Human Resources Committee on Oct. 28th, 2025

[Rosemarie Falk, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster—Meadow Lake, SK]

This contradicts keeping seniors in their communities and in their homes. When you go into rural areas, a lot of times the post office is where a lot of seniors will get their socialization for the day. They'll go out and get their mail. It's a thing they do. I guess I'm seeing a contradiction in what you're saying in your opening remarks on seniors accessing services where they are, and I'm using the example of rural post offices.

[Stephanie McLean, Liberal, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

If I had been able to finish my answer, what I do know is that with respect to the rural post offices, there is a priority to ensure that rural postal services remain intact. I'm not aware of any plans that are in place with respect to closing down rural post offices—

[Rosemarie Falk, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster—Meadow Lake, SK]

Your government is in agreement with respect to closing down rural post offices—

[Stephanie McLean, Liberal, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

I'm sorry. The interpreters can't hear both of us when you're talking over me.

[Rosemarie Falk, Conservative, Battlefords—Lloydminster—Meadow Lake, SK]

There's a contradiction, and you're wasting time.

You're wasting my time—

[Stephanie McLean, Liberal, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

The interpreters can't—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Order.

Thank you, Ms. Falk and Madam Secretary of State.

I would again remind members that it's your time, but please respect both the person giving the testimony as well as the question.

Madam McKelvie for two minutes.

[Jennifer McKelvie, Liberal, Ajax, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thanks to all of you for allowing me to fill in today. It was wonderful to hear your testimony about some of the work you're doing to help our amazing seniors in this country.

I have two questions. I'll ask the first, and then, if you have time, you can move to the second.

My first is on how you engage with seniors directly. How are they engaged in this process and how are you hearing what they're saying and using that to inform the work you do?

The second you touched on briefly, but I would love it if you had more time to talk about the New Horizons program and how it's addressing loneliness.

[Stephanie McLean, Liberal, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

In terms of engaging with seniors, we have multiple levers that we take advantage of. Not only do I personally engage with seniors, but there's also the national seniors council. This is a body that provides advice to the minister, to the department. They are an extra sort of outreach arm that we can rely on, both with respect to research and to engagement of seniors to ensure we are hearing their perspective. We also have partnerships and arrangements with different institutes and universities that provide us additional research and information to make sure we have the best data possible.

One of the other things that I think is really key and that we don't talk about enough is the return to the long-form census since the last Conservative government. By returning to the long-form census, we're able to get better disaggregated data, including on seniors, so that we know where they're at in terms of their well-being and are able to make good, informed decisions with respect to that.

One of the other ways we engage with seniors is that we have a robust network of contacts within the department. We send out regular newsletters and solicit information from seniors' organizations and seniors' advocates. Not every province has a seniors' advocate.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Madam Secretary of State.

Thank you, Madam McKelvie.

Madame Larouche, you have one minute.

[Andréanne Larouche, Bloc, Shefford, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Madam Secretary of State, I want to follow up on something Mrs. Falk asked about Canada Post. You started answering, but I'd like to take the discussion further.

The Bloc Québécois maintains that the reforms to Canada Post must include assurances for seniors and regions, because they can't be left out in the cold.

In practical terms, how can your department ensure that the proposed changes to Canada Post will not negatively affect the services available to seniors, especially in rural and remote areas? Beyond being concerned, do you have any concrete ideas?

[Stephanie McLean, Liberal, Esquimalt—Saanich—Sooke, BC]

Yes, there are two things.

First of all, I think it's premature to get ahead of our skis. What has happened here, to my understanding, is that the minister, by removing restrictions, has allowed Canada Post to put forward a plan. He has given Canada Post 45 days to provide that plan. In terms of what that plan is going to look like, it remains to be seen, and I'm sure the minister will have more to say once that is put forward.

With respect to combatting—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Madam Secretary, Mr. Thompson and Ms. Underwood.

That concludes the first hour.

Thank you to all for attending this morning.

To the committee, we will suspend for about five minutes while we move to the next round.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Committee members, I would ask you to take your seats, so we can resume with the second hour, which covers youth employment in Canada.

Joining us in the room we have three witnesses. Nobody is appearing virtually, so I would ask the witnesses to please familiarize themselves with the headset, the earpiece, and choose the official language in which you want to participate in this meeting. If there is an interruption in interpretation services with either members or witnesses, please raise your hand and get my attention. We will suspend to have that corrected.

For those attending in the room, please put your devices on silent mode. Please refrain from tapping the boom of the mic, because it will cause issues for our interpreters. I remind everyone to please direct your questions through the chair.

