Human Resources Committee on Feb. 5th, 2013

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

Does the government have some type of database to allow us to access the availability of skills and labour in any particular area, if, for instance, I wanted to open up in Bavaria?

[Maximilian Metzger]

No, it's not a task that the government has to fulfill. You would have to ask the industry organizations for that. I think we do have a German-Canadian chamber of industry and commerce, and they would be able to help you with that kind of information. That's the way to go: approach the German-Canadian chamber of industry and commerce.

[Scott Simms, Liberal, Bonavista—Gander—Grand Falls—Windsor, NL]

What we call the Red Seal is basically a recognition in all provinces of a certain trade. You mentioned that earlier for all the states within Germany, within the federation, but you also said that your borders in the European Union are permeable. Do you find that troubling in many of the other European nations about accepting the trades for Germans going abroad? On the other side, do you find it troubling when people with certain skills come in from other countries, say, Spain, Italy or Greece, and you feel that the standards are not there? Is it more difficult on a European basis?

[Maximilian Metzger]

It has not really been a problem for us. A lot of the problems solve themselves, really.

For example, the variety of different languages in Europe leads to a situation in which only people with a certain qualification and with a high degree of interest really go into other countries.

[Christiana Tings]

We do want to increase mobility in vocational training, and that's why we have a European-level process that is aimed at making sure that professional degrees are also comparable. ECVET is the European Credit system for Vocational Education and Training. We are in the process of negotiating this so that at the end of their training, they are given information so that they can take this information and work in another country.

[Maximilian Metzger]

We have to say quite clearly that we're talking about the end of the training, the qualification that they have after undergoing training to guarantee that this qualification is the same on a Europe-wide level. If I understood you correctly, you were asking about the qualification that applies for an apprenticeship in Germany, and here the market is very open. All you need is your equivalent to school leaving diploma, which is considered to be the same and equally good in all of Europe.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Komarnicki]

Thank you for that exchange.

I understand, Monsieur Lapointe, you have one question. We'll just do the one question and a short response, if we can. We'd like to conclude with that.

[François Lapointe, NDP, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to thank the witnesses for participating in this meeting this morning.

From what I can gather, ongoing training and trades training are completely integrated in Germany. These are not two distinct things. Germans enter the system at the age of 15 or 16. The situation is very different here.

I would like to understand how you make this ongoing training possible. You referred to an individual who began as a baker and then obtained a Ph.D. How did he manage to do that? Was he a baker for eight years while attending evening courses with the assistance of the state? How do you make it possible for Germans to go from being a baker to obtaining a Ph.D. in your system?

[Maximilian Metzger]

It's very hard to do in reality. What is more likely going to happen is somebody will first of all do vocational training, work in a company, and then afterwards go to university to add on studies. It doesn't happen at the same time.

[Maren Verfürth]

For example, taking the case of our president, Professor Esser, which was mentioned earlier, he went to evening classes to get his school leaving diploma. You have to make sacrifices. You have to have a very strong will to further yourself and then you can do it. I think he would probably tell you the same thing if he were here.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Komarnicki]

Thank you very much for that exchange.

We'd like to keep you for a little longer, but time has run out.

We certainly appreciate, Mr. Metzger and the others, your sharing your information with us. I certainly found your presentation to be very useful and something that we can apply to our study. Hopefully we can take the positive aspects of your system and work toward incorporating those in ours.

Thank you very much for that.

I don't know, Mr. Metzger, if you have any closing comments, but feel free to make them now, and after that, we'll close.

[Maximilian Metzger]

Thank you very much. It was our pleasure to talk to you today. We would very much like to see the study when it is concluded, and what effects it will have. We would be very happy to be kept in the loop because we would like to learn from you as well.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Komarnicki]

Thank you very much for contributing.

With that we'll suspend for five minutes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Komarnicki]

We'll call the meeting back to order.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

Mr. Chair, just on a point of clarification, as you know, Mr. Cleary gave notice of a motion asking the minister to appear as a result of the privacy breach that impacted over half a million Canadians. I'm wondering whether we're going to be dealing with that in this meeting.

Mr. Cleary obviously isn't here, so I'll be moving that motion on his behalf. I don't know if you need me to read it into the record now.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Komarnicki]

My plan was to suspend the meeting at 12:45 and then deal with that matter. You could raise it at that time if you wish, at 12:45.

[Chris Charlton, NDP, Hamilton Mountain, ON]

We definitely still want to do that even though Mr. Cleary is not here, because it is a really important issue.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Komarnicki]

No, that's fine.

All right, with that, we'll have you present. We generally have each of you present, and then we'll have a round of questions going back and forth between the parties. We will adjourn at 12:45 because we have other committee business to deal with.

Your speaking notes, of course, will be translated en français as we go. Your slide presentation, being in English only, will not be distributed, but we will ensure that portion does get translated and distributed in the course of time.

