Citizenship and Immigration Committee on April 3rd, 2019

[Andy Foster, Project Coordinator, Arden Language Centre]

Thank you very much.

I noticed her right away because she was wearing a head scarf, and in our small hockey town you didn't see that very often. I walked over and said hi.

Over the next few weeks, my husband and I started to talk with her and her husband, and we quickly found out that they knew very little English. Thankfully, both of us spoke Arabic, and so we started talking. In one of those conversations, we found out that in his old country, the husband had had a cellphone company, but now with limited English, he couldn't do much at all in Canada.

I explained that while we were waiting on a visa for ourselves to go back overseas, if they wanted, they could come to study with a new family that had just arrived at our church and who were sponsored. My husband was teaching them full time, five days a week.

Two months later, the 2015 elections happened and the promise of 25,000 refugees from Syria became a reality. Our small town, Owen Sound, became actively involved with helping different churches and different groups sponsor different families, because of what it had seen on television and because people were very heartbroken.

Soon our ESL centre went from four students to 40 overnight. We ran nine classes a day, five days a week, from 9:30 to 1. It was amazing to see how our volunteers came out of the woodwork. At the beginning, we had only a few, and by the end we had over 50 volunteers. Our plan was to run the program for just one year. We had thought that once their sponsorship was over they would then go on to bigger cities. We were wrong. Instead, our students wanted to study often and wanted to study more, and instead of their leaving, people from the larger cities started arriving in our small town.

We are now in our fourth year at Arden Language Centre, and it's been a privilege to serve our students.

How do we measure success? For us at Arden, it's not just about learning the language. For us, it's about their integrating. We want them to reach their dreams, whether it's to get their AZ driver's licence or to get their PSW certification at the local college.

What keeps them coming back each day? Number one for us is community. If you were to walk into the Arden Language Centre at 11 in the morning, you would smell food from Eritrea, Syria and different countries. Both the centre and the students provide food each day. We have found that food is an amazing tool for community.

We also have small class sizes. Our classes range from one student to eight students. Also, we want the involvement of our students' lives with our volunteers' lives, so we intentionally build community, whether that's going fishing, going for coffee or working out together at the Y.

Finally, we have amazing volunteers. Since we started, we've had over 19,000 volunteer hours contributed.

What are my recommendations for you from Arden Language Centre?

First, give rural Canadians the tools to help. Right now there's a lot of frustration because when newcomers come to the area, there are not any resettlement services, but having a mobile resettlement centre would really help a lot. This mobile centre could have a representative who would answer questions to sponsors, do ESL training seminars for those who want to volunteer, and do English testing for the students.

Second, give them more than a year to learn. If you can imagine moving to another country, having only one year to learn a new language, and then having the jobs that you have right now, it would be impossible, but that's what we expect from our refugees and newcomers when they arrive in Canada. This needs to change.

Third, make bursaries available for newcomers. Before we started the Arden Language Centre, it was an almost a two-hour drive to the closest ESL centre. One issue is that often faith-based organizations want to get involved but do not have the funding to do this, and they are afraid to take government funding. As a case in point, in 2017, we ran an ESL summer camp. That summer we applied for the summer student program and got the funding with no problems. The following year, in 2018, because of the attestation on abortion that had been added, we could not sign for getting that funding. Suddenly we had over 100 of our newcomers without ESL, so having a program where ESL students apply directly to the government to get bursaries to continue their studies would be a really big help.

Before my time is up, I want to share some more about the couple I mentioned at the beginning. The wife, coming in with a grade 5 education, is now in her upper intermediate class. She's assisting me in teaching the citizenship class, as she just passed her test herself. Her husband is also waiting to be sworn in as a citizen. Next week, on April 13, he will open his own cellphone and computer repair shop in Owen Sound.

This is just one example of the many newcomers in our small town. For the past three years, we have had the privilege of seeing many newcomers' lives be impacted and rebuilt by the support of rural Canadians. Rural communities want to help and they need your support. Newcomers need the time and finances so that programs like Arden Language Centre can continue to help integrate newcomers to Canada.

Thank you for the opportunity.

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

Thank you very much, and good luck with your run.

We'll go to the International English Language Testing System, to Ms. Dienhoff and Ms. Sellar.

[Kim Dienhoff, Commercial Director, IDP Education Ltd., International English Language Testing System]

Thank you. Good afternoon, Mr. Chair.

