Thank you, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.
I represent Unifor Marine Workers Federation Local 1. We appreciate the opportunity to speak with you today to highlight the importance of the shipbuilding contract for our members.
My name is Shannon Sampson. I'm the president of Local 1. With me today is our business agent, Adam Slaunwhite.
I understand that Kevin Mooney and Kevin Young have invited you to come to visit the Halifax shipyard. We would be honoured to have the opportunity to introduce you to your proud shipbuilders.
The three main topics I would like to discuss are as follows: number one, our members and the national shipbuilding strategy; number two, the challenges of COVID-19; number three, the transition from AOPS to the Canadian surface combatant project.
Marine Workers Local 1 was established in 1937. We have had up to three generations of shipbuilders working together at one time. Our members have weathered the boom and bust of national shipbuilding, and we still stand. We know what it means to see our members lose their livelihoods. The period of bust before that big announcement in October 2011 saw the largest shipyard in the country close. Saint John Shipbuilding was once home to over 3,200 skilled trades building the frigates. That is something we would never want our members to face.
Today we are building ships to sustain future generations. Canada has made this possible, and we do not take this for granted. The national shipbuilding strategy is growing a whole new generation of shipbuilders, and we are committed to delivering the best ships to the Royal Canadian Navy and the Canadian Coast Guard.
My generation is committed to the national shipbuilding strategy. We're keeping trades home, and we're bringing them home. Our local has over 229 apprentices, which is the largest number in a single employer in Atlantic Canada. Local 1 is committed to supporting our apprentices throughout their journey to achieve their Red Seal certification. We had a record-breaking number in 2021 and we're on track to breaking the record again in 2022.
The NSS has added over 700 skilled shipbuilders to our local. These shipbuilding opportunities are life-changing for our members. Our workforce is growing and diversifying, and we believe that skilled trades must include the under-represented. I am the first female president of Local 1, and I am proud of the number of women in trades at our shipyard. It exceeds both the provincial and the national average.
The Halifax shipyard and our members felt the impact of COVID-19, being an essential workforce. Nova Scotia Health Authority regulations closed schools and day cares for months on end, which reduced our workforce because of the need to care for young children. Irving Shipbuilding worked closely with the Health Authority to create site-specific distancing and safety protocols that protected all of our members. Maintaining these protocols affected production efficiencies, but we still persevered to deliver two Arctic offshore and patrol ships and are pulling together to deliver ship number three this fall.
Our members in ship repair, which is the mainstay of hundreds of jobs, have also delivered HMCS Charlottetown back to service and have welcomed HMCS Ville de Québec to the dry dock.
We're working hard to maintain the vote of confidence we rightly earned from Canada in 2011. As a team, Local 1 firmly believes that the protection of Canada against threats to our sovereignty and security begins at home and should be built at home. The NSS is all about Canadians working to keep Canadians safe.
AOPS has given us the opportunity to grow our team and expand our skills as we get ready for CSC. In order to sustain our workforce, we need to ensure there is no gap between completing AOPS and starting CSC. Our skilled members at Irving Shipbuilding earned the contract to build these combatant ships, and we are committed to building them all. This is a generational opportunity, and we are 100% focused on seeing this generation and the next employed on this historic journey for the navy.
Thank you.