We have three witnesses. From the Forest Products Association of Canada, we have Derek Nighbor, president and chief executive officer. From the Students Commission of Canada, we have Sharif Mahdy, chief executive officer. From the YMCA of Greater Halifax/Dartmouth, we have two representatives, Rebekah Skeete, director, employment services, and Julie-Ann Vincent, chief operating officer—one of you will be providing the statement.

Each witness has five minutes or less for an opening statement.

We'll begin with Mr. Nighbor for five minutes, please.

[Derek Nighbor, President and Chief Executive Officer, Forest Products Association of Canada]

Thank you, Mr. Chair and members of this committee, for the invitation today and for making this study on youth unemployment a priority.

As the leader of the Forest Products Association of Canada, as the proud son and grandson of unionized pulp and paper workers in the upper Ottawa Valley and as someone who worked in the forestry sector as a young person to help pay for school, I will say that this is a topic that’s close to my heart both personally and professionally.

Forestry is jobs: 200,000 full-time, family-supporting jobs in over 300 communities across the country and another 200,000 indirect jobs from coast to coast.

Let me begin by thanking all parties around the table for their engagement with and support of our sector and its employees during this very difficult time.

Last week, we were grateful to have representatives from the Liberals, Conservatives, Bloc Québécois and NDP all join us for our national forestry conference and all commit to standing with our industry, our people and our forestry communities as we face serious headwinds given the current trade dispute with the United States, which now has our softwood lumber companies facing combined duties and tariffs of over 45% on exports to the United States.

As the government works to secure a deal that works for Canada, we, as an industry, are doing our best to keep employees working and to keep them as connected as possible to our mills and woodlands operations. We are working with the federal and provincial governments and our labour partners to support employees who might find themselves out of work, either temporarily or for a longer period of time. The priority now is to protect the existing jobs as best we can.

Despite these challenges, which the committee is looking at through this study, for the foreseeable future we still have a lot jobs that need to be filled: forest technologists, forest technicians, logging truck drivers and heavy equipment operators. What some young people might not know about are the emerging opportunities in drone technology, AI, wildfire risk mitigation, biomass electric power generation, and prefab, modular and mass timber manufacturing. We continue to be focused on building a future-ready industry and supporting the talent pipeline for the jobs of tomorrow in Canadian forestry.

Half of our employees will retire within 20 years, and right now only 10% of our workforce is under the age of 25, despite nearly five million young Canadians being ready to work. We see real opportunity in the young Canadian talent pool and a huge opportunity in the indigenous youth talent pool. We are working with a range of partners to address skills gaps, rural infrastructure barriers and a generally limited awareness of some of the interesting careers and good-paying jobs that can be found in forestry. Last fall, FPAC released “Unlocking a Future-Ready Workforce for Canada’s Forest Industries”, which profiled some of the needs and opportunities.

In summary, I'll close with just a few recommendations, and we can get into more detail in the Q and A if you wish.

First, we should develop a forest-sector skills development plan that clearly maps skills gaps and a regional approach to addressing them. There’s some great on-the-ground infrastructure to build off of.

Second, as part of this development plan, we should support employer-led training programs in rural and northern communities so that young people don't need to leave home to be trained.

Finally, we should stabilize and grow proven youth employment programs and support networks through multi-year youth employment program funding through ESDC. With regard to groups that are tried, tested and true, I'll reference the outland youth employment program as one that has 25 years' experience in providing six-week training opportunities to indigenous youth in high school, aged 16 to 19. In that 25 years, they've put over 1,000 indigenous high school children and youth through that program, and they've touched nearly 200 communities across the country. Well-established groups like OYEP should not be facing funding cuts; they should be leaned in on because they have a proven track record. Project Learning Tree Canada, Forestry Together and Women in Wood are other grassroots initiatives that we're pretty proud of, that are connected to communities, that started with a coalition of the willing and that now enjoy broad support across Canadian forestry.

In closing, before I turn it over to my colleagues, I just want to say, on behalf of businesses, employees and communities in the forestry sector, that we appreciate your engagement and support.

I look forward to any questions or comments you might have.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Mr. Nighbor.

Mr. Mahdy, you have five minutes, please.

[Sharif Mahdy, Chief Executive Officer, The Students Commission of Canada]

Mr. Chair and members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to share the Students Commission of Canada’s perspectives on youth employment in Canada.

My name is Sharif Mahdy and I am privileged to serve as the chief executive officer of this organization.

The Students Commission of Canada is a national Canadian charity, founded in 1991, with an expertise in youth engagement in all facets of Canadian life, including employment and skills development. We partner with youth. We listen to youth. We work with them and their expertise to address the challenges they face and engage with them, together, to contribute to Canadian society. Our mission includes supporting other organizations, businesses, governments and collaborations to do the same.

