Citizenship and Immigration Committee on March 10th, 2015

[Kelly Pollack]

Thank you, yes, I do.

To add to what Kristyn just said, I was lucky when I was with MOSAIC and running our language centre for over 10 years that we had a licensed child care centre. I will tell you that in those 10 years, it was constantly oversubscribed. There were never enough spaces for the immigrant women who wanted to be in the language programs and be able to leave their children in our child care.

While we tried to expand.... It was a combination of both space and funding, quite frankly, but we knew there was the opportunity to probably double or triple what we were delivering in terms of child care for immigrant women in language classes.

[Lysane Blanchette-Lamothe, NDP, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

That's very interesting.

During the last meeting on this same study, representatives from Citizenship and Immigration Canada acknowledged that it was an obstacle and said that there were child care services. But you are saying that, even though there are, they aren't enough. Your opinion is that this type of service should definitely be increased.

Is that correct?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

We have to move on. I'm sorry.

Mr. McCallum.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Welcome to our guests.

My first question is for Mr. Allen.

In terms of the mismatch between foreign engineers and jobs in Canada, I think the federal government's powers are limited in the area of professional credentials, but at a minimum it seems to me that the people coming here should be informed before arrival as to what is in store for them or what the needs are in terms of credentials.

I remember being briefed by the engineers association and being impressed by the information through the websites that you are providing to foreign engineers before they immigrate to Canada.

My question for you is on whether we can do more in this area. Do you think there's a greater role the federal government could play, either in better informing people in advance, or perhaps in helping them to acquire those credentials before they get here?

[Kim Allen]

Absolutely, I think there's a lot more to do, and I think we need to do it working together with those ones.

One of the initiatives we're looking at is becoming designated under the express entry program as an educational credential assessment provider. With that designation, anyone who would be coming to Canada and would be required to have an engineering educational credential assessment would actually be forced to go through the rich information that we have.

One of the challenges we have is that fewer than one in five folks coming to Canada claiming to have engineering credentials actually ever end up applying to any of the engineering regulators.

When we talked with them, even with our panellists going around to see how many of these highly skilled people actually have a plan of what they're going to do when they come to Canada, we learned the number is shockingly low. It is very, very small. Before they have to spend a penny coming, we want to actually go through a little quiz and provide lots of information about what is required and how engineering should be practised in Canada, and say that if they want to practise engineering in Canada, these are the types of things they have to do.

It really becomes a mandatory part that they actually understand those. My belief is that engineers around the world can put together that plan on how people can best meet those credentials, if they know what they are.

A number of the regulators currently offer assessments from abroad, and it has been a real challenge to get people to apply. There are very few that apply from abroad to do those ones. Some of them allow them to start writing exams while they are still abroad. I think it's that whole movement of how much we can do of pre-assessment, pre-qualification for people who are still in their home country as part of their plan, and then when they hit Canada the time until they can become licensed is much shorter.

One of the big misinformations with engineers around the world is that they all believe they have to have a licence to work in Canada. They can become part of the engineering team without a licence. We want to tell them they are well on their path and show them how to start building their portfolio so they can come into it and understand the types of jobs that they are actually applying for. We think all that information is better preparing the individuals, and then other organizations can help them when they hit the ground to find that specific job.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Thank you.

I think both Ms. Pollack and Ms. Frank said similar things, if I understood you right, in the sense that it's sometimes easier for immigrants to get jobs outside the major cities than in places like Vancouver, greater Toronto, etc. I guess that poses a problem, because often the bulk of the communities of the new immigrants are in these larger cities and yet the jobs are more outside of the major cities, for some reason. I wonder how we can get around that challenge.

Perhaps I could ask a more general question. What can the federal government do better in terms of assisting immigrants to settle? You could say give more money, but other than that, what sort of initiatives do you think would be helpful, possibly focusing on smaller centres, or other ways?

[Kristyn Frank]

I would say that, since we are seeing this issue where smaller communities seem to be quite interested in bringing in educated immigrants, just providing immigrants with that information prior to coming here might be helpful, just to make them aware that there might be more opportunities in communities that maybe they hadn't considered moving to in the first place.

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Unionville, ON]

If I could interrupt for one second, I think that's one of the advantages often given to provincial nominee programs. I know particularly for Manitoba that they often target the smaller communities and then they get a certain critical mass of immigrants who go there and establish themselves well. I'm not necessarily saying more provincial nominees, but maybe the federal government could somehow replicate that focus on smaller communities that we see from the provinces.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you. We are way over time, Mr. McCallum, I'm sorry, unless you have a very brief answer, Ms. Pollack.

[Kelly Pollack]

I would agree. Very quickly, I would focus on pre-arrival, restructuring settlement so there is more pre-arrival and less post-arrival.

To your point, Mr. McCallum, I would focus on building the capacity of those smaller communities to help them track. It could be through the Manitoba example of the provincial nominee, but also through putting some of the onus on the communities to develop their own plans. I think there are lots of examples of that being done right now.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you.

Mr. Allen, some members of the medical profession tell me that some people coming to this country don't meet the standards to become a practising doctor or practising medical person. Does that apply to the engineering profession, and to what percentage of people coming here does that apply?

