concerned about finding a job after graduation. After all, students have primarily pursued post-secondary to get a leg up when entering the labour force. Unfortunately, many graduates either already know or will quickly find out that a successful transition from school to the workplace is not an easy one. This transition requires not just academic credentials but, increasingly, work experience too. A recent report from TD Economics indicated that, cumulatively, Canadian youth impacted by poor transitions to the workplace will lose over $23 billion in earnings over the next 18 years.

The added benefits of advanced education and training are clear. In 2012 there was an 11-point gap in the employment rate between youth who had completed high school and those who had completed some form of post-secondary education.

That being said, there are policies in place that are barriers for students to successfully transition into the workplace. Increasingly, students work while studying to help make ends meet. The amount of federal financial assistance available to students has remained the same for nearly a decade and the cost of an education has not.

Those who receive student loans are only allowed to earn up to $100 per week while studying before they start to have their financial assistance clawed back. Nearly six in ten upper-year students work an average of 18 hours per week. Whether it be part-time work, co-ops, internships, or other forms of work-integrated learning, penalizing students and creating disincentives for working is unfair and unnecessary. Removing these limits will create an environment that will help young people make the transition to lasting, meaningful, and gainful employment.

Poorly integrated new entrants, PINEs, as you might be aware, are a class of youth who have the skills and qualifications that make them employable but who frequently find themselves moving between temporary jobs and unemployment without being able to gain a foothold, even when the economy is growing. This is a big problem. Unfortunately, we lack the labour market data and information to be able to grasp the gravity of the situation. Recent graduates working in precarious and low-wage jobs continue to be grouped statistically with those who have secure, well-paying jobs. Better access to better information will result in better policy for government, better training for youth, and better hiring for employers.

CASA believes that a key destabilizing feature of Canada's employment landscape, one that is particularly troubling for youth, is the presence of unpaid internships. Vacant positions that should be filled by entry-level workers are instead being filled by individuals who can afford to work without compensation. This is especially troubling in a country desperate to build employment opportunities for youth. While this issue will be discussed further by other witnesses, all orders of government should immediately act to ensure that young people trying to find jobs are not offered positions that provide nothing more than trivial experience with no pay.

Youth have always had higher rates of unemployment than the general population, and we recognize that. What is most concerning about the current situation is that the transition to the workforce is becoming more challenging. It will be problematic for all society if the reality of precarious employment follows current youth throughout their lives. If nothing changes, it could cost the whole country dearly.

Thank you for your time.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you for your presentation.

We'll now hear from the Canadian Intern Association, please.

[Claire Seaborn, President, Canadian Intern Association]

Hello, everyone.

My name is Claire Seaborn.

I am a common law student at the University of Ottawa. I am also the President of the Canadian Intern Association.

We're a not-for-profit federal organization that aims to improve internship experiences and end the exploitation of unpaid interns.

Over the next five minutes I will speak about the problems with unpaid internships, outline the internship issues within federal jurisdictions, and provide legal and policy recommendations.

The word “internship” isn't defined in Canadian workplaces or in law. Internships can be paid or unpaid and they can be part of a formal educational program or they can be independently organized. An estimated 300,000 unpaid internships outside of school programs take place across Canada annually.

I speak to interns about their experiences every day and I've been an unpaid intern twice myself.

Although paid internships can be extremely valuable, unpaid internships facilitate socio-economic, gender, and intergenerational inequality. There are two University of Victoria master's students who recently undertook a study of unpaid internships to examine these issues. They're here today. While this study has limitations, the results provide insight on the characteristics and outcomes of internships in Canada.

For many industries, unpaid internships have effectively become a prerequisite to a job. The result is that those without the right financial means or connections are simply unable to break into certain fields.

The University of Victoria study found that unpaid internships have a disproportionate effect on women. Industries with unpaid internships are typically female dominated. Now, older generations who did not perform internships are benefiting from the labour of younger workers.

Unpaid internships also present other problems: they drive down wages, replace paid positions and contribute to youth unemployment.

In 2013, roughly 14% of Canadians aged 15 to 24 who were looking for work could not find a job.

A study from the University of Victoria revealed that 86% of unpaid interns were not hired at the end of their internship.

