Evidence of meeting #81 for Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities in the 44th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was youth.
A video is available from Parliament.
Deputy Minister, Department for Women and Gender Equality
This number has been announced, it is nothing new.
Bloc
Louise Chabot Bloc Thérèse-De Blainville, QC
It is still possible that the Minister of Finance will make an announcement in the fall economic statement. Do you know whether the minister and your department, in view of the program's record, have concluded that it should receive more funding, given the number of applications? Has that been done?
Deputy Minister, Department for Women and Gender Equality
As you know, the fall economic statement is created by the finance department, so we do not have any information about what this year's fall statement will contain.
In the past five years, the number of applications for this program has increased by 200% to 300%, so it has been very popular in recent years.
Bloc
Louise Chabot Bloc Thérèse-De Blainville, QC
I have one last question for you. If you do not have time to answer, you may do so in writing.
Would it be possible for MPs to receive feedback after the program has been implemented, regarding the employer satisfaction rate, or what worked well and what didn't? I expect you collect that information from employers and young people. Do you use that feedback in assessing the program and determining what must be improved for the following year? If so, could that assessment be shared?
Deputy Minister, Department for Women and Gender Equality
The employer survey is indeed an essential part of the program. For young people, taking part in the survey is optional. That said, we do have some information that we can share.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bobby Morrissey
Thank you.
Could you submit that to the committee, Ms. McRae?
We'll have Madame Zarrillo to finish this because we are getting close to the vote.
Go ahead, Madame Zarrillo.
NDP
Bonita Zarrillo NDP Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'm just going to go ahead and reiterate two questions and give one question to answer here because we do not have a lot of time.
I just wanted to be sure to reiterate my request to have the most recent qualitative and quantitative data for the CSJ. I'm assuming it's 2022, but if it's 2021, then it's whichever.
Also, I would personally like to ask for the data for Port Moody—Coquitlam to come to me in my office.
I also assume that there will be an analysis of this year's Canada summer jobs grant based on the impact of the drastic reduction in funding. I'm very interested in those results too, so I'd like those to also be reported to this committee once they're available.
My question is around information sessions for those communities where English or French is not their first language. I think about my riding of Port Moody—Coquitlam, where there's a very strong presence of Korean and Persian small businesses that have not been able to be aware of the program or to have access to the program.
Is there a plan to have information sessions that are demographically aligned with the community?
Deputy Minister, Department for Women and Gender Equality
I will just say for purposes of information sharing that all information related to the program in terms of uptake and employers is posted on opencanada.ca. That's something that members might be interested in.
In terms of information sessions, we do currently run them in English and French, as the member notes. We have not had significant demand in other languages, but we would be happy to work with different MPs about specific gaps for information to see what we can do to fill those.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Bobby Morrissey
Thank you, Madame Zarrillo
Thank you, committee members.
Just before we adjourn, I want to advise the committee that I'm setting a deadline for the AI study witness list for 4 p.m. on Monday, October 23.
Could we agree to accept written briefs for Bill C-318, with a maximum length of 2,000 words? Is that agreeable to the committee? This is on the legislation.
I see that the committee agrees to accept written briefs for Bill C-318, the legislation, with a maximum length of 2,000 words.
Thank you, committee members. Thank you, department staff. You can see that this is a program that engages members of Parliament, and we thank you for your input today.
With that, the committee is adjourned.