Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee on Nov. 17th, 2009

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

That is good advice, Mr. Chair.

You were here in the room when we heard from the Skills Canada representative.

You probably suspect what my first question is. Were you consulted when the needs of Whitehorse's merchants and businesses were being assessed?

[Rick Karp]

Do you mean the need for labour? Yes, but it isn't necessarily by Skills Canada. We are certainly consulted often by the business community for their needs. They come to the chamber, probably on a daily basis, asking where they can get some reliable employees.

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Your mission is to learn what the Whitehorse business community's needs are. You are in contact with them.

In order to meet those needs, does Skills Canada consult you, as a member of the chamber of commerce, to find out what your community's labour needs are?

[Rick Karp]

No.

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Do you ask for meetings with Skills Canada or Human Resources Canada to request training in the sectors where you need it?

[Rick Karp]

Over the years, we have participated with Skills Canada with their competitions. We've had talks with them, but we haven't been at the table seriously talking about labour market issues.

We have with the Yukon government and we have with business. We have surveyed businesses to find out the needs and what is going on. We are currently sitting on four committees with the Yukon government with advanced education, and they are working on this labour market situation, but we have not had serious discussion with the federation of labour or with Skills Canada.

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

Based on your knowledge of the region and your needs, do you think that if you were able to hire first nations people to do the work that needs to be done in the territory, you would have enough labour to fill the jobs that are currently available?

[Rick Karp]

Yes, at the entry level we would have enough with first nations, with social assistance clients. Yes, we would have enough to solve labour market issues at the entry level in Yukon, in Whitehorse.

[Richard Runyon]

Can I add to that?

[Rick Karp]

Yes, of course.

[Richard Runyon]

When we talk about entry level, one of the biggest problems in the Yukon is housing for entry-level workers. For example, when you look at the rental market, I think we have about a 2% vacancy rate, which is about 12 units in Whitehorse that are available for rent. And most of those units are available for rent because they're substandard, with mildew and things like that.

As Rick has indicated, what we have done in the business community is bring over Filipino workers from the Philippines. People live here and they rent out rooms. They have 15 people living in one house, that type of thing. So that deals with the housing issue for this entry-level worker as well. It's very expensive here in that regard.

[Yvon Lévesque, Bloc, Abitibi—Baie-James—Nunavik—Eeyou, QC]

I am sorry, but I do not think that is the way to solve the problem. You are creating one in order to solve another, and I do not believe that approach will solve the problem. I am sorry, but I do not agree with you, and I do not follow your logic one bit. The local government has a duty to create decent housing spots for workers from surrounding communities, in order to help Whitehorse's economy.

Mr. Chair, allow me to finish even though I have used up some time.

The problem seems to be housing and labour retention. If the Employment Insurance Act made it possible to support workers for short periods in places with a job shortage and if ongoing training was offered, thereby improving the skill level of these workers, could you fill all the jobs with people from the Yukon and surrounding areas, before bringing in workers from the Philippines?

[Rick Karp]

If we had the proper training, if we had the proper attitudes, because this is a big issue in small business as well, that we have had in the past.... Employees come in and they get hired. They'll be there for a few days and then leave. The attitudes are questionable, to say the best, and this has literally forced us to bring in foreign workers, because the attitudes of the foreign workers.... These attitudes are starting to have an impact on local workers; they're beginning to learn from the foreign workers proper attitudes, a proper work ethic. If there were training available for first nations--and I believe there is training available--if there were the desire to take on that training....

I'll give you an example. A local company that is owned by five first nations called those first nations and told them that in a week or two they were going to have a hiring day. So they worked with the first nations. They set up a day. They wanted to hire ten or eleven first nations individuals. The first nations said, “Absolutely. This is fantastic. We'll have the people there and set up the whole day. We'll have coffee and doughnuts and everything ready for these people.” The day arrived and not one person showed up. That same company now has ten foreign workers working for it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

We'll have to finish up with that.

Thank you, Mr. Lévesque, Mr. Karp and Mr. Runyon.

Now it's over to Mr. Bevington for five minutes.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

I'm pleased you're here with us tonight, staying through the evening on this issue, because really I think, in the four years that I've been in Parliament, this is the first time northern development has had any focus at the committee level. We're going to be engaged in about 40 sessions over a period of one year on northern development. It's a very important study that's going on and we appreciate all the input that we get.

I'm curious. It seems that the population growth rate in the Yukon over eight years has been about 1.5% per year. So you have a nice orderly growth rate. Your GDP per capita has gone up pretty steadily during that time. Our figures show that you have a pretty good profile, really, for the economy, yet you're saying businesses are not doing well. Is it certain sectors of the economy that are really suffering, such as tourism?

