Human Resources Committee on March 3rd, 2022

[Rachel Wernick]

The intent of the labour market impact assessment is to ensure that the entry of foreign workers will not have an adverse effect on the Canadian labour market and that the employer and job offer are legitimate. Protecting the health and safety of temporary foreign workers while they're in Canada is of top importance, and there is concern that suspending LMIA requirements could limit the Government of Canada's ability to protect workers from potentially negative situations such as employer abuse or poor working conditions.

There is also a risk in some areas that wage rates in the sectors could be negatively affected for both the temporary foreign workers and Canadians.

I would like to say that the government is currently considering different reforms to the program to enhance and streamline it, but as I mentioned in my opening remarks, it will never be a very full solution, because it is still a very small number of foreign workers relative to the Canadian labour market that we would be able to receive in the country.

[Alex Ruff, Conservative, Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, ON]

All right. I can acknowledge that to some extent, but I think the struggle is even more apparent in rural Canada. I'd like any feedback on how we're going to deal with that in rural Canada, where we just don't have the labour force.

As I said, our unemployment rate has never been lower to some extent, even despite the pandemic and the challenges. I guess tied into that are the skilled trade requirements needed, because, until that's up and running, we need to put food on the table and take care of our seniors. I really think the idea of putting a temporary foreign worker program, like speeding up the process.... This is an urgent requirement that I think needs to be addressed now.

Could you expand on the rural side of the house, please?

[Rachel Wernick]

I'm sorry. I'm not sure I understand the question.

The role of temporary foreign workers in rural parts of the country...? Is that the question?

[Alex Ruff, Conservative, Bruce—Grey—Owen Sound, ON]

Yes, specifically in rural Canada, and for any of the programs that would help support rural Canada.

[Rachel Wernick]

As I mentioned, 80% of temporary foreign workers work in agriculture, so they are working largely in rural areas currently. I do think it is an important point to recognize that there are specific market challenges to rural areas.

There has been some successful work in attracting new immigrants to rural areas. The experience suggests that if you get a critical mass of new immigrants and a community started, more will come, so that is one of the efforts that is undertaken for getting workers into different parts of the country.

The government announced in budget 2021 a new program that we are looking at called the “community workforce development program”. It's about funding communities to do workforce development to bring all the players to the table to explore how they can do a better job of matching workers with openings in their communities, including how to reach the underutilized sources of workers such as the under-represented groups that I mentioned earlier. You have all of the partners together—the appropriate community organizations and employers—come up with solutions at the community level.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Madam Wernick.

Now, for five minutes, Mr. Coteau, you have the floor.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I want to first—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Excuse me. Just to clarify for everyone, please direct your questions to somebody specifically so that we can make the best use of our time. Indicate if they're to any of the witnesses or if they're in general.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

I'll just ask a general question and the witnesses can determine who's best to answer.

I want to start by saying thank you to the member for bringing this forward. I think this study is so essential and so important today in Ontario and right across the country.

One of the issues I've always seen is that it doesn't seem that any government across the country or the federal government has really figured out how to utilize foreign-trained professionals. For example, I think an extreme case would be doctors. I know that in Ontario about 7% of doctors who are foreign-trained doctors actually end up being doctors in Ontario. That's a huge underutilization of a workforce and a specific group of people.

I'd like to know what the federal government is working on to accelerate credentials for foreign-trained workers. What has worked in the past, what's being identified as successful and what is being amplified or changed? For any of the witnesses, how do we align our immigration specifically to fill in those gaps where we need the specific skill sets of foreign-trained professionals?

[Rachel Wernick]

I'll start and others can add.

I would like to speak to the federal foreign credential recognition program that I mentioned in my opening remarks. As I said, this program is very much about the federal role in convening the different partners that it takes to bring down the barriers to skilled immigrants being able to use their skills in the labour force.

What we have seen is that, in addition to support for navigating the certification process—I think it's important to note that this is very much in the hands of the regulatory bodies at the provincial levels, and we have to work very closely with them, as well as professional associations—we have found that our loan program has made a huge difference. We have a zero default on these loans in supporting new immigrants in navigating that process and successfully completing it in terms of the recognition process.

The other thing that is really key is Canadian work experience. Through this program, we support projects that get foreign-trained professionals into the workplace and into work placements to get hands-on experience and get that experience on their resumés. That is very key. For the 20 projects I mentioned in the opening remarks, the vast majority are focused right now on health care professionals, ranging from physicians, nurses, pharmacists, dentists, midwives, ultrasound technicians and physical therapists to medical laboratory technologists. We have a lot of work going on right now about supporting foreign-trained—

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

I don't mean to be rude, but I want to ask a second question, if that's okay.

[Rachel Wernick]

Sure.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Chair, I think we have probably two minutes left. Is that right? Okay.

Thank you so much.

I'll ask the question to the assistant deputy minister, if that's okay.

[Rachel Wernick]

There are two assistant deputy ministers here, me and Karen.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

You've been answering a lot of the questions. I'll just throw this one out to anyone who wants to take it.

In my community, in Don Valley East, we have a lot of unemployed young people. It's hard to find work. Has the government done anything to align the procurement process, specifically on government spending, to filling in some of those labour shortages, aligning it with education and people who are looking for types of work and how we spend government money for massive procurement processes?

I think it's community benefit programs. That's my question.

[Rachel Wernick]

I'm answering the question as the senior person here.

We were invited to speak to labour shortages. I would have to look into getting you information about procurement from our federal partners in other departments.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Okay. I'm asking about tapping into young people in communities, especially some rural communities, indigenous communities and racialized communities, where we have this huge potential of young people who can work but the skill alignment is sometimes off.

Have you heard of any type of procurement aligned with accelerating specific skill development?

[Rachel Wernick]

At ESDC, we work closely with—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Madam Wernick, we're over time.

If you could provide a written answer to the committee for Mr. Coteau's question, that would be good.

[Rachel Wernick]

Sure.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Thank you so much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

I'm sorry. We need to keep on schedule.

I'm going to finish this round with Madame Chabot and Madam Zarrillo, for two and a half minutes each.

Madame Chabot.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My question will be on the pilot projects for long-term care and home support.

I must admit that I really don't understand why the federal government is putting money into pilot projects for training care workers when training and education fall entirely under provincial jurisdiction. The federal government has nothing to do with training programs.

In every province, there is a training curriculum for certain professions. One example is personal care attendants. Furthermore, there are professional associations. These fall entirely under provincial jurisdiction.

So why would there be pilot projects to micromanage the training of care assistants? Who is asking for this?

You won't be able to answer me, but wouldn't it be better to invest through Canadian health transfers to properly equip the provinces to deal with these issues?

[Rachel Wernick]

This is a pilot project with voluntary participation. Several provinces are collaborating with us, as well as colleges across the country. What we discovered during the pandemic is the fact that it is incredibly diverse, not consistent, not standard in terms of the training, the competencies. Mobility is very difficult. It wasn't easy for workers to move between areas of the country to work. It is also a factor in professionalizing the job, because it's difficult to know what the standards are or what the pay will be. It's inconsistent across the country.

There was an interest in collaborating on this pilot and this innovative program. It's not mandatory. It's not prescriptive, but it will find some interesting results to be shared.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Madame Chabot, and thank you, Madam Wernick.