Human Resources Committee on June 5th, 2014

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

Take an issue like the increase in the number of Canadians that are working for minimum wage, which has grown by about 68% since 2006. Are the tools to measure that...? Can you draw some conclusions from that, the increase in that number?

Are the analytical tools out there to evaluate why this has taken place? Why has the growth taken place in those people that are working for minimum wage, or do you see a benefit in maybe trying to develop tools to measure that?

[Mostafa Askari]

I'm sure it is possible to look at that question as to why the number of people with minimum wage has increased. Typically, when we go through a severe recession and a rise in the unemployment rate, obviously people who are unemployed look for anything they can find. There's a possibility that they grab whatever is available at the time and that could be a minimum wage job.

As we come out of a recession and the economy recovers, and we have better labour market conditions, that may change again. People find the jobs they are qualified for and jobs that pay for the skill levels that they have.

We haven't really done any kind of analysis to that extent, no.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

The information that you get from StatsCan, it seems that there has been less information or that the quality of the information from StatsCan has sort of dropped off a bit over the last while.

Are there aspects of information gathering that have been cut, that you see would merit a reinvestment, or has the information been fairly consistent over the years?

[Mostafa Askari]

We are probably a bit biased because our business relies on information and data. Obviously, the more that is available, the better it is for us to do our job, and therefore, for parliamentarians.

Certainly, Statistics Canada has gone through budget cuts as have many other departments. They have had to find a way to prioritize their activities and focus on the areas that they are obligated to provide information on, and then cut the areas that are not as important at least from their perspective.

My suggestion is that if you can somehow provide help to Statistics Canada, so that they could provide better detailed information on the labour market or any other thing; obviously, it would be better for us and better for the country as a whole because that kind of information is needed to provide a solid analysis to parliamentarians and policy-makers.

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

We've sort of heard it from witness to witness, over the course of the study, that we need the information almost quarterly, by sector, by region. The mass data and generalizations aren't as helpful, so you would think investments in those areas would be of benefit to everybody.

[Mostafa Askari]

Absolutely.

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

You'll have to leave it there, Mr. Cuzner, you're over time.

Our first panel was here for half an hour and that pretty much gets us very close, within a couple of minutes of half an hour.

If I might ask a question because my orientation is from heading up the Ontario Home Builders' Association as a builder, prior to my political life, in a professional organization.

How much data do you receive from industry groups such as construction? Mine was home building. We kept pretty accurate...not on-time data but we were in touch with the fact that in the mid-1990s we were short of bricklayers in Ontario. How much of that information do you receive and how much of it factors into your comments?

[Mostafa Askari]

The data we normally use has to be official data because we have to make sure we are using reliable data that has the necessary characteristics. If that kind of information from different industry groups and employers' associations is not official data then we don't normally use it. For example, CFIB provides data on labour markets, which we have used in our report, but that's official data. It's an official survey, and it's conducted based on the necessary standards.

One point I'll make very quickly is that there are always shortages, mismatches in the labour market. In a dynamic labour market like Canada's when people come in—new entrants, new firms, new hiring—there are always some skills mismatches, but that's normal. I think the question, and what one wants to evaluate, is whether we have gone beyond the normal level of skills mismatch. That would require some attention by changing the policy. I think that's really it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

I'll close with one last personal comment. I think it behooves every member of Parliament to know what's going on in their riding. They represent the employers in their riding, and frankly when it comes to decision-making on issues like this I have a close monitor on the riding, and I think most MPs do. I don't think we're in a void, at least not if we're doing our job representing the people within our region of the country or our riding.

I have one point of clarification, Mr. Cuzner. Mr. Drummond has been invited and he has declined.

Thank you very much for being here. We appreciate your input today into this critical study of labour market development agreements, and we will recess until we resume with the next panel.

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. We're continuing this hour with our study of the renewal of labour market development agreements. We're now joined by a panel of witnesses to provide their testimony and to answer questions for about an hour.