Now I'd like to shift to internship issues within federal jurisdictions.

First, there is a complete lack of data on internships in Canada. No provincial or federal government has collected any statistics regarding the prevalence or characteristics of unpaid internships.

Second, federal workplace laws are unclear regarding the status of interns. The Canada labour code does not have provisions for training or for internships, and the Canada labour program has not released any interpretation guidelines. Under Canadian workplace law, interns are considered employees unless they are subject to some kind of statutory exclusion. So provinces like Ontario and Quebec and British Columbia have all released statutory exclusions or interpretation guidelines for interns and trainees. But the federal government hasn't done that.

This legal ambiguity at the federal level means that interns can't claim EI or CPP, and they can't make contributions either. They're not protected under federal workplace health and safety laws.

The third problem is that measures designed to prevent employers from offering unpaid internships are insufficient. For this reason, unpaid interns do not pay income tax. We believe that millions of dollars in tax revenue are lost in this way.

Now I have two examples to illustrate these internship issues.

The first example is Jainna Patel, who is one of over 100 unpaid interns at Bell Media in Toronto. She did telephone surveys, performed research, and wrote reports. She is actually a math and statistics major. She filed a complaint with the Canada labour program and the inspector rejected that complaint.

After we put Bell Media on our wall of shame, we received emails from a bunch of other interns who had similar experiences. One was an unpaid intern in Bell's hardware department. He provided technician support for Bell's computers. Unpaid, he implemented software and hardware for the network infrastructure as well.

Jainna has appealed her decision and a hearing is going to take place this summer to determine whether Jainna was entitled to wages and whether Bell must pay their interns.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

We're coming up against time so can I just get you to wrap up, please?

[Claire Seaborn]

Sure.

I'm going to quickly mention the second example which is about the tragic death of Andy Ferguson.

He worked at a radio station in Alberta as an intern, and as a contract employee. After finishing a double shift— which lasted 16 hours and ended at 5 a.m—he fell asleep at the wheel and his car collided with a truck. When the Canada Labour Program did an investigation, they concluded that the paid hours were within allowable limits. They had no authority to investigate the unpaid hours because Andy was a post-secondary student.

In conclusion, the first recommendation is Statistics Canada should begin tracking unpaid internships as part of the labour force survey.

The second is parliament needs to amend the Canada Labour Code to extend employment standards to protect interns.

The third is the Canada Labour Program and the Canada Revenue Agency should adopt proactive enforcement strategies.

Finally, we would just like to thank the three members of Parliament—Scott Brison, Andrew Cash, and Brent Rathgeber—who have already spoken out about this issue.

We're very pleased to have the opportunity to address the committee.

Thanks.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you.

I'll remind witnesses that the reason we do limit is so we can allow as much time for questions as possible.

I will now give the floor to Mr. Sylvain Groulx, from the Fédération de la jeunesse canadienne-française.

[Sylvain Groulx, Director General, Fédération de la jeunesse canadienne-française]

Good afternoon. Thank you, Mr. Chair and members of the committee.

First of all, allow me to say that as an organization representing French-speaking young people in the country since 1974, our federation believes in working with and for young people. The Fédération de la jeunesse canadienne-française believes it has a duty to ensure that young people have a voice at events like this one today. So it is actually unusual for me, the director general, to be speaking today on their behalf. Because of the storm that has hit the Maritimes in the last few days, our president, Alexis Couture, was not able to be here today because his flight was cancelled. I would like you to know that the testimony I will be presenting today comes from Alexis. That said, I would like to thank you for having invited the FJCF to appear before you this afternoon.

As an organization that offers programs through the Youth Employment Strategy, and having created many employment projects for French-speaking youth in Canada living in minority communities, we are convinced that we will be able to contribute to your study on youth employment in the country.

The FJCF's priority is to defend the interests of French-speaking youth living in minority communities. According to the most recent Statistics Canada data, there are more than 450,000 young people aged 14 to 25 whose first or second language is French, and who live in Canada but outside of Quebec.

Our federation also creates a range of activities that allow young people to have French-language experiences across the country and also locally, with the help of 11 youth organizations in 9 provinces and 2 territories.

