Official Languages Committee on April 3rd, 2014

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

FedNor would provide some support.

[Lucie Perreault]

That's right.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Furthermore, in addition to the $4.5 million that you receive through the economic development initiative, do you put aside a certain amount from your own money to subsidize francophone organizations in northern Ontario?

[Lucie Perreault]

The entire amount of $4 million is for funding francophone communities in northern Ontario and for supporting their development.

Does that answer your question?

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

So that is what the money is really for?

[Lucie Perreault]

Yes, the program is specifically designed for the development of francophone communities.

FedNor has three programs. First of all, the northern Ontario development program provides funding to cover economic development in its entirety, including francophone communities. EDI, which is a continuation of the first program, is specifically designed for the development of francophone communities and includes the $4 million you mentioned.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Okay, thank you.

Mr. Daniel.

[Joe Daniel, Conservative, Don Valley East, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, witnesses, for being here.

I'm going to start with more of a general question about skills and some of the young people. One of the things we've heard from many witnesses is that most of the young people, regardless of which minority language they are in, have to go away for higher education and quite often don't return back to their communities to continue doing things there.

My question is, what programs are in place for young people to learn and master necessary skills for a good job or for entrepreneurship in any part of the minority linguistic communities in Canada?

[Krista Campbell]

Thank you.

I'll start with perhaps a couple of general observations and then others may have something they would like to contribute.

Much of the skills agenda falls to counterparts in Employment and Social Development Canada who have more direct levers with respect to some of the activities.

I would say that for a department like Industry Canada, the skills gap overall is an important issue that we spend a great deal of time thinking about and thinking about how to assist with skills gaps either in various sectors or various regions.

We have, as a government, different ways that we work with provinces and territories; for example, supporting post-secondary education. One of them is the recent knowledge infrastructure program. And as I mentioned in my opening remarks, a significant amount of money went to official language minority communities, universities, or colleges. That greatly enhances the ability for young people to get education in the language of their choice, often in the community of their choice, and to stay in that community if they put down roots or decide to move back to wherever they came from.

I think that broadly it's an important area that we're thinking about, and there are some direct tools that we can use, such as supporting some of these universities and colleges. But much of the direct programming falls to counterparts in other departments.

[Lucie Perreault]

FedNor has programs for young interns.

So we have youth entrepreneurship programs that assist youth to remain in our communities by offering them employment coming out of their university programs.

What we're seeing from results is that the programs are successful and the students are successful and they are staying in our communities.

[Kimberly Fairman]

For the Canadian Northern Economic Development Agency, we don't have programs aimed specifically at minority groups for skills, but we do have a program that focuses on skills development between high school and going into the workforce and that program has been quite successful. In fact, we're coming up to a symposium some time this month so we can discuss some of the outcomes there.

[France Guimond]

At WEDC, we respond to industry demand through our own programming. So if industry tells us there is a gap, we'll work with industry to see how we can work, so it's kind of push and pull.

In terms of francophone communities, a good example of a project we did was with Université de Saint-Boniface where they identified that they needed some lab equipment to train students in media. We would not support the curriculum, but for example we would support buying the equipment for the project. That's a way of really supporting the youth to get the training they need to get really good bilingual jobs.

[Susan Anzolin]

It is an important area for us in southern Ontario because we do see some of the statistics in terms of young francophones having to leave their communities, especially rural or smaller ones, to access opportunities in larger urban centres. Like my colleague at FedNor, we've looked at working with businesses because our mandate is to work with business and economic development. We focus on internships and providing that opportunity for young people to get a work assignment or a work term with a small or a big business. Reciprocally, the business gets the advantage of having a young person, so there's that great exchange between the two. I think internship is a good example of what governments can do. But as Ms. Campbell has said, skills are really the mandate of our sister agency, Employment and Social Development Canada.

Madame Guimond talked about working with colleges and universities. That's the other thing that we do at FedDev. We work with post-secondary institutions to provide those opportunities for satellite offices so that young people can stay in their communities.

The third thing we do is provide entrepreneurial counselling or services to young people so they can start their own businesses in their own communities.

[Serge Tanguay]

One of the very successful programs that we have instituted in Quebec is with the youth employment services program, the YES organization, which has had an entrepreneurship program in the greater Montreal area for quite some time. The objectives of the program are to provide coaching, guidance, help, and assistance with respect to starting a business. The program has been so successful that now they have started to spread out in other areas of Quebec, and have started to develop the e-ship program, which is basically a virtual entrepreneurship program. So this has been quite successful and we'd like to think that it's retaining some of our youth in the regions where they're from.