Joining us now we have Mr. Michael Atkinson, president of the Canadian Construction Association, and joining us by video conference from Saskatoon we have Mr. Sean Junor, manager of workforce planning and talent acquisition, human resources, with Cameco Corporation. I would like to proceed with the witnesses' testimony. You have up to 10 minutes, gentlemen, and we'll proceed with Mr. Atkinson.

[Michael Atkinson, President, Canadian Construction Association]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

As was stated, I'm the president of the Canadian Construction Association. We represent the non-residential construction sector in Canada. Essentially our members build everything except single-family dwellings.

You heard from our sister association, the Canadian Home Builders' Association, about two days ago. I'm tempted to just say “ditto” and leave, but I think I'm going to fill in the blanks and maybe provide some of the supporting information for some of the testimony you've heard.

Together with our friends in the residential sector, the construction industry in Canada employs over 1.3 million people. That is a record employment level for our industry. We've been sustaining record employment levels for some time now. Even when we lost workers during the recession, we made that up almost immediately, very shortly after the recession first hit.

We certainly appreciate the opportunity to be here. With this size of employment, you can well imagine that we are employers who are extremely interested in the subject matter before you.

I have three recommendations for the committee with respect to the specific subject matter you are looking at, but I'd like to set the table first, to give you a snapshot of where we are particularly in the non-residential sector of the construction industry.

We have a perfect storm happening. Canada's construction market, according to Oxford Economics, is now the fifth-largest construction market in the world. For a population the size of Canada's, that's saying something when you're up there with China, the United States, India, and Japan. It projects that over the next decade, Canada will remain in the fifth or sixth position. Russia may edge us out.

We're having unprecedented demand for our services, primarily from the resource sector and from large public infrastructure projects, especially in the transit area. Canada's public infrastructure is reaching that 45- to 55-year life and needs a massive overhaul and renewal. So we have that going on.

At the same time, we have an extremely aging demographic in our industry—and I did hear the previous witness—and we have excellent labour market intelligence, coming from a sector council that the industry established, which has all participants at the table, including labour and including owners who rely on our services.

They project demand for our industry out over an eight- to ten-year period. Then, as typical economists will do, they look at the supply side and say, “Where are we going to be with respect to our labour supply in terms of how many people are going through the apprenticeship system right now?”

The provincial governments are part of that exercise, providing excellent information on how many apprentices there are and what the labour supply looks like. That's being done by something called BuildForce Canada. I highly recommend that you visit their website. It tracks the supply and demand in the non-residential sector of the industry as well as in the residential sector.

What do they say? They say that by 2023 we will need to find 300,000 new workers just to replace those who are going to be retiring in the intervening years, and to keep pace with our rising demand. Often when people look at where your labour supply needs are and what you need in terms of your labour market, they forget to factor in projected demand.

With all due respect, most of the economic studies done with respect to labour supply are looking in the rear-view mirror and using old statistics. For an industry like ours, and the size of our industry, where a lot of our training in our specific trades takes four to five years, we can't be looking in the rear-view mirror. We have to be looking straight ahead and using a GPS system to tell us where we should be going. Labour market information, for us, is all about looking forward, not looking backward.

Where will these 300,000 workers come from? In fact, BuildForce Canada looks at how much of that can be dealt with and sourced in Canada. It finds that almost half will be sourced in Canada. There is, however, a shortfall of about 100,000 to 120,000, who, they say, are going to have to come from outside the construction industry or indeed outside Canada.

Now, I want to stop right there and say that the first preferred option of all of our employers is to hire Canadians and permanent residents. Absolutely that's what we want to do. That's our preferred option.

In fact if you look at our industry's usage of the temporary foreign worker program—and I'm using the 2012 stats, the most recent available—at the peak our industry was bringing in about 12,000 temporary foreign workers. That's less than 1% of the 1.3 million I just mentioned. Many of the reasons why we were bringing them in as temporary foreign workers were that for a long time the front door, permanent entry, was closed to us because of that silly 100-point system.

So the best way for us to get permanent workers was to bring them in on temporary visas, get their 12-month experience, have them go through a Canadian experience class, or indeed, through a provincial nominee program. We want permanent workers. We want workers for our future labour needs.