On behalf of the three partners of the international English-language testing system, more commonly referred to as IELTS, I'd like to first take the opportunity to thank you for the invitation to appear today as the committee continues to undertake this important study on settlement services across Canada.

My name is Kim Dienhoff, and I am the commercial director at IDP Education Ltd., based in Melbourne, Australia. I am joined today by Victoria Sellar, assistant director, partnership and policy, at Cambridge Assessment English in the U.K.

IDP and Cambridge Assessment English make up two of the three partners that own the IELTS test. Our third partner is the British Council. IDP and the British Council largely focus on test delivery, while Cambridge is responsible for test production, development, research and analysis. In all, between the three partners, there is an extensive collective experience in language testing and delivery internationally.

By way of background for the committee, since launching in 1989, the IELTS test has largely been recognized as the most secure, accessible, high-stakes English-language test around the world. Currently, the test is accepted as proof of language proficiency by over 10,000 institutions and organizations globally, including over 450 in Canada, most notably universities, professional associations and government immigration authorities. There are currently two versions of the test, general training and academic. The former is used largely for migration purposes, while the academic version is used most often by higher education and professional associations as proof of English proficiency. The test is broken into the four basic components of English assessment: listening, reading, writing and speaking.

For over 15 years, first on an interim basis and then in 2014 on a full designation basis, the IELTS test has been recognized by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada as proof of English-language proficiency for express entry, Quebec-selected skilled workers, and provincial nominee programs. In total, since 2003, over two and a half million IELTS tests have been delivered in Canada. We remain one of only two language tests currently accepted by IRCC. Over the course of our partnership with the Government of Canada, the IELTS partnership has enjoyed a strong, collaborative working relationship with IRCC. We greatly value our shared goal of providing a service that truly works well for all involved.

I'll hand it over to Victoria.

[Victoria Sellar, Assistant Director, Partnerships and Policy, Cambridge Language Assessment, International English Language Testing System]

In terms of the mandate for this particular study and to give the committee a better idea as to the supply and demand for the IELTS test, over the last 12 months there have 3.5 million tests taken globally via one of our over 1,600 test-taking locations. Specific to Canada, 163,000 tests were taken within the country in the last 12 months at one of our 200 plus locations across the country. Simply put, the demand and trust for the IELTS test in Canada and around the world are evident.

To respond to this demand and plans for future capacity, IELTS has always made a concerted effort to consistently innovate to ensure better service delivery and client support. As a recent example, in late 2018, Canada became one of 47 countries to benefit from the global rollout of computer-delivered IELTS. There are currently six computer-delivered locations in Canada, and this number can and will grow based on supply and demand.

Computer-delivered IELTS is also available in nine out of the top 10 Canada-bound countries, with the U.S. set to launch soon. Using computer-delivered IELTS now means that the test is available seven days a week, up to three times a day. Moreover, new test centres can be set up in eight to 10 weeks to respond to any capacity constraints. Computer-delivered IELTS is but one of the many examples of investment by the partnership to provide better service delivery and respond to demand.

Finally, it should be noted that test-takers still have a choice of taking a paper-based test, which we have found to still be the preferred and most in-demand choice in Canada and globally. Paper-based tests expand accessibility, as it means that even in low-tech remote locations a secure test can be delivered.

The mandate of this study also seeks to understand the “criteria for measuring success” of a service. The IELTS partnership measures our success by ensuring a secure, accurate, fully accessible test that ultimately allows for the successful integration of individuals into Canadian society. At the end of the day, this is one large and important component of successful settlement in Canada.

In this regard, we must underscore that the IELTS test is a high-stakes test that underwent a rigorous accreditation process with the Government of Canada. We are extremely proud of our record, both inside and outside of Canada, in terms of setting globally accepted and understood standards, with no major incidents to report.

This point takes us to our one recommendation for the committee. Should any future tests be considered for recognition by the Government of Canada, we stress that they be put through this same extensive accreditation process and be based on evidence-based decision-making based on the need or demand for that test. Examples from other countries where additional tests have been introduced by governments show that they have in many cases resulted in unintended policy consequences, especially in terms of equivalencies and/or comparability of the tests. Specifically, there has been a lack of differentiation in test results in writing and at the high end of speaking. This ultimately impacts the number of points awarded under a system such as express entry here in Canada.

