Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Dec. 3rd, 2014

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Mr. Manicom.

[David Manicom]

Yes, the point system under express entry, as we call the comprehensive ranking system, will give applicants up to a maximum of 1,200 points; 600 points are given based on their human capital, their work experience, their education, their language skills, their age, with a heavy weight in favour of younger immigrants.

In addition, a significant number of bonus points, supplementary points, will be available, as I mentioned, for those holding an approved job offer or nominated by a province. This means everyone in the pool will have high human capital, and in each draw some of them will have approved job offers or provincial nominee applications. They will almost immediately be invited to apply, along with those in the pool at any given time who don't have an approved job offer, but have the very highest human capital based on that ranking system.

We also are allotting some points to spouses, based on their education and language experience; that's how the weighting will work. We are very highly transparent. People in the pool will be able to see how they're ranked and what's occurring in the draw every two weeks.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you.

Mr. Labelle, you have the floor for seven minutes.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you.

Good afternoon, everyone. This is probably the first time you have noticed me here.

I am looking at the budget requested this year. It is almost $7 million. To start with, I would like to have a quick breakdown of how the money will be used. I am wondering about the pool of targeted employees. Could you tell me what the relationship is between the size of the pool and the amount of money requested? How many potential employees are expected to be in the pool? How is the $7 million justified?

That is the first part of my question.

[Anita Biguzs]

Perhaps I will start, then turn to my colleagues.

The amount of funding we're seeking for express entry is an amount of $6.9 million. In total, budget 2014 announced funding for my department of $29.4 million over five years.

Funds are required for a number of things, primarily around standing up our IT systems. There are a lot of IT requirements as we create a new application management system, so we need to have the information technology capabilities in terms of making the changes to the system. We need to align our network capacity to some of our existing economic programs, like the Canadian experience class, and to meeting our service standard commitments of six months, because, as we indicated already we have a commitment to process applications within a six-month timeframe. We need operational project capacity, and that means people who have to be trained and equipped to be able to actually on-board a new system, in terms of how we're going to be drawing down high-skilled applicants. There are a lot of transition costs associated with express entry.

In terms of the number of people we're expecting, we're only standing up the system as of January 1, 2015. As a result, we are actually expecting the numbers to initially be relatively modest, but over time we would expect that a large part of our economic programs—and we indicate the number of applicants that we will take in through economic programs in our levels plans every year—and all of our economic immigrants will largely come through the express entry program.

I don't know if David or Bob wants to add to that.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

What is the projection?

[David Manicom]

For the number of people who...

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

This is spread over a five-year period. How many people will be using the system per year?

[David Manicom]

Some tens of thousands in the early stages, then rising rapidly beyond that. Simply to clarify, those in the pool will not constitute a cost outlay. The systems' outlays are there, but they're an electronic inventory so I don't know when we'd draw on it.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

I understand.

Let's go back to our famous pool. Imagine that my name is in the pool, but I am not selected. Will you direct people to employers or will employers consult the pool? How does that work? If I was not selected, how long would my name remain in the pool? Would it remain there indefinitely?

[David Manicom]

The names of the candidates will remain in the pool for 12 months. The applications and expressions of interest will be removed from the system, but the candidates can always submit another expression of interest.

The pairing of employers with candidates will be done by advertising our program, especially through the Job Bank.

The names of candidates in the pool will be placed in the Employment and Social Development Canada Job Bank, so that employers can see their contact information and communicate with them if they so wish. The candidates will also be able to see available jobs in the Job Bank and be proactive about contacting the employers.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

I would like to talk about the labour needs assessment. We know that it was difficult to obtain the numbers on the real need for temporary workers.

What data will you use to determine the needs of the Canadian labour market? Surely you will not go to Kijiji.

[David Manicom]

What matters is the number of people we ask to apply formally. In terms of the percentage of invitations per job, it is up to Canadian employers to use the system, and we are going to encourage them to do so.

The number of formal applications, invitations and processed applications will depend on the immigration levels submitted to Parliament each year. It depends on all our economic programs, including the humanitarian and compassionate immigration category. The government has decided to increase immigration levels for 2015 because of the labour shortage and the general state of the economy in Canada.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Could you share the point system with the committee? What criteria will be used to assess the people in the pool? We would be able to have a better idea of the situation and eventually get back to you on the issue.

[David Manicom]

Yes. That information was published in the December 1 Gazette, and the committee can consult it.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Okay.

Citizenship and Immigration Canada is responsible for the interim federal health program. On November 5, the government made changes to expand the coverage for beneficiaries. However, nothing in the estimates reflects this expansion of services.

Will those costs be covered under the current budget? Perhaps you did not anticipate that expanding the services would cost money.

[Anita Biguzs]

Mr. Chair, the reason that it's not included in the supplementary estimates is because the funding for the program is already in the main estimates in the appropriations of the department so we allocate the resources accordingly. The supplementary estimates only reflect when we actually need incremental or additional resources in addition to what's already in our base. In this case we already have a base budget for the interim federal health program and that's what's being utilized in terms of the provision of any of the benefits under the interim.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you.

Mr. McCallum.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses.

In terms of taking the best first out of the pool, I wonder if this would put the skilled tradespeople at risk because in terms of human capital the skilled trades would likely have higher points. Does this mean there's a risk you'd draw skilled trades all the time, skilled workers and tradespeople would lose out consistently as it were?

[David Manicom]

No. We will ensure that doesn't happen. There are a couple of different ways in which the system can respond to that.

There are the three federal programs in the pool: federal skilled trades, Canadian experience class, and the federal skilled worker program. We can set the draw so as to ensure that a certain number who are meeting the profile of each of those programs are withdrawn, so in a way the best of those meeting the federal skilled trades program profile.

In addition, in the federal skilled trades program, many will have either a Canadian trades credential or a job offer for which the system will give a very significant number of points.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Okay.

My next question is on the job bank. The job bank seems quite important to your program—or it's not a program, but your new system—but it doesn't seem to be functional now and I'm wondering why it isn't, what happened, and when will it be working?

[Anita Biguzs]

We have been working very closely with the Department of Employment and Social Development. In fact, ESDC is currently making a lot of systems changes to have an enhanced and more improved the job bank. When our express entry system is launched on January 1, there will be a capability at that point in time for applicants to the express entry system to fill out a job-seeker profile. This is what is required for an applicant to actually identify all of their various characteristics for the job bank. They will be in fact registered, if I can put it that way, in January.

It will only be a number of months later that ESDC will have completed all of their systems changes. We're hopeful that by April the employer function will be stood up and the job-matching function should be fully capable by then. At that point in time, certainly, there will be the opportunity for employers then to reach out and do that job match with applicants.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

But not until April?

[Anita Biguzs]

That's right, although the individual, the applicant, at the time of applying for express entry will also be able to put in their profile for the job bank, so it will be a facilitated process in terms of ensuring that people don't have to come back later in terms of applying for the job bank.