Interprovincial mobility is a huge area for us, and you know there isn't one solution for us in our labour market needs. Immigration's part of it, but it's only part of it. We realize for labour mobility we have to be better at getting the workers where the work is. That's the other perfect storm element we're facing.

Our projects are getting bigger just by the very nature of the types of projects. ReNew Canada publishes on an annual basis the top 100 public infrastructure projects in Canada. The latest report says of the top 100, 44 are individually valued at $1 billion or more.

Now I can remember 10 to 15 years ago, if you asked me how many billion-dollar projects there were in Canada, I could use one hand and not have to use all five digits. We are seeing that expanding. Natural Resources Canada has said there are some 600 large projects that are going to have to be done within the next decade worth over $650 billion.

Certainly our foreign competitors know how hot the Canadian market is. All the big European companies are here right now.

I better speed up. Otherwise I'll not get to my recommendations.

Our first recommendation is with respect to labour market information. Absolutely we need that, but we define labour market information as looking through the front window with a good GPS system, not looking in the rear-view mirror. We ask you to take a look at what BuildForce Canada is doing. It's an excellent approach that should be duplicated by other industries and other sectors.

Quite frankly, speaking for our industry, we like to do our own LMI because we trust it a heck of a lot more than something coming from government, with all due respect. The Job Bank does a great job of having a snapshot of where we are currently, but it's still not looking out, and we have to look out.

Secondly, and I think you have heard this from all witnesses, there has to be more employer engagement in determining where training dollars should be spent, particularly with LMDA funds. Why? Because employers are a major contributor. It comes from EI funds. Government's money? No. Employers and employees pay into the EI fund, and employers pay $1.40 for every dollar labour puts in, so let's stop this myth right now that business doesn't pay attention to training.

On a $1.95 billion expenditure just under LMDA alone, my calculations say $1.1 billion of that comes from employers in this country. So they should have a say, and we would argue that say should, again, be replicated at the provincial and regional level because there are unique differences in our country. Indeed, labour markets, as other witnesses have said, are different from one segment of the country to another. We need more employer engagement.

I'm not pointing a finger at governments and saying they failed to do that. To a great degree industry itself has failed to be at the table and be involved in that.

Our third recommendation is to avoid an “Ottawa knows best” approach to the development and management of these EI programs. The labour needs across the country are diverse. So from our perspective, leave the management of the programs with the provinces, but find a way to have true employer engagement in that model.

I think I'm going to stop there, Mr. Chair. I would like to entertain some questions about what you heard from the previous witness about whether or not there's a skills shortage in our industry. I can tell you there is and it is somewhat regional, but we have some big challenges ahead.

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

Thank you, Mr. Atkinson. You were right on time by the way, sir.

Now on to Mr. Junor, on video conference.

Sir, you have 10 minutes.

[Sean Junor, Manager, Workforce Planning and Talent Acquisition, Human Resources, Cameco Corporation]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thanks to the committee for inviting Cameco Corporation to share with you our views on the challenges and opportunities in developing and delivering workforce training programs in remote areas of the country.

For those of you who don't know, Cameco, headquartered in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, is one of the world’s largest producers of mined uranium used for clean energy production. The majority of our production comes from our four mining and milling operations in northern Saskatchewan.

Our mandate as a northern Saskatchewan operation is to maximize the participation in our workforce of people who live in communities located within the northern administrative district of Saskatchewan. This district is home to only 36,000 people, or roughly 3% of the population of the province. However, those individuals are scattered in communities that amount to about 40% of the terrain of the province.

Despite this geographic and obvious demographic challenge, we are proud that in our company’s 25-year history we have steadily built our local workforce to the point now where one in two, or 50%, of our employees who work at our four northern operations are local to the region.

Through agreements with the Province of Saskatchewan, these employees are classified as residents of Saskatchewan’s north, or RSNs. About 90% of RSNs are of aboriginal background, reflecting the actual makeup of these communities in the north. For an actual head count, about 1,500 of our mine site jobs today are held by workers of first nation and Métis heritage—that would be a combination of both our own employees and our contractors—making Cameco the largest industrial employer of aboriginal people in Canada.

