Human Resources Committee on March 24th, 2022

[Andrew Brown]

There are some investments through what's known as the union training and innovation program, and it's also related to apprenticeships.

Starting in the 2022-23 fiscal year, it's to support more apprenticeship opportunities and partnerships in the Red Seal trades. I speak to this, because the new investments in the union training and innovation program will continue to target greater representation and participation from women, indigenous people, newcomers, persons with disabilities, and Black and racialized communities.

This is work that is being done in conjunction with unions to encourage and increase participation in the skilled trades.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Madame Chabot, you have the floor.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I am going to come back to the temporary foreign worker program.

Ms. Tummon, in your answer regarding processing times for LMIA applications and the reasons behind those times, you said that you had to have discussions with Quebec, more specifically. That is so true that we believe it would be much simpler if Quebec managed the program, which is currently managed by Ottawa, because the processing times are inexplicable.

In the food and beverage sector, for example, there is something like a 25 per cent labour shortage. Eleven associations have joined together to propose concrete short-term solutions. They are asking that you sit down with them and look at long-term solutions.

What is the explanation for the inability to meet the needs of industries hit by the labour shortage in a timely manner?

There may be all sorts of explanations, and it may be that the shortage will fade over time, but at present, this is hurting industries and businesses.

What can you tell us about processing times?

How can we speed the process up?

[Nisa Tummon]

Thank you for the question.

On the subject of how to improve processing of LMIA applications throughout Canada, we are in the process of making a number of changes to our own ways of doing things and our processes for accelerating decision-making and providing recommendations to employers.

We have made a few internal changes to simplify how we process applications. First, we are putting a process in place that will be standardized across the country so that cases are processed the same way and at the same pace from coast to coast. We are also recruiting more staff to expand our capacity to process cases speedily.

We know there has been a sharp increase in the number of applications in Quebec in particular, as compared to other provinces and territories. As the Minister has already announced, there is an agreement between Canada and Quebec to simplify processing of LMIA applications from Quebec in order to meet employers' needs and combat the labour shortage in a number of sectors.

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

To all appearances, that agreement to simplify the process, which which I am quite familiar, is not working. I'm talking about companies and employers in Quebec, of course.

I am aware of one case in which a worker has been waiting since September to get an answer to their application.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Ms. Chabot.

We'll have to get that question answered with another.

Now we go to Madam Zarrillo, for two and a half minutes.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm going to carry on with my questioning around the gender lens, but I wanted to start by just sharing that last night late in the night, I received a message from one of my constituents who has family escaping Ukraine. They are in Romania right now, a mother with two children. She has all the infrastructure she needs when she gets to Canada but can't make her way here because she needs biometrics to pass through the visa applications, and that is impossible. She's there in Romania with only $200 and yet she can't get a biometrics appointment until April 29, which is nine days after the expiration of their visa. That's how I'm coming to the table today, with those thoughts on my mind.

Getting back to the gender lens, I want to ask about the modernization of EI. I think some of these legacy policies were made before we really thought about women in work and diverse genders coming to work and persons with disabilities coming to work. I just wondered if staff could share with us how the gender lens is being applied to the modernization of EI and that work.

[Catherine Demers]

One of the key objectives of the EI modernization work that we're doing is looking at ways to ensure that all workers have access to EI and that the EI program is more inclusive, stronger and simplified. We're looking at all aspects of the program in terms of administrative and program simplifications, but also access issues with respect to workers losing their jobs and families experiencing life events such as the birth of a child or illness. A key area of discussion through the consultations has been focused on ensuring that we understand well the issues with respect to the changing needs of families, including working mothers.

Minister Qualtrough has met with employer groups, worker groups and various groups representing families including adoptive parents, for example, to understand these changing needs.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

It must be a very short question, Madam Zarrillo.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

I'm just going to carry on with that questioning. I was just wondering if any of that consultation, maybe just one or two things that were learned, could be shared with the committee.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Give a short answer.

[Catherine Demers]

We are compiling the information and doing the analysis now. Certainly a lot of interest has been raised from worker, labour and family groups around access, such as eligibility rules for accessing programs and flexibilities for using parental and maternity benefits. For example, there is interest in looking at the number of weeks of benefits available for adoptive parents compared to birth mothers and other birth parents in general.

There was a lot of interest in that aspect. There was a lot of interest in simplification issues, as well as flexibilities in general.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Madame Zarrillo.

We'll continue with Madame Gladu. As soon as the minister arrives, we'll move to that part.

Madam Gladu, you have five minutes.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to members from the department. I'm happy when the minister shows up to interrupt my time. I'm happy to have her make her comments and to perhaps have a chance to ask her a question.

