Human Resources Committee on Nov. 22nd, 2016

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

All right.

Mark, you have five minutes.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley—Aldergrove, BC]

Danielle, thank you for your testimony. Poverty is in many different communities and many different age groups. I thank you for your work and your focus. Congratulations on the advancement of your career and your education. It's very exciting to see how you're moving forward.

In British Columbia, the BC LNG Alliance has an ad out with Chief Joe Bevan which you've probably seen. In it he says that in his community there was 80% unemployment and now it's zero. He said that instead of saying no, can we move forward and protect the environment but also provide jobs for our community in the future? There was a great deal of success with this.

How important is it that we work with communities so there is a good, healthy look at the opportunity to say yes instead of no so we can provide those jobs and that future to end poverty? Could you comment on that video on Chief Joe Bevan and how we can use that as a model?

[Danielle Levine]

Based on my experience working with first nations in British Columbia, each community is unique. Each community is on a spectrum of, on one end, completely against resource development, and on the other end, is in active pursuit of development. Communities can fall anywhere on that spectrum. It's very difficult to generalize because each community is different. With the short term of chief and council in some of the communities those aspirations can change on a whim. Having conversations with communities on where they stand is important. I believe there are opportunities that don't necessarily impact the environment. There are local opportunities that are culturally relevant that people will buy into. I think it's important to have the conversation with communities.

I don't know that all the communities in British Columbia will ever be jumping on board with LNG. I don't see that. I think all the communities would agree they want opportunities for their community members, absolutely. Nobody wants to say they want poverty; none of them do. They all want to create local economic development. B.C. first nations know if 50% or more of their membership is not living in the community, they've voted with their feet. They know there's an issue. Where they fall on that spectrum is completely based on the community.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley—Aldergrove, BC]

Okay. Thank you.

[Danielle Levine]

I'm sorry I don't have an easy answer for you.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley—Aldergrove, BC]

There are no easy answers.

Our decisions as individuals and also as communities will affect others and the employment opportunities.

In my community of Langley, Kwantlen First Nation, Marilyn Gabriel, has a very entrepreneurial spirit. Lelem is a wonderful restaurant in Fort Langley that is an example of that. If you're in the area, just across the river—

[Danielle Levine]

Yes, I am.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley—Aldergrove, BC]

—I'll treat you to coffee there sometime.

Do I have another minute or so?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

You have 30 seconds.

[Mark Warawa, Conservative, Langley—Aldergrove, BC]

CFIB, thank you for what you've shared. My focus is on seniors issues. I think we're missing out on huge opportunities for geriatrics and taking care of our aging population. Because I don't have any more time, I'll just leave it at that. We need to train our young people to take care of our aging population. There are great opportunities in business.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Ashton, you have three minutes, please.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

One of the trends we're starting to see in our economy is the rise of precarious work among young people in the country, and here we are talking about poverty reduction. We know that the best way to reduce poverty is gainful employment, and yet for many young people in Canada, that's less and less of a possibility, despite the fact that we are the number one country in the OECD when it comes to educational attainment. Ms. Moreau, and however much time we might have for the others, I'm wondering if you could speak to how important this trend is. How seriously do we need to take it? What could the federal government be doing to contribute to bucking the trend?

[Monique Moreau]

Certainly. I know that our members, as I've mentioned, employ many youth and they often get their first jobs in a small business. Something that we had overwhelming support for—80% of our members supported—was the previously announced youth employment hiring credit that the Liberal government introduced just after the start of their mandate. That program disappeared after budget 2016 and we're not sure where it went. When we polled our members, 80% of them supported that because they do hire a majority of youth. This was a credit aimed at 18- to 24-year-olds. It would have given small businesses essentially an EI holiday in recognition of the extra time that they spend hiring youth.

If we are looking at trying to encourage more stable, full-time, or part-time as the need may be, jobs for youth, doing what we can to facilitate that is an important step, recognizing that small business owners often not only train youth, but they also let them go and move them on to the next level. Our members support the training program. They understand that's their role. They understand that is something small businesses do and it is the role they play in the economy. I think extra recognition would be helpful to them to acknowledge that they spend a lot of time and investment in training youth just to have them leave, which is a good thing. We want that, right? We want them to proceed in their career.

[Niki Ashton, NDP, Churchill—Keewatinook Aski, MB]

Ms. Flanagan, or maybe, Ms. Hare, do you have any thoughts to share in terms of ensuring more stable employment for young people? Maybe, Ms. Hare, do you have any thoughts?

[Courtney Hare]

I can speak briefly to the tremendous success of our financial empowerment programs for youth. One of the programs we run is a match savings program giving youth the knowledge, skills, and confidence to grow their income and to grow their assets. Mostly these youth cash out of the program for either tools for work or for post-secondary education. They learn the importance of that, how they can access it, and then we also provide them with the funds for them to be able to do that.

We see more than 90% of these youth achieving their dreams and their goals around a career. We've seen more than 90% continuing to save and build their assets, even five years after the program. I would really encourage investments in this type of financial empowerment program for youth.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bryan May]

Thank you very much.

Now over to MP Poilievre for six minutes.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

My question is for Madam Moreau. Do you have a sense, anecdotally, of how most small business start-ups get the financial credit they need to start their business? Is it typically a loan from a bank or a financial institution?

[Monique Moreau]

I do have research on that. We just published our banking report, which we do every three years reporting on financing for small business. The smaller you are, the harder it is to get financing.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

How do they get it? Is it a loan typically?

[Monique Moreau]

Sometimes. We also call “love money” an important part of that, where people go to friends and family. Depending on the amount, they turn to credit cards.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Do they get loans from banks ever?

[Monique Moreau]

Sometimes, but again it's harder the smaller you are.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

Given that it's harder, what do they use as collateral?

[Monique Moreau]

Whatever assets they have at that time, often personal.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Carleton, ON]

What's the most common one?