Finance Committee on Oct. 22nd, 2012

[Pamela Foster]

We welcomed that initiative and would like to see it expanded for other nurses and health care providers—not just for those working in rural and remote areas, but for those in other areas upgrading their nursing degree to become nurse practitioners, for example. I'm curious about the uptake and I'm wondering if the federal government also has data on whether or not that program has been used.

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

In rural and remote areas you would perceive perhaps nurse practitioners, physiotherapists....

[Pamela Foster]

Absolutely, and I would see expanding the grants program, for example, to support RNs returning to school.

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

As a new program, obviously it will take some time to have the relevant data, so you do perceive that we'll have some good impact in terms of dealing with that very important rural and remote area issue?

[Pamela Foster]

Sometimes rural and remote aspects are important. It will be interesting to see what the uptake on that program is to see if it is a successful measure. Again, we would welcome further grant forgiveness for other nurses.

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

I know it would be nice to be looking at all the things in health care, because I think it's a very diverse and complex field. The Nurses Association came before us and suggested a very bite-sized approach, the approach being to look at five indicators and create some goals. Would you at the Canadian Federation of Nurses think that would be a good approach to at least starting to deal with some pan-Canadian bite-sized thinking?

[Pamela Foster]

The Canadian Federation of Nurses Unions is supportive of the National Expert Commission report, which includes the top five and five, and that would be approached. The CFNU is also interested in seeing a national conversation among the federal government, the provinces, and the territories on a health accord, which would have a scope longer than five years, but probably the top five and five could feed into what we would hope to see in terms of a renewal of the health accord expiring in 2014.

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

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Thank you, Ms. McLeod.

We'll go to Mr. Brison, please.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, to each of you, for your presentations today.

Mr. Severin, you spoke of the importance of temporary foreign workers in Alberta, but I can also echo that in rural Nova Scotia, for our horticulture industry, temporary foreign workers are absolutely essential.

One of the arguments that farmers have made to me is this perception that they take jobs from Canadians, which actually does not bear out under scrutiny. When you evaluate it, often what happens is that there's a creation of more value-added jobs further up the chain. For instance, in the horticulture sector, as one example, if the crops aren't picked by temporary foreign workers, the value-added products can't be produced further up the food chain or the value chain. There are jobs created in that. I think that's an important argument.

The theme of access to skilled workers and to professional trades is interesting. One of the issues is this whole notion that training and retraining and lifelong learning are so essential, but over the last 20 or 30 years—and not just in Canada, but in a lot of the industrialized world—we have seen the diminution of the honour of skilled trades. We've moved away from that.

Do we need to have a national strategy in Canada aimed at restoring the honour of trade professionals and ensuring that when people are going through high school that trades are presented in a very positive way as a potential career track? Should we be dedicating more scholarships, more funding, aimed at changing people's attitudes toward professional trades? I'd be interested in your views.

[Brad Severin]

I think the economic and labour realities bear themselves out. The demand for these skilled labour participants is certainly not felt anywhere more than in the province of Alberta.

I can certainly attest to the demand for those spots in post-secondary education. Our technical institutes, such as the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology and the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology, are routinely taking wait-list applicants to gain entry to these positions. I think that labour attraction, moving from one geographic area to another in Canada, certainly would bear out the demand for these very valuable skilled labour positions.

Anything the government can do in areas where there are pinch points as far as labour need for skilled labour is concerned would be welcomed, particularly in our province.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

In terms of best practices, we could look at Germany's model around apprenticeship. Incidentally, Germany has less income inequality than a lot of other places, including Canada.

Are there any other thoughts on this imperative?

[Ron Watkins]

If I could comment briefly, first of all, I agree with the importance of exactly the point you're on, Mr. Brison.

I don't know what the full solutions are. Part of it, I think, goes back to the high school years. It's making this seem like valuable, positive work going forward, and a great opportunity.

In our industry and in associated industries, we certainly feel the need to get to a greater group of younger people earlier in their lives to get them to prepare for trades, to be technicians, to work in a lot of different areas.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

I'd like to hear from Ms. Goldstein on that issue as well.

Ms. Foster, you raised the importance of early learning and child care. We often think of how it helps children develop their cognitive skills and long-term competitiveness around—

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Could we have the question?

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

You raised the issue of helping women participate in the workforce. There was an article in The Economist in April 2006 called “Womenomics”.

The importance to working women and to greater access to skilled women, for instance nurses, I think is a really wonderful argument that we need to hear more of, for—

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Is this a comment? I ask because you've used up all your time.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Oh. It's become a comment, yes.

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

I'll just remind you that Mr. Brison has this wonderful habit of asking very good questions at the end of his time.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

It's because I'm so far away from the chair. I can't see you without my glasses on.

[The Chair, Conservative, James Rajotte]

Well, hopefully Ms. Foster will be able to return to that.

We'll go now to Mr. Adler, please.

[Mark Adler, Conservative, York Centre, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

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

I want to start with you, Ms. Goldstein. You talked in your submission about labour mobility and particularly about the challenges that new immigrants face when they come to Canada.

Could you talk a bit about how you see our role, as a federal government, in, number one, alleviating some of those challenges faced by new immigrants? Number two, how we can help in terms of interprovincial mobility, in terms of labour moving from one province to another, going to where the demand for labour is greatest? Could you please talk about that?

[Dr. Rose Goldstein]

Thank you for the question.

I think the federal government has several places to make an impact. One of them, I think, that's fairly obvious is where there has been progress but indeed there could be more. That's in terms of alleviating the barriers to immigration and to licensing for professionals. There's a lot of work that could be done.

You alluded to the mobility between provinces in alleviating the bureaucracy, frankly, and the complexity of accepting the qualifications of immigrants. At McGill, being a very international university, as I mentioned, we train foreign students, many of whom would like to stay here. I think we could make it a lot easier. The qualifications are usually accepted, but from the immigration point of view, I think we could definitely streamline.

As I say, there have been improvements, but I think there is room for improvement, certainly in the licensing.

[Mark Adler, Conservative, York Centre, ON]

Could you mention specifically what you'd like to see?