For the past 18 years, the FJCF has led projects funded by the Youth Employment Strategy. Our organization has designed and led nine editions of the Francophone Youth Employment Program, which was funded by the Career Focus Section of the Youth Employment Strategy.

Since 1996, the FJCF has helped find placements for around 200 young people per year through the Languages at Work Section of the Young Canada Works Program. This program is administered by the Department of Canadian Heritage, through the Summer Work Experience Program.

Furthermore, for three years we have led the Traduca Internship Program, funded by Public Works and Government Services Canada.

In the 2014 budget, the government committed to making sure that employment programs better reflected the realities of the job market. Given the new conditions for certain employment programs, it is obvious to us that the government will not be able to ensure that its employment programs line up with the realities of the job market for official language minority communities.

Unfortunately, because of the new conditions, certain employment programs will limit eligibility to private sector employers or those who do not receive any public funds.

As a result, French-speaking youth who want to work in French outside of Quebec will be left behind by these programs. We find it alarming that this new trend could spread to other programs which have not yet been affected by the new conditions.

For this reason, it is critical that the government review its program policies in order to include francophone minority community organizations as potential employers in these employment programs. This would allow us to fight against two significant problems, the first and most important of which is the small number of French-language jobs in Canada in official language minority communities. I am not referring to bilingual positions, but rather to positions where the young workers would be working mainly in French. The second problem is that francophone minority community organizations have difficulty recruiting educated and qualified labour.

Apart from a few communities, francophone community organizations are the largest source of French-language jobs in Canada outside of Quebec. They represent an incredible springboard for young students or graduates who speak French and who live in minority communities, because these organizations provide early and enriching work experiences in a wide range of fields related to young people's studies. Furthermore, if we want Canada's francophone and Acadian communities to flourish, we will require good youth employment programs for young students and graduates who speak French, through francophone community organizations.

It is important to understand that the reality for not-for-profit francophone organizations outside of Quebec is not the same as for anglophone organizations. For this reason, francophone organizations should receive this type of funding.

In his presentation before this committee on March 6, Mr. David McGovern, Senior Assistant Deputy Minister in the Department of Employment and Social Development, argued that the government was trying to match job offers and job seekers, to benefit skilled young workers.

We believe that the interest French-speaking youth have for their language is underestimated. So, the government is not currently meeting the ambitions of these French-speaking youth.

To conclude, I would say that there is currently a significant lack of job opportunities for French-speaking youth in minority communities. However, effective methods have already been successfully established to fill part of that gap, such as the programs that were offered by the FJCF. All these programs require is a change in the conditions that would allow not-for-profit organizations to be considered as employers. These are programs that have a huge impact on young people and that meet real needs, both for young people and their communities.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you.

Next we'll go to Mitacs, please.

[Robert Annan, Vice-President, Research and Policy, Mitacs]

Thanks.

Good afternoon, honourable members. Thank you for the opportunity to present to the committee today.

Mitacs is a national, independent, not-for-profit research organization that supports Canadian innovation through collaborative research projects that link Canadian businesses with leading experts at Canadian universities. A key component in all of our programs is skills training and professional development of our participants—graduate students and post-doctoral fellows at Canadian universities.

At the foundation, we understand that education is key to preparing our young people for jobs and that a strong foundational education is key to tackling chronic unemployment. At Mitacs we work with some of Canada's best educated young people, but even for these highly schooled youth we recognize that transitioning into high-quality jobs is a bigger challenge for this generation than it has ever been before. It is not just that these young people suffer these challenges, but in underutilizing their talent and training, we as Canadians lose the opportunity to be more productive and more innovative as a society. Over the last 15 years, we've developed programs that support skills development and training to ensure that we support the transition of these young researchers into productive, well-paying jobs.

Our flagship program, Mitacs Accelerate, is a program that integrates industrial research experience and professional skills development into the academic research training for graduate students and post-doctoral researchers through paid research internships aligned with their academic studies. Accelerate has grown from 18 internships in 2007 to well over 2,000 internships this year delivered from coast to coast in every sector and academic discipline.