Is the problem in the service sector? Is it uniformly the problem that you don't have the personnel? How does this work?

[Rick Karp]

The problem over the last few years has been things such as Internet shopping and a transition in Whitehorse to a franchised economy. If you look at Main Street, you will see close to 80% of the businesses are now franchises. If you look to the north, you'll see that most of the businesses are franchises. They're large businesses. Many of the family businesses that were here 15 years ago are not here any more.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Your retail sales have gone up, they say, 6%.

[Rick Karp]

Yes. That's because the huge Wal-Marts and the Canadian Tires that we have now, the franchises, are keeping people shopping here a little bit more. But in terms of the smaller businesses, the sole-proprietorship businesses, the small partnerships, in the last year we've lost 28 businesses in Whitehorse. So it's the discretionary spending where we've lost the businesses, and we have to somehow get that back.

It's the discretionary spending, where we have this recession down south and all the media that has come north. We have, as Richard was saying, some 80% government workers. They've lost some on their RRSPs, so they've been holding back. They say, “Well, I don't necessarily want to go to a nice restaurant. Let's go to McDonald's or Tim Hortons.” They want to go out, but they don't want to go to the really nice restaurants. So we've lost a couple of restaurants.

They're saying, “Well, I'm going to go to Canadian Tire or to Wal-Mart to get some clothing. I'm not going to go to the men's shop.” So we've lost a men's shop; we've lost a ladies' shop.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

Then you have a question here. What market can we compete in and win in the global economy? You don't talk about import replacement. Do you not consider that an important part of it?

[Rick Karp]

Absolutely. We have some programs that we're running at the chamber. One of those programs, called “Partnering for Success”, is bringing together a steering committee that is representative of all the sectors. So we have government, the city, the mining sector, the regional director general for INAC, and business and industry on that committee. We have the manufacturing sector, the mining sector, tourism, and the retail sector sitting on that committee. Each one of them, when we meet monthly, has an opportunity to express the concerns they have for our economy.

What we're saying here is that we have a little over 34,000 people in the Yukon and we need to grow that economy. We need to be business friendly, as Richard was saying, so that we can attract more business.

We have identified four pillars to our economy, mining being one, but right now we have only one fully operating mine. We have to develop it.

Labrador, if I'm not mistaken, has six or seven operating mines.

[Dennis Bevington, NDP, Western Arctic, NT]

If I could go back, in the Northwest Territories we have a number of operating mines, our GDP is through the roof, and yet our businesses are saying exactly the same thing as you: it's not the volume of economy, it's the quality of economy. That's what you're saying there too, with your small businesses, with the people who are doing the things on the ground. I wanted to get to that point.

Go ahead.

[Richard Runyon]

When I went to Yellowknife I walked through your city, and it's very robust. You have three or four computer stores and those types of things. When you walk through our downtown, it's all non-government organizations--Save the Fish, Save the Ducks. Those are not really revenue-generating businesses. That's what it comes down to.

[An hon. member]

You don't have any Save the Businesses?

[The Chair, Conservative, Bruce Stanton]

Okay, that will do it, Mr. Bevington. Thank you very much.

Now we'll go to Mr. Duncan.

[John Duncan, Conservative, Vancouver Island North, BC]

Thank you.

I know you have been very busy today, maybe as busy as us, because we've seen you before. I want to thank you, Rick, for introducing us to Rolf Hougen tonight. It was a very special time that we spent with him. He's a very important Canadian. I noticed he was wearing his Order of Canada merit there.

I'd like to look at your submission in the context of the fact that we are in a global economic recession. Some of the things you are talking about here don't actually address the fact that we're in special circumstances. We're not really comparing apples with apples unless we take into account that this dip in economic activity is happening everywhere, so I'd be surprised if you remained unaffected. It's no surprise that private sector investment has been down in the past year. It's no surprise that your mining, tourism, and environmental groups sometimes work against each other's interests. Guess what--that happens everywhere.

We did have a lot of optimistic witnesses today. I must say that. In your fifth paragraph you talk about your waterfront real estate remaining vacant. We did hear from one of our witnesses this morning, from the Pelly group, that there is a proposal on the table for developing that property along with a first nations partner. It sounded pretty positive.

Our mission is to look at the federal role or contribution, to try to help out on the economic development front. This is why we're here.

You made the statement that federal programs are designed in Ottawa by technicians who often have limited experience in rural communities. I like to think that most of our programming has actually had significant partnerships. South of 60, the provincial governments have been partners, and I know that the Yukon territorial government and the first nations have been significantly involved in designing much of what's been rolled out in the Yukon. We've heard a significant number of witnesses today who have had very positive things to say about what has been funded. Somehow, there is a disconnect between what you're seeing and what we're hearing. Can you try to join the dots to tell me I'm wrong?