I have some questions on the mandate and some questions that are more general.

First of all, I want to talk about people coming from Ukraine and how they are going to need English as a second language or English upgrades. I think this department has typically been responsible for budgeting that. I didn't see anything in the estimates.

Have there been discussions about offering that kind of training to the Ukrainians who are coming?

[Lori MacDonald]

I'll start off and some of my colleagues may want to jump in here.

We're in the process of looking at what programs we can leverage that exist already in the department and what additional programs we can add through a grant and contribution agreement, for example, or through some of the programs we have, like our job bank.

At the same time, we're looking at leveraging what's already in place in some of our community resources to see if we can build on those to meet the vast array of needs we expect people arriving in Canada from Ukraine will have. These may be education, English as a second language, support for day care, housing, child care or clothing.

We're in the process of looking at a number of those measures and what the department can contribute in that regard.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Madame Gladu, I'm advised that the minister is ready.

I'll take direction from the committee. Do you want to pause for a moment or do you want to continue with your questions?

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Let's hear from the minister.

Can I have the rest of my time to ask her questions after that?

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Yes.

If it's the direction of the committee, we'll conclude the first round of this meeting and then we will move to the second.

Thank you, witnesses. I believe you may be staying while the minister is here.

We'll suspend for a couple of minutes while the minister is brought into the meeting virtually.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Committee, we are back.

Minister Qualtrough, welcome to the committee.

The members are looking forward to your appearance here and that of the departmental officials. We have Jean-François Tremblay, deputy minister; Lori MacDonald, senior associate deputy, who has stayed with us; and Karen Robertson, chief financial officer.

Madam Minister, I understand you have opening remarks. You now have the floor.

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Minister of Employment]

Thank you very much.

Hi, everyone. Thank you for inviting me to join you today.

I'll be speaking to you first about main estimates.

The funding for Employment and Social Development Canada represents a total of $87.4 billion in planned budgetary expenditures. This is a net increase of $5 billion over last year's main estimates. This is primarily due to significant increases for the early learning and child care agreements with the provinces and territories and for the Canada student financial assistance program.

We're also forecasting important increases to the old age security pension and the guaranteed income supplement. These increases are actually being offset by a decrease for the three statutory temporary recovery benefits.

I'll now speak quickly to my mandate items so we can get to questions, where I'll account for some of the specifics of the estimates: supporting workers impacted by the pandemic; modernizing EI; improving the temporary foreign worker program; building a strong, skilled workforce; ensuring post-secondary education is more affordable; and making Canada a more barrier-free, disability-inclusive country.

As Minister of Employment, Workforce Development and Disability Inclusion, I'm responsible for ensuring workers in Canada are supported. Most recently, this has meant the creation of the Canada worker lockdown benefit. During the rise of omicron in December, we expanded the definition of a lockdown so that more workers would be eligible. This expanded eligibility was extended and ended on March 12. We also increased the number of weeks available under the Canada recovery caregiving benefit and the Canada recovery sickness benefit, which, as you can see in the main estimates, show a combined decrease of almost $6.5 billion.

We're also focused on modernizing EI. Of course, one key lesson that we learned during the pandemic was just how important employment insurance is and how much stronger Canada's system could be. I'd like to thank the members of this committee for your excellent study on this issue, which included your 20 recommendations and which I regularly turn to to see if we're on track and to see how close the feedback I'm getting is to what all of you spent time recommending.

On February 17, we wrapped up phase one of our consultations. We held 10 national sessions and 11 regional sessions. We did a parallel online survey for Canadians and got more than 1,900 responses and 60 written submissions.

What we heard was that employment insurance could be more fair and more inclusive. It could be—and actually should be—simpler to navigate and should get benefits to Canadians quicker. We also heard that we need a program that supports workers and employers both when there's high unemployment and when there are labour shortages. I'm pleased to advise that we're going to publish a summary report soon on what we heard, and the second phase of consultation will begin in April.

Ensuring workers are safe and supported is also a critical part of my mandate, and that includes all workers. Another key priority for my department is addressing the systemic challenges that are in the temporary foreign worker program. I have publicly committed to a series of actions to improve upon the quality and timeliness of our inspections and, as we prepare for the 2022 agricultural season, my department has already taken steps to implement these actions. We are now truly better able to support our inspection staff through supplementary training, enhanced tools and improved workload management.

I'm also working with the Minister of Agriculture and Agri-food to help address labour shortages in farming and food processing. Earlier this year, we streamlined the processing for many of these employers, and we're working with the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship to establish a new trusted employer system. You'll also see about an additional $19 million in the main estimates for a migrant worker support network, and that's to enhance the temporary foreign worker program.