I'm not sure who's going to present first.

Mr. Wilson, do you want to go ahead, and then we'll proceed to Mr. Diotte?

[Mathew Wilson, Vice-President, National Policy, Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair and members of Parliament, for inviting the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters here to discuss these issues.

The issues around youth engagement in the workforce as a whole, apprenticeship programs, and overall skills shortages are major issues for Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters and our 10,000 member companies across Canada.

In a recent survey completed by CME of 650 Canadian manufacturers and exporters, we found that one of the largest issues affecting business investment in Canada was the size and strength of the labour force. The same survey also showed that nearly 50% of Canadian companies are facing skill shortages today, and due to labour and skill shortages, almost one-third of companies are considering relocating operations, including production, to other jurisdictions outside of Canada. This would have a tremendous negative economic consequence for the country.

While the skill shortages identified by our companies in the survey covered a wide range of jobs from management and administration to general labour and sales, by far the largest reported shortage was in the skilled trades. Today 50% of companies are facing shortages of skilled trade workers such as welders, machinists, electricians, and engineers, the highest of any occupational segment. It is expected that within five years that number will jump to over 55% of companies facing these shortages, primarily as a result of Canada's aging demographics.

Simply put, without more skilled trade workers, Canadian companies will struggle to create innovative products and remain globally competitive. As a result of these significant economic concerns of labour and skill shortages, CME and our members have been very supportive of the government's efforts on immigration reform, temporary foreign worker program changes, and foreign skilled trade worker programs.

However, while the increase in the skill level and supply of foreign workers is essential, Canada will not address the significant labour market challenges we face today with foreign workers alone. We must also significantly increase the size and the skill level of the domestic labour force.

One of the largest challenges Canada faces in this regard is actually not the apprenticeship program itself; it is getting youth engaged in the skilled trades in the first place. In every region of the country there's a major challenge in getting youth interested in skilled trades and in seeing the trades as an economic opportunity as a whole.

There are a variety of reasons for this challenge; however, a primary factor is a lack of technical education in elementary and high schools across the country, as well as how our youth are mentored in education and in their career choices. Elementary and high school students today in almost all provinces have no exposure to the trades. At one point not that long ago, shop and other skilled trades were taught beginning in grade 7 and continued on through grade 12. This exposure to technical trades would engage youth in the possibility of careers in the trades.

Following high school, technical colleges would be a natural next step for students, which would become a primary feeder system for both industry and the apprenticeship programs across the country. Today most shop programs, as well as the technical and vocational schools, have closed across the country. Many youth are no longer exposed to the skilled trades or job opportunities in the skill sets in demand by industry across the country. Getting kids into technical trades is a first step to address these challenges faced by the Canadian economy to grow the size of the skilled labour pool and increase the number of youth in apprenticeship programs.

As a first step in this, industry, labour, and all levels of government must work much more closely together to refocus their efforts on the education system and ensure students are getting the exposure and necessary information about the jobs available in the trades and the steps necessary to begin a career.

Currently, CME runs programs in both Quebec and Manitoba with this as an objective. The programs are designed to link high school students with local manufacturers to show students the types of jobs that are available in modern advanced manufacturing. Students spend up to a week during the school year with local industry, and industry provides guidance and mentorship as to the appropriate apprenticeship or technical training required from students to obtain the jobs available.

As a result, industry has seen an increase in the number of youth engaged in the skilled trades in these jurisdictions. These types of programs need to be seriously examined and replicated across Canada to improve the quality and quantity of students engaged in technical skilled trades, as well as the apprenticeship programs as a whole.

In addition to improving the education system to provide a better supply of students in the apprenticeship program, the apprenticeship programs themselves need to be more adaptable and flexible to current realities. Some of the specific recommendations from our members include improving labour market information available to students and apprentices on available jobs across the country in future growth areas. Improved information must be communicated to industry on the benefits of programs like the Red Seal program. Currently, a lot of companies do not know what the program does, what the benefits are, and how they can help their industrial competitiveness by increasing the supply of labour and enhancing labour mobility across Canada.

While largely an area of provincial jurisdiction, the ratios for apprentices must also be examined. Given the skills shortage of labour today, it is very difficult for companies to have sufficient technical masters to be able to train the number of apprentices required. We need to increase the ratio levels while maintaining the safety of the programs themselves.

Specific to the Red Seal program, CME generally agrees with the Red Seal program's own assessment during the review it did last year of how it can improve, especially with the focus on: moving to a more practical and competency-based assessment approach to demonstrate competencies; increasing the consistency for assessment across the trades and across jurisdictions; and fast-tracking challenges of the program, especially foreign workers.

Thank you again for the opportunity to discuss apprenticeship programs in Canada and engaging youth in modern manufacturing workforces.