Since 2007, Mitacs has supported internships for more than 5,000 Canadian students and post-docs. Our studies demonstrate that these students have an easier time transitioning to non-academic jobs, earn higher starting salaries than their peers, and even start their own companies at a higher rate. We've also observed an indirect benefit for young researchers through these internships. Host organizations clearly value the research performed by these interns. They have served as exceptional mechanisms to transfer knowledge and expertise from the universities into more than 2,000 Canadian companies, most of which are small and medium-sized enterprises. This value is best exemplified by the fact that companies often create new positions in their companies as a result of their participation in the program. Nearly 20% of our participating companies hire their interns into newly created positions within their firms. Not only are the interns benefiting personally from their improved employability but these internships have the potential to grow the pool of available jobs.

Mitacs has several other innovation programs, all built on the same general model of providing relevant experience and skills training as part of a comprehensive education. For instance, we have a post-doctoral training program called Elevate, which is now a national program thanks to funding in the most recent federal budget. Post-doctoral fellows are a wonderful, untapped resource of highly trained and educated young researchers, but many languish in university labs due to fewer opportunities to find jobs as university professors. Elevate provides these researchers the opportunity to work with industry and to gain skills and experience through a combination of mentorship, experience, and workshops all geared towards providing them with the ability to act as research managers for Canadian companies that lack capacity to build and manage research portfolios. This year, several hundred post-docs across the country will work as young research managers with Canadian companies, providing valuable research expertise to their company hosts while easing their transition out of the universities and into industry.

Finally, I'll mention our professional skills training program called Step. Mitacs runs a series of Step workshops at universities across the country on topics such as project management, communication skills, and business etiquette. These immensely popular workshops are offered free of charge to graduate students. In five years more than 10,000 students have attended Step workshops at universities in every province in Canada. These workshops supplement the students' advanced education with so-called soft skills that our industrial partners have identified as key hiring factors.

In all of these cases, we have engaged with industry partners—those who know best what skills and expertise they need in today's job market—to train our students. We believe a significant strength of our approach is that we do not seek to replace or to supplant the fine education provided by Canadian universities. Rather, we seek to supplement the quality education provided by our world-class institutions with the opportunity to apply knowledge first-hand to gain relevant experience and to connect with the professional world before facing the job market upon graduation.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

You have one minute.

[Robert Annan]

We are passionate about internships and experiential learning because we've seen them work time and again. They leverage the strengths of our existing educational institutions with the opportunity to engage directly with those firms that understand in-demand skills best.

We sincerely support the work of this committee to address issues of youth unemployment and are pleased to provide whatever support we can.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you very much for your presentation.

We'll now go to Polytechnics Canada, please.

[Nobina Robinson, Chief Executive Officer, Polytechnics Canada]

Thank you for the invitation to speak with you today, honourable members, on the persistent challenge of youth unemployment.

We have two recommendations to propose, which will conclude my remarks.

My name is Nobina Robinson, and I'm the CEO of Polytechnics Canada, the association that represents Canada's leading urban, degree-granting, publicly funded colleges and polytechnics. You know us best as the champions for increased supports for apprentices and the inclusion of college applied research in federal support for innovation and R and D.

Polytechnic applied education has three distinct features that are relevant for our discussion.

We offer undergraduate degrees and graduate certificates as well as the full range of traditional community college vocational and professional credentials. We offer more than 220 skilled trades training programs, and student involvement in applied research projects is available for hands-on R and D experience, along the lines of what our colleagues in Mitacs do for the graduate students.

Applied education is outcomes-based. Our members work closely with industry partners to set curricula according to industry standards, ensuring that our graduates will meet employer expectations and hit the ground running on day one on the job. Work-integrated learning is the hallmark of our model of education. Irrespective of the various debates over the skills mismatch, I want to make the case that advanced applied education is the best insurance against youth unemployment and underemployment.

There is a diverse set of needs and experience levels among the youth who are unemployed and underemployed. At least two different descriptors are needed to capture this diversity: those who are “not in education, employment, or training”, now known as NEETs; and those who are the “poorly integrated new entrants” to the labour force, now referred to as PINEs, as our colleagues in CASA mentioned.

It is the PINEs I want to focus on today, those who are underemployed, sometimes overqualified, or generally mismatched to the needs of employers.

I understand that you will be hearing from the traditional community college sector next week. All of Canada's colleges offer solutions for those known as NEETs. Polytechnic institutions have innovated their training programs to develop a solution for PINEs.

