So far, in terms of the best practices that we are looking at, first of all, we definitely see a strong interest from the business community, or the corporate employers. Overall, they are interested in how they can support refugees. I think that's a shift not just in terms of looking at their skills but in terms of some compassion and the ways that they want to adjust the way they work.
In Vancouver—and I'm using Vancouver as an example because I work there—it starts through the provincial government. Of course, the Immigrant Services Society of B.C. is also part of it. They are developing and have already formed five refugee response teams in B.C., so we work particularly at leading in Vancouver, and what we have done is to invite about 38 organizations, including employers, the city, the language providers, and the health care professionals, to meet and develop strategies in approaching this.
In terms of the employment working groups, as we call them, we have had meetings, and we had the B.C. employment council work with us to develop a questionnaire for us to do surveys to find out who the refugees are who are coming here, what their language skills are, and what their jobs were. We learned that many of them could be farmers. Many of them could be good at driving. We don't know too much, but here's what I think we need to do. If the employer really wants to hire, they want to know who they are looking for, who they are, so we will compile the information and we will put it in the public domain on a website.
We also have employment counsellors who can negotiate with what we call the “labour market engagement specialists”. We can engage with them, say that we have have this pool of refugees, and ask how we can help. Some employers may be even willing to do some job placements, and then they also provide some kind of a workplace connection. They could have some refugees.... Right now, many immigrants could have a job experience there, build up their confidence, and have employers knowing who they are. I think that's something we want to do.