Our success so far in advancing aboriginal employment has been accomplished through well-designed recruitment programs, training partnerships with government and aboriginal agencies, as well as accommodations by unions and clear management policies. We intend to continue building on those achievements in the future. We also believe the federal government can and should remain a participant with our industry and the Province of Saskatchewan in advancing education and skills training for people in remote northern communities.

We know this isn't an easy challenge. Saskatchewan’s largest post-secondary institutions are located in Saskatoon, Regina, and Prince Albert. The town of La Ronge, which is the biggest community in Saskatchewan’s north, is also home to a regional college, Northlands College. But even La Ronge and Northlands are still located hundreds of kilometres south of the seven key first nations and Métis communities in what is known as the Athabasca Basin. I should point out that these communities in the basin include three Dene first nation communities that still lack year-round, all-weather road connections.

Despite these challenges, there are still several hundred employees from the Athabasca Basin communities connected to our mines and mills through employment, benefiting from our long-standing practice of operating our mines on a fly-in, fly-out basis. The challenge, however, remains that half the working-age population in the north does not possess a proper grade 12 education. In order to bolster the ranks of our aboriginal workforce, we continue to scour northern communities for good employment prospects, and work with educational institutions and government to upgrade educational achievement so that more people can find themselves eligible for employment within the industry.

Current labour market development agreements negotiated by the federal government and the Government of Saskatchewan have thus done a good job in working with communities and individuals in advancing foundational training. At two of our operations, we have full-time workplace educators who work in partnership with the college, that being Northlands College. These workplace educators provide GED upgrading and skills training to both our employees and contractors.

But in order to increase the participation rate of northerners at our mining operations, there is a need for more cooperative efforts to increase opportunities for advanced training. One way to do that is to increase the number of apprentices who can be taken in and supported by industry. Cameco currently has 17 apprentices, all of whom are northern aboriginal residents. Initially these 17 apprentices must do some compulsory course work at a post-secondary institution in either Prince Albert or Saskatoon. After placement at one of our operations, workplace educators assist these apprentices in providing further academic support.

We are excited by the possibility that proposed changes to the LMDA program could allow companies to provide additional training opportunities such as apprenticeships. We are encouraged to see that there appears to be aspects of the Canada job grant program that are well aligned to both our company’s and our industry’s needs. We think it quite valuable that companies could work with existing employees to access funds for training to boost their skill levels.

Employees working for Cameco already have advantages and opportunities to advance, especially in the north, through our career transition program. It identifies and encourages high-performing, motivated northern residents to make the transition within the workforce to a higher-level occupation. Today, we currently pay for their tuition and books for technical school or university, pay their wages while they attend school, and employ them during the summer break in the new occupations that they ultimately desire to obtain. Then, we hire them back into their fields once they complete their education.

Not everyone is suited for, or ready for, an extended period of time outside the home community attending a post-secondary institution. Having more trade apprentices learning and working on site, and being supported by a program such as the Canada job grant, would increase the number of people with the opportunities for advancement in their mining careers.

Only if there is an upward progression within our operations can we see further permanent gains in the level of aboriginal employment in our region. Federal support for enhanced training opportunities, which support this type of upward progression for motivated individuals, would benefit not only the individuals but ultimately society as a whole, by creating a better educated and better compensated taxpayer.

I thank you for your attention.

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

Thank you very much.

We'll move on to our first seven-minute round of questioning.

Madam Groguhé for seven minutes.

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I also want to thank the witnesses for being here with us today

In the context of our study, the Parliamentary Budget Officer has given us some very interesting and very relevant information. If the government wants to move forward with the renewal of the LMDAs, we are all going to have to agree if we are to obtain some reliable data.

If we are considering training programs, as you pointed out, Mr. Atkinson, it is in order to be able to move forward. We will have to do projections regarding training so that employment insurance recipients are matched up with the jobs to be filled.

I would like to ask a question concerning the gathering of this information.