At the end of the day, tests such as IELTS play a large role and service in ensuring successful settlement. We would be happy to elaborate more on this during questions.

In closing, we thank the committee once again for the invitation to appear today. We look forward to our continued relationship with the Government of Canada and to answering any questions you may have.

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

Thank you.

We will now give the floor to Mr. Belhocine, from the Maison internationale de la Rive-Sud, in Montreal.

Welcome, Mr. Belhocine. You have seven minutes for your presentation.

[Noureddine Belhocine, General Manager, Maison Internationale de la Rive-Sud]

Am I the one who has the floor?

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

Yes.

[Noureddine Belhocine]

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

First, I want to thank you for inviting me to testify before your committee. I received the memo outlining the topics for our intervention. I know we have a seven-minute limit. It will be difficult but I will do my best.

The Maison internationale de la Rive-Sud is a community organization that has been working in the immigration field for 44 years. We are located in Brossard, a town on the south shore of Montreal where there is great ethnic diversity. In Brossard, there are more than 50 different cultural origins, if not more. This is a very multiethnic city. The organization has existed for about 44 years and has 30 permanent employees. This concludes my outline of the organization.

I was asked to broach the following points: the range of services we provide, exemplary practices, the criteria by which success is measured, and the information collected on service supply and demand. Finally, I will say a few words on the services provided outside of Canada to the persons who have not yet got here, the immigration applicants.

As for the range of services provided by the organization, there are the services for which there is public funding, and those for which there is none, that is to say the self-funded services. The Quebec Ministry of Immigration, Diversity and Inclusion (MIDI) program, Réussir l'intégration, or PRint, is the most important of these. Then there are the francization programs for immigrants. Those are the two most important MIDI programs which we administer.

We also offer a range of services, funded, among others, by Emploi-Québec in the case of employability programs, and by the federal government in the case of services for young immigrant professionals of less than 30 years of age who want to integrate the labour force.

We also manage a multitude of projects and activities with various partners, such as the youth centres. Ours is the Centre jeunesse de la Montérégie. There is also a health clinic for refugees, the Clinique santé des réfugiés, where we offer a complete health check-up to the refugees who are taken on by the government when they arrive. We also have a pool of regional interpreters we manage internally. Those are, in the main, the services we offer thanks to public funding.

As for the services without public funding, we opened a coffee shop for senior immigrants. This service for the elderly, which did not exist before, has received very little public funding. It is basically funded by our organization. We also have a day care service and family vacation projects for newcomers in Quebec summer camps. We also offer language classes in English, Spanish or Italian, occasionally. We provide free help with income tax returns to newcomers and we distribute some food, particularly to vulnerable older people who come to our elders' Café des aînés.

As for exemplary practices, I noted four of five. I will go over them very quickly. First there is the continuous enrichment of our service offer. In other words, our service offer is not set in stone, which means that it evolves according to the groups of immigrants who arrive. We are also very flexible and the accessibility of our services is appreciated. That flexibility involves schedules, places, types of intervention and so on. Moreover, we have a frontline multiethnic team which can help the newcomers with linguistic issues. Internally, we speak about 15 languages, that is to say the main languages. In general, that is sufficient, but we can call on interpreters when we need them. We are also concerned with continually adapting our services.

In other words, there is no standardized procedure that would force interveners to act in a way that might not be the right call. We give our frontline, settlement and integration teams the freedom to adapt the services as needed.

In addition, one of the features of our exemplary practices is the continuum of services. There is a continuum of services. In other words, we want the newcomers to find just about everything they need in the same place. If we are missing something, we establish partnerships with local resources to ensure that that the immigrant does not draw a blank. Those are the exemplary practices.

As for the criteria to measure success, generally, as you know, there are accountability measures included in the agreements with the funding entities. There are programs, projects and calls for projects, and most of the funders, if not all, require accountability that predefines the criteria for success or failure, that is to say the indicators that allow one to measure results. We respect that, naturally. As for the activities that are not funded, we take inspiration from those models or we develop our own results assessment indicators to ensure that we are headed in the right direction.

As for the information we collect on supply and demand, we listen to the clientele. We also listen to our partners. Project ideas or the identification of needs may also come from our partners. Funding bodies may also make suggestions in the form of calls for projects. Of course, when there is a call for projects, this means that a need has been defined. And finally, we may consult studies and academic research.