We saw a strong trend of students enrolling in our institutions who had already completed a university bachelor's degree and who sought targeted skills that would give them a competitive advantage in the marketplace. We developed graduate certificates to respond to this demand, providing students with small classes, industry-experienced faculty, and relevant workplace experience. These certificates put them not just into a new job but on the on-ramp to a prosperous career.

In the absence of timely labour market information—a vital federal role—we've decided to collect our own. Our members offer more than 200 such graduate certificate programs open only to those who have completed a prior post-secondary credential, usually a university degree. An average of 12% of our full-time students have already completed a four-year university bachelor's degree and are now enrolled in these targeted graduate certificate programs. In some cases, the percentage of university graduates is as high as 15%.

These graduate certificates are in high demand. The ratio of qualified applicants for each available seat is often 10:1 or higher. I can provide specific examples in our discussions to follow.

Our two recommendations for your study are the following.

First, provide timely, relevant, objective, credible, and consistent labour market information by focusing on two Statistics Canada surveys: modernize and improve the Workplace and Employee Survey; and reactivate the Youth in Transition Survey. These were noted by the 2009 Drummond panel. These surveys will provide the depth and the breadth of data needed to connect education to employment. That will allow employers to look for new hires with the right credentials and will allow educational institutions to design more outcomes-oriented programs and students to make more informed choices about what to study.

Second, to increase the capacity of our institutions' high-demand programs, such as these graduate certificates, a portion of the funding for the Canada social transfer for post-secondary education should be set aside for demand-driven, industry-responsive programs.

For every one student who gets to register for these in-demand programs, our current capacity restraints force us to turn away nine other fully qualified applicants.

In conclusion, the plight of younger workers is a persistent social and economic challenge that has much impact on Canada's productivity. As a closing remark, it is worth saying that all of this will be easier to do once we establish a parity of esteem among the various post-secondary options young people choose from today.

Thank you. I look forward to your questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you very much for your presentation.

We'll now welcome from the University of Toronto Students Union the president-elect, Ms. Yolen Bollo-Kamara.

You have five minutes for your opening presentation.

[Yolen Bollo-Kamara, President Elect, University of Toronto Students' Union]

Good afternoon. My name is Yolen. I'm the vice-president equity and president-elect of the University of Toronto Students' Union. I, like most students at the University of Toronto and our peers across the country, opted to pursue higher education in the belief that our initiative, hard work, and financial investment would lead to well-paying, secure jobs that would allow us to repay our loans. That is no longer the case.

During the recession, youth unemployment peaked at more than 15% and hasn't changed much since. Recent figures place it at about 14%, double the national rate. If this number accounted for those who are underemployed or in precarious work with part-time, temporary, and contract jobs with lower wages and few to no benefits, it would double to about 28%. Of jobs created between 2008 and 2013, 72% fall into the precarious category, which leaves Canada ranked 17th among OECD countries for the proportion of people who are precariously employed

As our tuition increases, the financial value of our investment seemingly decreases. An undergraduate degree on average provides a 30% earnings premium over a high school degree, but in the last decade, degree holder wages have increased by 8% while high school and college diploma wages have increased by 13%. With increasing debt and fewer good job options, young Canadians are in crisis, and many who are desperate for employment are forced to consider working for free.

It is now believed that as many as 300,000 young Canadians each year are forced to take on unpaid internships, an extreme form of precarious work. Regulations vary based on jurisdictions, and there is poor enforcement of what little regulation is in place, making these positions especially precarious and prone to abuse.

Although many students are aware that they are being exploited, they find it difficult to come forward to report incidents because of the fear of being blacklisted. In Ontario and at the University of Toronto Students' Union we have been working towards pressuring the provincial government to enforce a six-step process, as outlined in the Employment Standards Act, to ensure that students are not being taken advantage of. We've been able to work with Yasir Naqvi, the Minister of Labour, to ensure that interns are better covered under provincial legislation.

However, this is not just a provincial issue. It is a national issue, and a growing issue at that. The case of Andrew Ferguson in Alberta was mentioned; he was a student who died after driving home from his unpaid internship.