In your view, what mechanisms need to be put in place to gather information on the labour market that is of the best possible quality? Do you have any recommendations on how these mechanisms should be established? Currently, there are many levels involved in gathering the data. How can we make sure that the data is much more centralized? According to what several witnesses have told us, it is as though there were gaps in certain areas, which means that the information is not reliable and available in a timely manner. Consequently, we cannot reach objectives in a realistic way.

You have the floor, Mr. Atkinson.

[Michael Atkinson]

Well, I guess from my perspective the BuildForce Canada model is a model that certainly our industry thinks is ideal for our sector. I'm no expert in all the details of that model, but essentially what happens is that they use an economic model from an economist that they engaged, which builds the information from the regions up.

They will go into British Columbia, Alberta, and different regions and talk to construction owners to get an idea of what the demand is going to be for construction activities over their subject period. They will then talk with the provinces to get data on how many actual construction people are in the occupations they track. They track some 33 occupations, and not just trades but supervisory people as well.

They then test that information against small forums that bring in labour, employers, and the training community, so that they have some way of bouncing it off the people who have the boots on the ground, if you will. Based on that, they create a prognosis, or a projection, provincially, regionally, and nationally, based upon that model. They update it on an annual basis. It does change and can fluctuate. With the size of some of these projects, if a project gets delayed by six months, you can imagine that it's going to have an impact on the demand side.

Now, this is based on the sector council that we put together some time ago. We fund the sector council's infrastructure. It's difficult, I think, for some of the other industry sectors to raise the funds to fund a sector council, but we've been able to get all of the players to the table, including labour and owners, to fund that mechanism, because we all agree that the information derived from that effort is absolutely essential for planning our long-term labour market needs.

I would say to look to the BuildForce Canada model.

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Very well.

My next question is for Mr. Sean Junor.

In his appearance before the committee, the Minister of Employment and Social Development Canada stated that he wanted to further develop the apprenticeship programs.

Can you describe your experience with the apprenticeship programs? What recommendations would you make to improve the programs and the support offered to apprentices in the automotive industry?

[Sean Junor]

Yes. Thank you.

I think the additional context that's required for us is that as a northern or remote employer we face additional challenges with our apprentices that urban employers or employers who operate in larger centres just simply won't have, and that's the distance between the home community and the institution.

Many of our apprentices come from communities that could be as small as 500 or 1,000 people, and they don't often leave their communities. Asking them to leave for seven weeks of training is a real barrier, a psychological barrier and an economic barrier. They are also individuals who haven't had access to the strongest foundational secondary education, and they will struggle with some of the core components of the apprenticeship program. That's why, as an organization, we've tried to have our workplace educators provide some tutorial or academic support to these individuals who are in those programs so that they are ultimately successful, because they have an investment in that and we have an investment in that, and we don't want to see them fail.

But it is definitely a challenge in the sense that the distance between some of these communities and their learning opportunities is quite far, and in many cases it is just too insurmountable for these individuals. Again, that could be psychological, or economic, or a combination of both. We've tried different things. We've had the trades training trailers for select occupations go to those communities, so that the individuals don't necessarily have to move or disrupt their lives, but obviously not all trades are able to be delivered like that. We try to seek areas where it's flexible, but it is definitely a challenge, and one that we continue to face as we look to diversify our workforce.

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

Thank you very much.

We'll go on to you, please, Mrs. McLeod, for seven minutes.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to thank both the witnesses for their testimony.

I have to really contrast the information we heard from the PBO earlier with what we've heard from a number of witnesses, and certainly we hear the minister regularly say that there's not a generalized skill shortage across Canada, though we surely have some areas and some regions of the country where that's particularly important.

As we look at the data that the PBO used—it was Bank of Canada, the Conference Board of Canada, CFIB, and Statistics Canada—certainly those are all very well-recognized and respected institutions within Canada, but I think what I'm hearing from you, Mr. Atkinson, is that they don't have the ability to tell the whole story in Canada. Therefore, if they don't have the ability to tell the whole story, then perhaps some of the conclusions are less than accurate.

Do you want to comment on that particular piece?

