Human Resources committee  I'm not familiar enough with the politics around this to know what's doable and what's not. If you could get the provinces to come together--and to some extent I hear they're trying to work on some of those issues collectively, through the forum of labour market ministers, and so on--I think there needs to be an impetus or an incentive that's put in there from the federal government.

Human Resources committee  There are advisory services to government as well. We're providing a service to government. I just need to clarify that this aspect is not getting any funding from either the federal or provincial governments--for the role that we play in advocacy.

Human Resources committee  When there was the Canadian labour force development.... There have been various committees started federally, and then they have had provincial spinoffs, partnerships, in which the sectors were able to get together and talk about the ways in which clients would come through programming.

Human Resources committee  I concur with Jane. I travel a lot across Canada, and I have colleagues in other provinces who are in situations comparable to mine. I'm surprised by the commonality. I've seen some great devolution agreements. In Quebec the devolution worked out quite well. In Alberta the devolution agreement has worked out quite well.

Human Resources committee  I want to comment that at the conference I was at yesterday I heard presentations from all across Canada. They were talking about the services available to skilled immigrants in each province. The thing that struck me goes back to the question we talked about earlier: should these services be delivered federally or provincially?

Human Resources committee  Yes. I forget what the bill was, but I think it was Bill C-911. What that did was change the definition of access to programming for those who were EI-eligible or—

Human Resources committee  I'm old enough to remember when I started in the employment training field. It was 1986. At that time, I worked in a program that saw me work directly with clients. We were able to help anyone who came through the door, and sometimes there was a breakdown in ages. There were certain programs to help people under the age of 24.

Human Resources committee  That ended in 1997.

Human Resources committee  Both, actually. It's a bit of a conflictual situation sometimes. Our first mandate is advocacy, so we represent our agencies and the issues of our agencies to both the federal and provincial governments and to many ministries in the provincial government. We provide networking opportunities.

Human Resources committee  IMMPowerBC, yes.

Human Resources committee  I was very interested in that. I just came back from Ottawa last night, where I was at a conference. IMMPowerBC receives joint funding from the federal government and the Ministry of Economic Development in British Columbia to help skilled immigrants get employment commensurate with the skill that they came to Canada with.

Human Resources committee  Yes.

Human Resources committee  Yes, although there's much talk of devolution here in British Columbia. We have mixed feelings about that, because as I said in my presentation, the federal government has been instrumental in ensuring there are services in most communities in B.C. We're grateful that Service Canada is there.

Human Resources committee  With respect to the role of the Government of Canada, if I'm referring to the LMPA, I believe the funds associated with the LMPA are funds that are available to all Canadians and able to be used for more multi-barriered clients.

Human Resources committee  I'm speaking for myself, and I'm also speaking on behalf of my board, because we've had this discussion. We believe the Government of Canada should be responsible for that. We have a distrust of the sometimes interesting political peccadilloes of the Province of British Columbia.