I look forward to the discussion after the comments.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Komarnicki]

Thank you for that, Mr. Wilson.

We will now hear from Mr. Diotte, who represents SaskPower, a fairly large employer in Saskatchewan, particularly in the southeast part of the province, with quite a few employees and a number of trades as well.

We look forward to hearing from you.

[Jim Diotte, Vice-President, Human Resources, Safety and Environment, SaskPower]

Mr. Chair, I appreciate the opportunity to address the committee. My perspective will be that of a company that's working in an area in the country that's experiencing some fairly significant growth. I would suggest we're at the forefront of that challenge for skilled trades and recruiting the talent that's required for us to be able to support the growth in the province.

Just by way of background, SaskPower is a crown corporation. We employ about 3,000 employees in 71 different communities across the province of Saskatchewan. We operate coal, hydro, gas, and wind facilities. We are a completely integrated utility so we generate electricity and do transmission and distribution to the end customer.

From an apprenticeship perspective, we focus on four main areas. The biggest one by far would be our power line technicians. Those would be the folks who climb the poles and connect the power lines across the province. We also have electrician apprentices, industrial mechanics, and instrument technicians. In the past we had welder apprenticeship programs as well, but we recently discontinued that apprenticeship program.

The bulk of our apprenticeship focus is on that power line technician group. We currently have 72 apprentices. They go through a four-year program. We realized we really needed to focus on marketing this program. It's not as commonly understood or as well known as some of the other traditional trades, but obviously is very important to our business. We particularly wanted to make sure we were on the radar of our aboriginal community. We felt that we had an under-representation of aboriginals in our apprenticeship program and in our line trade and we went about correcting that. We employ a sourcing consultant who's strictly focused on that group. We've targeted the youth in our aboriginal communities, and we're very pleased with the success that we've had in terms of increasing the representation of aboriginals in that area.

We will receive upwards of 500 applications for apprenticeship PLT, power line technician, programs annually. Over the last four years we've been able to take our representation from 20% to 25%, particularly in that aboriginal group. That's equated over time to our having about 10% of our line trade represented by the aboriginal community, which we feel is very important for us as we try to make sure that our employee set represents the people of the province of Saskatchewan.

The major challenge that we see from a trades perspective is that we have a bit of a perfect storm from a workforce planning perspective. We've had, and have benefited from, a very stable workforce that's very tenured. We know that one-third of our employees are poised to retire in the next five years, which includes a large number of our skilled trades. We are concerned about our ability to replenish that workforce with youth coming into the apprenticeship programs.

While we do primarily recruit from within the province, we also have participated in job fairs across the country and have gone so far as to travel to Ireland to do some recruiting there, particularly for electricians and for power engineers.

The challenge that we see, particularly in a competitive market space, is that there are a number of employers who are continually competing with each other for the same limited pool of resources. We understand that we're going to need to grow. We can't just steal from other companies. We have to grow our own tradespeople.

The one thing we are very much interested in is making sure the programs are in place that support the free flow and movement of talent across the country. We look for the various trades commissions to standardize some of their Red Seal or different trades certificates to make it easier for an employee who is looking for work in Ontario to come to Saskatchewan and assume a trades position.

With that I'll cut off my comments and leave it to the committee for questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Ed Komarnicki]

Thank you for that presentation. We will start our first round with Monsieur Lapointe.

[François Lapointe, NDP, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to thank the witnesses for participating here today. It is very much appreciated.

We have been doing this study for quite some time, and, right across the country, we are always hearing the same topics. For example, we hear about our aging human resources. In 5 or 10 years' time, we will have to have found replacements.

Mr. Diotte, I appreciated the comments you made at the end of your presentation. You said that mobility would not resolve everything given that, in the case of a general economic boom in Canada, everyone would be fighting over the same individuals. So there is no miracle solution as far as that is concerned. We do need to ensure some flexibility but that may not be what resolves the urgent problems. When our committee visited the west, we saw communities with populations of barely 30,000 individuals that needed to staff 7,000 jobs. So the need is urgent.

Earlier we heard from representatives of the German Department of Education and they told us that people began trade training at the age of 16 or 17 and that the industry played a very important role. The people from industry participate actively. They provide guidance, for example, by explaining that the situation will become critical unless at least 800 electricians are trained over the next 7 years.

Do you have the impression that Saskatchewan and some other provinces are starting to implement a system that includes this level of involvement? I do not want wide-scale intervention, but I do believe that the problem is serious. At one point, we are going to have to make a decision and action will have to be taken.

[Jim Diotte]

I can answer as far as Saskatchewan is concerned.

We visit the schools, and through a number of our programs we let students know that there are many job opportunities at SaskPower. We start in secondary schools. This is very important to us. We want students to have a choice.

However, there is a problem.

Are the schools preparing the students to pursue these jobs?

[François Lapointe, NDP, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

So there is a challenge on that front?