Evidence of meeting #34 for Citizenship and Immigration in the 43rd Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was alberta.
A recording is available from Parliament.
5:30 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Salma Zahid
Thank you.
Ms. Kwan, your time is up.
We will now proceed to Mr. Hallan. We will end this panel with Mr. Hallan and Mr. Regan, each of whom will have two and a half minutes.
June 7th, 2021 / 5:30 p.m.
Conservative
Jasraj Singh Hallan Conservative Calgary Forest Lawn, AB
Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you to all the witnesses for being here today.
The labour shortages in health care and seniors care services are the highest of the sectors in Canada's economy. I know that in rural Alberta especially, in many communities there's an urgent need for physicians and nurses.
I'll open this up to any one of the witnesses who want to answer. To what extent can immigration address these health care sector shortages in rural areas?
5:30 p.m.
Chief Executive Officer, Century Initiative
Oh, that's a tough one.
I'll just speak at a high level, and I'm sure that will inspire those, especially in Thunder Bay, to provide us with some practical experience.
We talk about immigration, particularly if it's driven by local community needs, such as through the provincial initiatives or the new municipal program pilot.
If we can connect people to local needs, give local residents in those communities a stake in the program, we can.... There's a role for employers to actually support them, by welcoming not only the employee, but also working with the families so they feel supported. They're more likely to stay within those communities and contribute to those communities.
With regard to health care, I come from Kirkland Lake. My mother needs to drive to Sudbury to see a specialist. When we're talking about our work, we talk a lot about the fact that immigration drives GDP.
When there's more money, there's more money that can be invested in those services. They can support the development of greater social and health care services in those communities, so it can be a boon to those communities.
Does anyone else want to add to that?
5:30 p.m.
Supervisor, Economic Development, Thunder Bay Community Economic Development Commission
Perhaps I can add to it. We've seen a large percentage of RNIP applicants who are PSWs and registered nurses. Before, as the committee knows, there was no stream for personal support workers in Ontario, so we've seen a great success in that program. We've seen people move from other cities, particularly the Hamilton and Toronto areas, to Thunder Bay to work as nurses and personal support workers.
5:30 p.m.
Workforce Development Officer, Thunder Bay Community Economic Development Commission
I don't know if there's any more time left, but I'd like to say something about doctors while I can here.
5:30 p.m.
Workforce Development Officer, Thunder Bay Community Economic Development Commission
The immigration system works really weirdly for doctors because they're self-employed, so for any of these job offer streams like RNIP.... For example, we have a doctor shortage, but we can't use the RNIP program for doctors because they're self-employed. They're not getting third party salaries; they're billing through OHIP or whatever, so it doesn't work.
The clinics don't want to do labour market impact assessments and make the formal commitment to these doctors—
5:30 p.m.
Workforce Development Officer, Thunder Bay Community Economic Development Commission
They don't have an interest in doing that here.
5:30 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Salma Zahid
Thank you, Ms. Lauzon.
We will now proceed to Mr. Sidhu for two and a half minutes.
5:35 p.m.
Liberal
Maninder Sidhu Liberal Brampton East, ON
Thank you, Madam Chair.
To Ms. Lauzon's point, I known that foreign credentials are supposed to be recognized by the provinces—it's within provincial jurisdiction—and I get a lot of these requests in my office as well. It's important to note on the record here that the provinces need to continue working to approve foreign credentials.
Ms. Lalande, I believe I read somewhere on your website that in order to support higher levels of immigration there needs to be more support for families with children. A national day care system and quality education are two factors listed as imperative to executing this well.
Our government's 2020 budget outlined our plan to bring down fees for regulated child care to $10 per day on average, within the next five years, to make child care more affordable. This goes hand in hand with increasing Canada's economic activity by providing parents with more affordable options, which would allow more parents to get involved in the workforce.
Ms. Lalande, what are your thoughts on this plan? Do you have any specific recommendations as we work with our provincial counterparts on our Canada-wide early learning and child care plan?
5:35 p.m.
Chief Executive Officer, Century Initiative
That's a great question, and I'm glad you asked it. I think child care and the goal for a national child care system are not new. We've seen this before, and it hasn't actually materialized. Century Initiative is prioritizing advocating for a national child care plan, working now towards action with co-ordination across all the provinces.
John, quickly, because I know we're writing a paper on this, can you just pull out a couple of key points so that we have this documented? We can then follow-up with our paper, post-committee.
5:35 p.m.
Policy and Research Advisor, Century Initiative
Sure.
I would say that the proposal that has come forward from the current government is indeed very significant and will go in large measure towards achieving a vision for a national child care system, which has really been under discussion for the last 50 years in Canada. I think the work going forward is really going to be about that kind of pan-Canadian work of co-ordinating with provinces and territories to set-up the Canada-wide system that we all envision.
Let's not to lose sight of the ball. This is now an issue on which there will be differences of opinion, differences of views across parties, but let's just acknowledge that, like health care, child care is something that we want to see as a core of our public services, and we want to see that all parties have their own plans and their own ideas on how to move the ball forward.
I would just add that there are many benefits of a national child care system, but one of the things that Century Initiative has identified as a continuing issue is the income gap between immigrants and non-immigrants in Canada, which is particularly significant for women immigrants to Canada. There's strong potential for the national child care system to really support the kind of involvement in the labour market that will help to close that income gap.
5:35 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Salma Zahid
Thank you, Mr. Medow.
With that, our round of questioning comes to an end. On behalf of all members of this committee, I really want to thank all of the witnesses for appearing before the committee today and providing your important input as we continue this study. If there is something that you would like to bring to the committee's attention, some issue you want to highlight that you were not able to discuss today, or if there are any further statistics or information you want to provide to the committee members, please feel free to send in some written submissions to the clerk of the committee, which will then be circulated to all members.
Thanks once again to everyone for being here today. With this, the panel comes to an end.
The meeting is adjourned.