Another example is an unpaid bus person internship at Vancouver's Fairmont Waterfront Hotel. Unpaid internships favour those without student debt and those who come from higher income backgrounds. Those who cannot afford to work for free lose out on networking opportunities, can suffer from skills degradation, and often can have their skills fall behind innovation, making it more difficult to enter their field, if given the opportunity.

There have been numerous cases in which unpaid internships offer little benefit to students while providing a service to an employer who would otherwise pay for the position. Unpaid internships are unfair for students, and changes need to be made. We are calling on the federal government to take a leadership role in addressing the national youth employment crisis.

For these reasons, we ask that the government take the following measures. First, develop a national strategy to address youth unemployment, underemployment, and unpaid internships, and that includes as a first step collecting relevant employment data on recent graduates. Second, restore funding to the Canada summer jobs grants program. Third, eliminate the practice of unpaid internships within government and federally regulated companies; I think it's important for the federal government to take the leadership in this instance. Fourth, work with the provinces to create employment standards for precarious work in internships, as well as to increase the ability to enforce the standards.

Youth are not the future of the economy; we are part of it now. We need the government to take action today to ensure that we are able to fully participate in the labour market.

Thank you for inviting me to speak today. I and my colleague Najiba will be happy to take any questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you very much for your presentation.

We'll begin members' questions.

Mr. Dubé, you have five minutes.

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank all of our witnesses for being here today.

I have a few questions for you, Mr. Groulx.

During this study, we have often talked about mobility and the fact that some young people are leaving their region. You spoke about official languages, which I find interesting. When I had the opportunity to meet with representatives or your organization in the past, there was a lot of discussion regarding the consequences that these demographic changes could have on francophone communities outside Quebec. That was the first part of my question.

The second part concerns the Roadmap for Canada's Official Languages 2013-2018. Some youth employment programs were abolished by the government. Does this have negative consequences for these communities? The guarantee of services is based on the strength of each francophone community. If people leave the communities, services are reduced accordingly.

[Sylvain Groulx]

Thank you for the question.

There are consequences on student mobility. Because young people have few opportunities to continue their post-secondary education in French in most of these communities, they move towards large urban centres. We are looking for ways to have these young people come back.

People return to their regions for all sorts of reasons. Feeling like they belong is important, but jobs are really the main reason why people return to their communities. It is therefore very important to ensure that there are jobs in the regions. All young Canadians are very mobile, but this is particularly true of young francophones. Because the communities are already small, they are impacted by this mobility.

There was a program under the previous roadmap. Public Works and Government Services Canada provided funding for a youth employment program for students studying translation and interpretation. Unfortunately, cuts in the 2013 budget have meant that PWGSC's assistance program for the language sector was abolished.

Some programs aimed at the language sector, including Skills Link, were strengthened. However, translation and interpretation services were not. At the same time, we are hearing that there will not be enough workers in this sector over the next decade. In terms of official languages, it is important for communities to continue to have access to translation and interpretation services. It is unfortunate that they are no longer included in the roadmap.

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Regarding youth unemployment, much has been said and much will continue to be said about the long-term impact on youth, who must find somewhere to settle down and have children and so on. I reiterate, and I will continue to do so, that this places francophone communities in a particular situation.

Given what was just said, are you starting to see impacts on youth employment in general?

[Sylvain Groulx]

Young people in minority communities are in a fairly unique situation in terms of employment. I mentioned it during my presentation. We talked a lot about linguistic duality. Young people want to settle down and find work, but in most cases, the language of work is almost exclusively English, which leaves no room for the francophone aspect.

This has an impact on communities. Fewer people return. Communities become weaker and more assimilated. In short, these communities are the losers. There are a few exceptions, such as the Acadian Peninsula, in New Brunswick, and some regions in eastern Ontario.

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Does your federation have any solutions to propose? Are you asking for the federal government to provide leadership?

[Sylvain Groulx]

In some cases, we have to ensure that not-for-profit organizations in minority communities have access to programs that are funded by the government so that they can participate actively in job searches. This would enable them to develop fully.

[Matthew Dubé, NDP, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

I will use the 30 seconds I have left to state that the situation of francophones in minority communities is extremely important.

Thank you very much for providing us with information on this issue.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you.

Next we'll go to Mr. Saxton, please.