Four pillars guide our work: respect, listen, understand and communicate. Our capacity to support, advise and consult with others is generated in part from the aggregated knowledge we synthesize, but its immediate and main genesis has always been from our own direct work with youth.

In our beginning, everyone at the Students Commission was a volunteer—both youth and adults. Youth became employees as soon as we were able to move from an all-volunteer model to one with paid staff. Paid youth staff and youth as co-op placements, for credits and/or paid, have been with us since the early years.

Today, I will share what we are hearing from youth. Specifically, I'll share some of the solutions and innovations that they’ve suggested to address and tackle our current youth employment challenges. This includes pulling and sharing results from our engagements and programs on youth employment, including sharing some direct voices of young people themselves.

What we are hearing very loudly and clearly is that this isn’t the same workplace or workforce that young people imagined 10 years ago. The economy is shifting, career paths are non-linear and success today is as much about connection, adaptability and identity as it is about credentials.

Youth are anxious about the present and the future that they face. What we have learned from thousands of youth and the organizations, schools and employers who serve them is that it takes a whole-of-society approach to address youth employment, so that they can handle the pressures of today's world, particularly after the gaps in pre-employment preparation that were generated during and post-COVID—an era of so much virtual work and virtual education.

We have a stream of programs focused on youth skills development. We work in the pre-employment skill development space. We are in the process of co-creating, implementing and scaling frameworks that integrate pre-employment soft and hard skill development through extracurricular opportunities and connections to service in community, with formal education and credit accumulation, and stronger ties to employers with practical experiences of work-placed learning and purposeful employment. Again, it's a whole-of-society approach.

We also lead the national Take Our Kids to Work program, which is Canada’s most recognized career education program. We provide ongoing resources, videos and experts to support employers, educators, families and students to participate in introducing grade 9 students to the changing world of work. In 2025, we reached 1,169 employers and 1,159 educators, and supported 400,000-plus students to be engaged in career exploration. Our “Career Live” virtual engagement program also attracted 6,000 attendees from coast to coast to coast.

We are working to expand this grade 9 innovation into a network of employers, youth sector organizations and educational institutions that are supportive of a more integrated work-learning strategy from grade 9 forward, linking skill development, practical employment and education, and breaking down silos across these various systems.

SCC's art of work program also serves youth in later grades. As a result, we have been able to bring corporate funders and government partners to the table to work together to integrate employment and engagement in experiences and effective training practices across multiple sectors. Again, it's an emphasis on the whole-of-society approach.

We have also learned to recognize that youth have diverse employment needs. Some thrive in part-time roles, others in full-time, and some use the experience as an entryway to education. We assist our employers and employment program funders to adjust their expectations and offer to provide this kind of flexibility, particularly for placements designed for youth facing employment challenges in first and transitional employment.

The Students Commission of Canada enhances existing systems by partnering with local organizations, schools and employers. We leverage national and local connections, evidence-based research, and evaluation to co-create sustainable, community-rooted solutions. We believe in a world where all young people transition positively into a successful adulthood.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Mr. Mahdy, for your opening comments.

Ms. Vincent, you have the floor for five minutes.

[Julie-Ann Vincent, Chief Operations Officer, YMCA of Greater Halifax/Dartmouth]

Thank you.

Good afternoon, Mr. Chair and honourable members of the committee.

My name is Julie-Ann Vincent. I am chief operating officer of the YMCA of Greater Halifax/Dartmouth, and I'm accompanied by my colleague Rebekah Skeete, director of employment services.

Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today to speak about youth employment and the important role the YMCA plays both in Halifax/Dartmouth and across Canada in helping young people find meaningful work and build the foundation for lifelong success.

The YMCA's mandate is simple yet profound: to ignite the potential in people. This helps build stronger, healthier communities. A healthy community is one in which young people have equitable access to opportunities, including employment. The impact of this work extends far beyond a first job. It builds confidence, resilience and the skills needed for lifelong employability.

At the YMCA, youth are at the very core of what we do. Examples of youth-focused programming include settlement services, before and after school care, child care, health and wellness programs and employment services, including those designed specifically to help youth find employment and support their workplace readiness. These programs recognize the strengths and assets that youth bring to work as well as the unique barriers they face in finding meaningful employment.