[Michael Atkinson]

Even when you delve into those studies, including the Drummond one, TD Economics, etc., they're not completely mutually exclusive. They're saying that for certain sectors and for certain regions of the country there is a problem. They're generally saying overall they don't see one. I guess if you have your feet in the oven and your head in the freezer, overall you're not doing too bad. But from a particular perspective that we have, projecting forward, I say we have a perfect storm.

The other thing that we didn't talk about was the fact that one of the other trends we're seeing, as the other witnesses said, is that many of the projects we have now are in very remote areas of Canada and people do not necessarily want to go to remote areas.

In fact, we helped fund a study by the Canadian Employee Relocation Council to look into what makes Canadians mobile, or what will make Canadians mobile. It was interesting. Only 34% of Canadians surveyed would actually consider moving if the incentives were right, including wages, and 55% of Canadians surveyed said they would not move under any circumstances. Unfortunately, if we have a large mining project from a construction perspective in northern Alberta, northern B.C., or a large hydroelectric project in Labrador, we can't move it to downtown Vancouver. We need the people to be where the work is.

Part of our challenge is not with respect to how many bodies there are, but do they have the skills? We have lots of apprentices coming in, but our apprenticeship system demands that they be mentored by fully qualified journeypersons, and it's the journeypersons we're losing through retirement. That creates a situation in which the need, yes, is in certain regions and for certain projects, but the need is complicated by the remoteness, the size of the project, and very often the need to mobilize people rather quickly.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

Thank you for that.

I always thought for my children, who are in their twenties, the world was going to be their oyster in terms of jobs, because the baby boomers were gone. I think maybe it's simply a little premature, because we do know that youth do have a challenge right now, but I suspect 10 years from now the youth won't have the challenge that they do at present, strictly by virtue of demographics.

I'm going to head to Mr. Junor next. You talked about the work that you're doing, but I'm wondering if you could talk to me a little bit about how the people are funded. We have the LMAs. We have the ASETS. We have the LMDAs. Can you talk a little bit about how those pieces all come together in terms of the work you're doing with respect to the mining in northern Saskatchewan?

[Sean Junor]

Yes. I didn't mention ASEP or any funding that I didn't believe was the focus of the committee, but we are very active participants in some of the funding that comes from different departments, particularly where it's focused on aboriginal peoples or northern remote areas. ASEP would be a perfect example. We are active in the two last northern career quest programs as an industry partner with education in government, where we're trying to create additional employment opportunities for what would be first nations individuals, which typically have been entry-level roles.

I think our biggest challenge today and for the future will be that those roles that would have existed 10 to 15 years ago as entry level or semi-skilled are just not going to exist in the future because of automation, drives for technical advancement. It's going to be harder and harder for individuals to come to a workplace or an industrial facility like ours with no formal education. Those roles are just simply going to drop off.

The challenge is how to get large segments of a small population to advance their education when their goal is to find employment and past generations have shown that they've made it into the workforce. There needs to be some incentives both from government and employers to advance individuals into the workforce so that they leave previously held roles and open up opportunities for new people coming in, because, just simply, net job creation in the future for us is not going to be at the entry level. It's going to be at the professional and technical level. I'm sure Michael Atkinson talked about some of the pressures on select occupations. Well, those select occupations just happen to be the areas where, traditionally, aboriginal people haven't held those roles. So it's going to be a struggle for us as an organization to maintain half of our employment for first nations and Métis people if we don't see advancement inside our own organization into areas like I talked about, apprenticeship or other areas in the professional and technical sphere.

[Cathy McLeod, Conservative, Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC]

So would you say that between the LMA, the ASETS, the LMDA, and then the education system, we've kind of managed to cover—and this is a quick yes or no—some of the broad basics in terms of what we need to do and where we need to go?

[Sean Junor]

I would say that there is a heavy focus on employability, direct employability into industries, not just ours. But I think you can't lose sight of the fact that a lot of these individuals need upgrading opportunities, GED, because without those components they don't have the opportunity to progress into college or technical or even university training. An area that's often overlooked is that whole component of GED or upgrading or skills enhancement, which would be in the high school equivalency.