[Wade Aucoin]

ACOA has a strong focus on business skills development. Within that we have a pretty strong component that's targeted at promoting youth entrepreneurship, so when we talk about skills development for youth, we, at ACOA anyway, tend to focus on promoting entrepreneurship among youth. There are a number of other elements that we have. We have the productivity in business skills initiative under the business development program that will help companies hire staff to improve productivity and business skills. We work with CBDCs, for instance, to put in place an entrepreneurial training fund that CBDC then provides to entrepreneurs, both young and old, with an emphasis on the young there.

I'd like to just talk about two specific initiatives that ACOA has funded that are targeted at youth because they address an important issue that has affected many rural areas.

One of those initiatives is called Je reviens! J'y reste! and it is offered

in the northeastern part of New Brunswick.

The other initiative, which is called PERCE, is offered

throughout P.E.I., but is targeted mainly at the western part of P.E.I. where the francophone population is targeted.

These two initiatives help to attract young francophones back into their communities. They connect them with businesses that may have opportunities for them. But part of the program is to help educate them about how they could apply their skills in their community of origin. It's been a pretty successful approach in those areas.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you very much.

Madame Perreault.

[Manon Perreault, NDP, Montcalm, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

There are a lot of you here this morning. It is very nice.

I will probably not have time to hear all your answers. So I would really appreciate it if you could forward them to the clerk in writing.

Recently, we met with a representative from the Association franco-yukonnaise. She told us that CanNor was not paying for the operating costs of the projects it was funding, which surprised me a great deal.

Why is CanNor refusing to fund those costs? To your knowledge and based on your personal experience, what are the consequences of that policy on official language communities in the region you are serving?

My next question is for all the witnesses.

Do you fund the operating costs of projects that receive funding through the roadmap? If so, there is sort of a lack of coordination between the two. I would like someone to explain that to me.

[Krista Campbell]

Thank you for that question. Maybe if I could, I'll make an overarching statement and then the more specific answer.

One of the things that we see when we look at the data and information on official language minority communities is how diverse they are, that there is no one portrait. There is no one defining set of characteristics for official language minority communities, that they really vary across the country in terms of what they need, and how they respond to different government programs.

So under the road map, the way that the economic development funding is allocated reflects and supports that diversity among official language minority communities. Industry Canada has an overarching role with respect to some coordination, pulling organizations together and the regional development agencies together for discussions around priorities and planning and evaluation.

But it's really up to the regional development agencies to understand on the ground what the needs are for their various communities, to take a look at their existing programs and services and what works well and what could be developed and adapted for the official language community needs.

The result is that the exact same program and service might not be available in every single community across the country because of the flexibility afforded to the regional development agencies, that are supposed to be the eyes and the ears on the ground for the Government of Canada with respect to, for example, economic development.

So that's a broad statement on some of the rationale for why you hear some of these comments from stakeholders. I'll turn it over to my colleagues to talk to the specifics.

[Lucie Perreault]

FedNor certainly wants to encourage development in the longer term. We could cover the operating costs to support an organization temporarily until it becomes self-sufficient.

Those costs are in a different continuum when it comes to economic development. It depends on where those organizations are in the continuum, the economic benefits that they will generate and the time they will need to be self-sufficient.

[Manon Perreault, NDP, Montcalm, QC]

Some projects do not get off the ground because the operating costs are not covered.

[Lucie Perreault]

That can happen. When we analyze a project and determine that the organization would not be able to survive in the long term without the government's ongoing support, we might reject it. Our decision would depend on the benefits and on what the organization is asking for.

[Manon Perreault, NDP, Montcalm, QC]

Okay.

In that case, could another agency make up for the operating costs of a project?

[Lucie Perreault]

All economic development agencies can cover the operating costs up to a certain extent. The decision to fund the operating costs of a project really depends on the results of the organization and the time it will need to achieve them.

[Manon Perreault, NDP, Montcalm, QC]

In other words, the other agencies or departments agree to pay for the operating costs.

I was also told that Employment and Social Development Canada had reduced the funding for the Enabling Fund for Official Language Minority Communities, which is now at 58% of the total budget. Of course, I have a few questions about that.

I would first like to know whether the departments were informed of the changes made to the Enabling Fund for Official Language Minority Communities and whether those changes have significant consequences on the programs, more specifically on the economic development initiative.

[Hélène Goulet]

Thank you.

That actually comes under another department's jurisdiction. The goal is to help minority associations. We are more involved in economic development. Our budgets have not changed compared with the old roadmap. Over the past five years, Canada Economic Development received $9 million in contribution funding and $1 million in operating costs. The same amounts are planned for the 2013-2018 period.

We will continue to have the same budgets for economic development and the fostering of development in Quebec's anglophone communities.