We also do more than provide services for youth. We also bring the perspective of a youth employer. Last year alone, 260 youth were employed through our programs and operations, representing over 52% of our workforce. Among our leadership team, 12 of our leaders are youth, making up 18% of our leadership positions. That's just the YMCA of Greater Halifax/Dartmouth. Collectively, YMCAs employ more than 13,000 youth across the country. With 37 associations across Canada, YMCAs are among the country's leading youth employers. Organizations like the YMCA are major employers, innovators and economic drivers in our communities. These numbers reflect our belief that youth are not just tomorrow's leaders; they are also the leaders of today.

Today, we're here to talk about the challenges young people are facing when it comes to accessing employment. Specifically, we're here with three recommendations to improve the current challenges.

The first is to adopt a youth-centred, people-first approach. There is no one-size-fits-all solution. Each young person brings unique strengths and unique challenges. Programs must be designed to meet youth where they are, recognizing their lived realities and building on their assets. We see first-hand how employment programs like the summer work student exchange, Canada summer jobs, and the youth employment and skills strategy program can alter the trajectory of lives. Programs like these support youth development and instill transferable skills—now appropriately called skills for success in ESDC's framework—for a variety of different careers and industries.

The second recommendation is sustained investment in community-based programming. Invest in what works—the continued and stable funding of community-based programs with demonstrated success and long-term impact. Earlier I mentioned that our experience has shown us that there is not a one-size-fits-all solution to youth gaining meaningful employment. Community-based organizations ensure that a variety of programs are offered to meet youth where they are, whether that is geographically, culturally, developmentally or their socio-economic status.

Further, proven youth employment models must be protected and expanded, not reimagined for every funding cycle. Funding programs that support pilots and innovative solutions are critical; however, there is a significant need for funding available to support programs that have been proven to work. If ongoing program funding is not available, programs enter the market and are then withdrawn, leading to instability and confusion, and it reduces the trust in the organizations providing these supports for youth.

The third recommendation is the recognition of the role that the social determinants of health play in youth employment. Employment interventions must support whole-person outcomes. Stable housing, food security, access to education, mental health support and a sense of belonging are prerequisites for employment success. They play a long-term, defining role in a young person's ability to succeed.

Investing in youth employment is an investment in healthy communities and a strong, inclusive Canadian workforce. The YMCA is proud to continue this work alongside government, employers and community organizations, and we are proud to stand with youth as they build the future of this country.

Thank you, Mr. Chair and members of the committee. We look forward to your questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Ms. Vincent.

We'll begin the questioning round with Mr. Genuis, for the opposition, for six minutes.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you very much, Chair.

Thank you to all of the witnesses for some really interesting and thought-provoking testimony.

My questions will be for Mr. Nighbor.

I want to discuss three distinct issues with you. The first is how we talk about vocations in the natural resource sectors, and in forestry in particular. The second is building homes where jobs are. The third is credential recognition as it relates to your sector.

On the first issue, it seems to me that some of the discourse from the government and other social actors has been quite negative about natural resource sectors, forestry included. That discourse has an impact on young people who are considering what areas to pursue their studies in. If you have authority figures telling you that something is a job of the past, it's going to be harder to attract people into those sectors, when in fact our natural resource sectors are the lifeblood of our economy and we need people to pursue those careers.

What are your reflections on that discourse around natural resource vocations specifically?

[Derek Nighbor]

Thanks for the question.

I'll be very direct. Under this government the tone has changed significantly. That has been welcomed.

I also think economic realities have forced us as a country to look inward at some of our natural strengths, which I think is where natural resource opportunities lie. We have seen coordinated campaigns to try to undermine Canadian forestry out of the U.S. and Europe—that's standard. I would say the current economic crisis that we're in has enabled an opportunity in our sector to get focused on the possible, to start thinking about the economy again and to start thinking about jobs and leaning into some of Canada's natural advantages.

What I'm hearing from our CEOs and heads of HR in our member companies is that young people want to know that they're making a difference. They want to know that forestry is sustainable. They want to know that we're making products ethically and treating the land that we're working on well. Those are themes. I'm proud of what we do in that regard in forestry.

I also think the opportunity we have on the housing piece domestically is huge, as well as the other community benefits that come with forest management.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I have to keep moving to the other themes, but to put a fine point on it, when you said the current government and previous government, are you highlighting specifically comments or the tone during the Trudeau years as being problematic?

[Derek Nighbor]

Specifically...yes, that's correct.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Okay.

On having homes where the jobs are, one of the things we have highlighted as part of our Conservative youth jobs plan is the importance of having homes and community infrastructure in places where jobs are in order to make it easier for people who are unemployed in a larger centre to consider job opportunities.

What are your reflections on the issue of people considering careers outside the area they grew up in, and the importance of having homes available as part of that?