I have a few last words to conclude, and then I'll entertain your questions, naturally. I was asked to speak about online services outside Canada, before people arrive here. As an organization, we do not have to put in place external services, except for our website, of course, which allows people abroad to make appointments with us and arrange for temporary housing if they need it. That is about the extent of what we offer outside of Canada.

However, the Quebec Ministry of Immigration, Diversity and Inclusion put in place an electronic platform for online services, so they exist—

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

I'm sorry, Mr. Belhocine, but we have to stop here so that we have a few minutes left for questions and answers.

[Noureddine Belhocine]

That's fine.

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

Thank you.

We'll begin our first round of questions.

Mr. Ayoub, you have the floor for four minutes.

[Ramez Ayoub, Liberal, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'm still going to ask the question in French. You can answer in English, no problem.

Ms. Foster, first I must congratulate you for all of the work you do on integration. You try to integrate the newcomers by teaching them English, especially, in your area.

At one point you referred to Canada Summer Jobs. I'd like to know if you submitted a request to Canada Summer Jobs before 2015. You submitted an application every year but one, because of the abortion issue; that was the main reason your application was rejected.

If I may, I'd like to ask you what the link is between learning English and abortion.

[Andy Foster]

Thank you for your question.

Yes, in 2017 we applied and had no problems. Then in 2018, because as Christians we couldn't sign the attestation for our church, because we couldn't agree with that. It was frustrating for us as well, because our newcomers actually had the same moral view as we had. For us I guess it would be the same question: What does ESL have to do with abortion? We felt like ethics should have been kept out of the funding.... That's what we thought.

[Ramez Ayoub, Liberal, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you for your answer.

Mr. Belhocine, thank you for your testimony and the information you have provided.

I only have four minutes, so I'll get straight to the point.

I have in hand a document you produced in the summer of 2018. It is very well done. The last report of the Auditor General referred to the failure of francization. Have things changed since? What is the situation with respect to the francization of newcomers, particularly in Quebec, and of employability in the regions?

My questions are quite broad and I only have a minute and a half left.

[Noureddine Belhocine]

Very well.

We read the report of the Auditor General, of course. As an organization and as a group of integration organizations in Quebec, we share her point of view. There are a lot of issues but also a lot of things that are well done. There are a lot of weak points in the administration of francization programs, notably the fact that it is rigid.

There is also an underfunding and underinvestment issue with respect to francization programs which, in my opinion, would first of all require a modernization of tools. This is 2019, but the teaching method is still the one where you have a teacher up front, students in the class, and a blackboard. These learners come from linguistic universes that are very far removed from that of French. That sometimes requires particular skills from teachers and modern teaching tools.

I believe I know—

[Ramez Ayoub, Liberal, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

May I interrupt you?

[Noureddine Belhocine]

Yes.

[Ramez Ayoub, Liberal, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

On francization, how long should it take for someone to be able to function in this language and occupy a job?

[Noureddine Belhocine]

My reply will be nuanced.

The newcomers already have varied schooling levels in their original languages. If someone never went to school in his country of origin, it will take a long time before he learns the rudiments of the language and is functional in the new one. However, someone who holds a doctorate from China and has never learned French will learn it quickly if he is in a full-time course. Unfortunately, it's not always possible because the newcomers also have to earn a living while they do this.

Our organization offers evening courses, but that it still part-time, and the means are not adapted. That is the heart of the issue. We have to modernize language learning.

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

I must interrupt you.

[Noureddine Belhocine]

Very well.

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

Thank you very much, Mr. Belhocine.

I don't usually ask questions, but I want to ask this of Ms. Foster. With the change in the attestation this year, have you applied to the Canada summer jobs program for this year's funding?

[Andy Foster]

We actually are staying away from the government funding, because of the fear of what's going to happen next year. We have found other ways to get our funding.

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

Thank you.

Mr. Tilson.

[David Tilson, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

To Mr. Belhocine, and then to Ms. Dienhoff if we have time, my question is this.

There are people who have come to this country seeking asylum who lack basic education or, indeed, have problems with literacy skills, or there may be other reasons. These people have had a harder time learning French or learning English and, hence, had a more difficult path to Canadian citizenship.

Has this been your experience and do you have suggestions to improve the results in this category?

Mr. Belhocine.