Evidence of meeting #51 for Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was welding.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Executive Director, Canadian Welding Association
That's according to the Skills Canada organization.
Liberal
Liberal
Dan Ruimy Liberal Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC
In your experience through your organizations, are you hearing that women are reluctant to pick up the trades because of the maternity factor, or are there other reasons?
Executive Director, Canadian Welding Association
There could be other reasons, but what I am seeing clearly is that there are more women who are participating specifically in welding trades at high schools and colleges. We're seeing that women are willing to enter the trade. They just need support and acceptance. Sometimes they have challenges in some of the small and medium-sized employers, for example, that may not have washroom facilities or change room facilities for them.
There are some challenges that are unique to women, and I think that the mindset in terms of employers, particularly some of those larger employers, has changed dramatically over the last number of years. We are definitely seeing more women engaged in welding trades and we're seeing this daily in the conversations that we have with various institutions, school boards, parents, and teachers. We interact with them daily.
Liberal
Dan Ruimy Liberal Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC
Typically, in your field, approximately how long does it take to get the welding education?
Executive Director, Canadian Welding Association
There are varying degrees and varying fields of welding. You can take a basic welding course for a year and you can find a job in welding. Now, you're going to have limited skills with that one year of training. If you take two years, your options will broaden. I always encourage students to take a three-year welding engineering technology program because that will really give them the opportunity to do many things such as automation, robotics, and other fields of welding.
Also, there's the apprenticeship route that many students take, and that time frame is typically three years plus. When I say “plus”, it could take as many as five years. It depends on how well the work term is aligned with the programs offered at the college. Students can only go to a college for their theoretical training during the times that it is available.
Liberal
Dan Ruimy Liberal Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC
Welding is one of those careers—it is a career, actually—that can span almost a lifetime.
Liberal
Dan Ruimy Liberal Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC
Do you have any experience with women in the welding industry who have had a child? Are there any stats on how many actually come back after their maternity leave is over?
Executive Director, Canadian Welding Association
I don't have that information. I'm sorry, I don't have that statistic. Perhaps Dr. Cherry may have some information.
Professor, Department of Medicine, University of Alberta
Certainly, we collect that information. I don't have it at my fingertips. I could guess that 50% would return immediately after the child. The majority of women in the study already had a child, and they were all welding at that point, so we can't say how many we lost before that, but a very large number of women with children work in welding.
Liberal
Dan Ruimy Liberal Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC
Thank you. It is interesting because I am actually trying to speak to Alicia's points of, let's say, single moms. I'm beginning to see it's critical that they have the option of being able to get back into that field because that, more than anything else, is going to help them take care of their family. That makes sense.
Executive Director, Canadian Welding Association
Absolutely. These are highly paid jobs in welding, and this is the kind of income that you cannot replace with many other professions. That's why I believe that women will go back to the welding profession once they have their baby and have the opportunity to return to a place of employment.
Liberal
Dan Ruimy Liberal Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC
Thank you.
Do you think that these new, flexible measures will help recruit and retain more women in the steel trades?
Executive Director, Canadian Welding Association
Absolutely. I think it is critical that we show women that we care about their work experience, that we care about their well-being, and that we will do things that support them so they can be a mother and be a professional tradesperson.
Liberal
Dan Ruimy Liberal Pitt Meadows—Maple Ridge, BC
Thank you.
Going back to Professor Cherry, what do you think are some of the other direct impacts that would be seen if the government were to establish this new national maternity assistance program to address these shortcomings? What do you see as some of those direct impacts?
Professor, Department of Medicine, University of Alberta
I'm very prejudiced in that I was quite closely involved with the Quebec system, which is splendid at protecting the health of women but is a very expensive program. If it were feasible to have such a program across Canada, I think it would assist pregnant women enormously. This is why I say there has to be consultations, but I think there are strong arguments for it. There are some difficulties in putting in place such a program with the very great differences between the provinces, at the moment, in what they feel is important and necessary.
Conservative
Bob Zimmer Conservative Prince George—Peace River—Northern Rockies, BC
Thanks, everyone, for appearing today at our committee.
I was a former carpenter, and I was actually a welding teacher too. I taught kids how to weld, and I'm kind of proud of that. A basic weld I could teach them, but probably not at the level you're at, Mr. Tadic.
I'm encouraged, I guess, by the fact that this is being addressed. I think a lot of times when women make a decision about a trade, they'll make a decision, even two years before, if there's a risk to pregnancy or health or whatever. They'll do something different, or they'll possibly get out of the trade if they are already in it.
I'm wondering what percentage of your members are female now. Has the number or the percentage gone up dramatically?
Executive Director, Canadian Welding Association
We have almost 70,000 members, and I would suggest that about 15% are female.