We also know that Canada is experiencing a shortage of available workers across many sectors and regions. To grow our economy, I'm taking action to maximize workforce participation by breaking down barriers to employment and by helping workers upskill to adapt to a changing labour market. To this end, I'm committed to expanding the foreign credential recognition program to help more newcomers enter the Canadian job market quicker. Yesterday morning, I announced funding for nine organizations that will help thousands of qualified newcomers enter our health care workforce more quickly.

I'm also moving forward with a disability employment strategy to help employers make their workplaces more inclusive and reach this untapped talent pool.

Another priority is to promote the skilled trades as first career choices for young people and diverse populations. We've launched the national skilled trades advertising campaign, which provides information on training, federal funding and in-demand trades by region.

We also have committed to doubling the union training and innovation program, or UTIP, which is a very popular program. We are moving forward with our apprenticeship service, which will provide more training opportunities for Canadians pursuing a career in the trades. Just last week, we announced new investments in Halifax and in Sudbury through UTIP. That will ensure more people get trained in skills such as carpentry and other essential in-demand skilled trades.

My mandate is a big one, but it also includes ensuring that Canada's workforce is ready to meet a low-carbon future. We're doing this by investing in our new sectoral workforce solutions program. To build talent for the clean economy, we're also committed to launching our new clean jobs training centre.

As you can see, there is a lot going on.

To make life more affordable, a critical part of my mandate is to make post-secondary education more accessible in Canada. To do this, we've committed to permanently eliminating federal interest on Canada student loans. We're also making repayment systems more flexible and less burdensome on Canadians, through multiple measures, including increasing the repayment assistance program threshold to $50,000 for borrowers who are single and allowing new parents to pause repayments until their youngest child reaches the age of five.

We're also looking to increase debt forgiveness for doctors, nurses and nurse practitioners who work in rural and remote areas, and we're committed to increasing this debt forgiveness by 50%.

Before I conclude, I want to turn to a part of my mandate that is close to my heart, as you know, and that's our work to improve the lives of Canadians with disabilities. No Canadian with a disability should live in poverty—no one should. One of my key priorities is to create a new Canada disability benefit and consult on its design with members of the disability community, provinces and territories and other stakeholders. Once implemented, such a benefit could help lift hundreds of thousands of working-age Canadians with disabilities out of poverty.

I'd like to take a moment to thank those members who have contacted me personally with their support to retable this legislation. I'm committed to doing so in the House as soon as possible.

This benefit is a cornerstone piece of our new disability inclusion action plan. This plan has four pillars: financial security, employment, inclusive communities and a modern approach to disability. In the spirit of “nothing without us”, we are committed to working closely with the disability community on the disability inclusion action plan and the design of the new benefit, because persons with disabilities know best what we need, the challenges we face and what barriers most prevent us from having financial security.

I'm happy to point out that over $78 million for the enabling accessibility fund and over $67 million for the opportunities fund are reflected in the main estimates for persons with disabilities.

I'll leave it there, Chair.

I hope that's demonstrated the breadth and strength of my commitment to my mandate priorities. I look forward to questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Madam Minister, thank you for coming in a couple of minutes under your time.

Now we will go to Madam Gladu for six minutes.

[Marilyn Gladu, Conservative, Sarnia—Lambton, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for appearing today.

I want to start with some of the items in your mandate letter.

I agree that the modernizing of the employment insurance program could be more fair. My understanding of this program is that employees pay premiums. If they've worked enough hours, then when they lose their job, they receive that benefit.

However, my understanding is also that, in this pandemic, people who lost their jobs because they didn't want to take a vaccine were prevented from getting employment insurance, even though they had contributed to it and they had met the hour criteria.

Can you explain this?

[Carla Qualtrough, Liberal, Delta, BC]

Thanks for the question. It is a question that I've had often.

I'll start by saying that the science is really clear that vaccines are safe and effective in reducing the spread of COVID-19. We think it's prudent for our workplaces, and good for the economy, that they be as safe as possible.

Each EI application is assessed on a case-by-case basis. However, if an employer has a mandatory vaccination policy and an employee is found to have not complied or has voluntarily quit because of that, they typically wouldn't be eligible to receive benefits, just like they wouldn't be eligible in the case of other policies that an employer has. It's the compliance issue with an employer policy, not necessarily a function of the EI system.

As I said, certainly I don't make those determinations, and each EI application is assessed on a case-by-case basis. It's a matter of non-compliance with an employer policy.