[Kim Allen]

The short answer is yes, it does apply to the engineering profession. On the percentage, again, we don't know, because we don't see all of those who claim to have engineering credentials. Of the 20% who actually apply for a licence, over 80% of them actually meet the requirements for licensure.

Part of the process we're talking about is that we'd like to think that there should be a third step in the whole immigration process. We call it the pre-decision. Before the immigrant makes the decision to come to Canada, they should know if they're actually eligible to apply for a licence, or know if their education is so far off that they should be looking, if they're interested in coming to Canada, at perhaps another career.

As well, if they call themselves an engineer in their own country, that definition is used broadly around the world. It could be vastly different from what we call an engineer in Canada. Maybe they'd fit into part of the engineering team as a technician, technologist, or some other one in there.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Just so I'm clear, in the legal profession, in the medical profession, they decide whether someone qualifies to practise in those professions.

[Kim Allen]

Yes.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Does the engineering association determine—

[Kim Allen]

Absolutely. Just as it is for lawyers and doctors, it's regulated provincially. It's province by province. We're the national body that works with the provinces. We work with the associations to have common standards across the board.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

The provincial associations determine—

[Kim Allen]

—if they actually need a licence. As I mentioned in my testimony, you can practise engineering, be part of the engineering team, without a licence. We need people to understand where they fit in. It's only when you need to be publicly accountable for that work that you actually need to have a licence in place. You would have to do that through the provincial associations.

That's why we think it's important that people understand where they want to go. They should apply to the provincial association where they're most likely to end up working. If it is in a smaller community in B.C., they should be applying to the B.C. association rather than applying to some other association. They all have slightly different processes. They all have the same standards, but the processes are slightly different. They should become licensed in the jurisdiction where they intend to go.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Mr. Leung.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

I don't wish to belabour the point, Mr. Allen, but I would ask you to elaborate a bit on the work you're doing with the education credential assessment project. Perhaps you could elaborate on how it has changed over time.

Let me share with you a personal example. I received my undergraduate degree in Canada. I got international experience overseas. I did a master's at the University of Southern California in engineering. I returned to Canada. It was assessed that my degree was a foreign engineering degree, and because my name was not a common English name, I was asked to take an English test. At the time I was a little bit disappointed, but I understand that the engineering profession, as you indicated, is provincially regulated, and therefore that difference might have caused some of their requests. I was told that if I wanted to practise in Canada, I would have to be re-educated in Canada, which I didn't really want to do.

Let me share with you my other profession. I was in public accounting. I'm glad to see that today, whether you are a CGA, CA, or CMA, you're a chartered professional accountant. As we move forward, can we structure the engineering profession, or can we have a situation in Canada where it vastly improves the ability of immigrant engineers, or engineers like me, who are educated in another country even though it was English speaking, to be gainfully employed in Canada?

Perhaps you could share from your experience how the education credential assessment will achieve that goal eventually.

[Kim Allen]

I mentioned our engineering road map for coming into Canada, so it's certainly vastly improved from the days when you may have gone through that process. You can go there and click on the online educational assessment tool, and if you have a certain type of degree, it will give you a pretty good indication of how quickly that degree will be recognized. We're members of a number of international ones since we have mutual recognition agreements with a number of countries.

We're also one of the founding members of the Washington Accord. The Washington Accord now has 17 signatory countries that recognize each other's accreditation system. A Canadian grad would be treated equally in Australia or New Zealand. India just came into the Washington Accord with their accreditation system this past year.

I would say it's a global pool. We're trying to say that we know that engineers are very mobile and they're going to work around the world, so how do we do a better job of recognizing those credentials? We're very much tapped into it.

With Engineers Canada we have a database and there are thousands of different engineering programs from around the world. We try to build that bridge information so when the provincial bodies do the assessment it's a decision tool for them. They can dig out and find the information about those various different engineering programs and compare where they stack up and how they stack up to a Canadian program.

The long story around the educational credential assessment.... The doctors and the pharmacists are already designated professions under ECA, so if somebody is coming in under two NOC codes for doctors and one of the NOC codes for pharmacists, they are directed to those two professions. With engineering there are 14 different NOC codes that require professional engineers, so they would come in and they would be directed to us and we would then have that filter to have a look at it to see if they are actually eligible to apply, where their education stacks in terms of Canadian education.

What we think is very important is providing that bridge information, so if it doesn't work for them or they may have bigger gaps in their programs, they can take additional courses or write additional exams. All those things will let them understand how they can become part of that engineering team while they're increasing those.... So provide those bridges and ladders so they can actually become fully licensed to work in the Canadian environment.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

I'm pleased to hear there is that vast improvement so that one who was educated in the United States does not have to take an English test again.

Let me direct my next question to Ms. Frank.

Given the circumstances of my personal experience, how would you be better matching the immigrant with the job, with someone who has U.S. education experience, who has a master's in engineering but still cannot find a job in Canada in engineering?

[Kristyn Frank]

There have been immigrants who have said they would be interested in things like job shadowing programs, programs that match people with individuals in a particular occupation. Of course there needs to be a coordinated effort, obviously, between professional organizations in getting mentors and getting people who would....

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

Does the express entry solve this problem on a pre-arrival basis?

[Kristyn Frank]

I can't comment on that. I don't have sufficient background.