Evidence of meeting #22 for Natural Resources in the 44th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was transition.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Director, Government and Public Affairs, Future Skills Centre
I think we've talked about it today. These are economic transitions that meet climate targets and provide people who are transitioning, whether for opportunity or as a result of disruption, with the kinds of jobs that allow them to support their family, meet their obligations and have dignified work.
Conservative
Greg McLean Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
Thank you very much. We'll note that.
Industries are moving their skill set requirements forward to address the jobs they think they require. Many of those jobs will be the result of changing government regulations—and government is changing regulations—and they're adjusting, but now they have a new study here that's going to say, “Here's a just transition” layered on top of what they're looking for, which is foresight, a line of sight on what those jobs are, and they're trying to meet those regulations.
Tell me how your activities, through this collective bunch of organizations here, are helping with that process, as opposed to layering in another bureaucracy on that?
Go ahead, Mr. Baldwin.
Director, Government and Public Affairs, Future Skills Centre
Future Skills Centre is a partnership, but a pretty lean organization.
We referred to a number of research activities, including in partnership with the Conference Board, that are starting to identify where those transitions are and where opportunities are in the future, both for workers and industry, as well as the skill requirements. We are leaning in further to that through some partnerships that will be announced in the coming months to try to get below national-level projections into some sectoral and regional ones as well.
Conservative
Greg McLean Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
Thank you very much.
I'm accustomed to provincial governments identifying the skill gaps in the regional economies and filling those skill gaps with their post-secondary institutions at the provincial level. There are various institutions—colleges, technical institutions and universities—that the provincial governments work with, and they spend a lot of money doing it, I should point out.
I see that the federal government is funding your organization in excess of $380 million to do what is really an overlap of the same thing. In addition, many of these organizations around the table are funded for hundreds of millions of dollars more in order to do this, and you're all working hand in hand.
This is an expensive, non-productive bureaucracy, in my opinion. My constituents are going to ask, “What is the value for this work you're doing?”, when it's really just spinning paper with no real eyesight on the outcome here.
That will be my last question for you, Mr. Baldwin: Can you say why you don't see this as a direct overlap with what's already being done at the provincial level to address the jobs of the future?
Director, Government and Public Affairs, Future Skills Centre
We work very collaboratively with the provincial and territorial governments across the country as well as with local partners to identify what their needs are. Our approach is not to go into communities and tell them what they need; it's to go and listen and work with them to try to support that.
We're supporting a number of initiatives that are designed to test how we can do things like support people moving from one sector to another or one occupation to another more rapidly to maintain good work or find new opportunities.
We talked about an initiative in Calgary with Calgary Economic Development. That was one that was developed by those partners—CED partnering with the post-secretary institutions in the city—to meet a need they had identified.
Conservative
Greg McLean Conservative Calgary Centre, AB
Thank you, Mr. Baldwin. I'm not sure that answered the question I asked, but I appreciate it nonetheless.
I'll go to ECO Canada here.
ECO Canada, thank you very much for a very good submission. In it you talk about providing $144 million in wage subsidies to produce 14,000 wage-paying jobs. With quick math, that is $10,000 per job, none of which may have stuck, but that's what it is. There are also other studies that say that it's $20,000 per job. With the limited jobs you're talking about here, there are very few jobs you can identify that are going forward in the equation.
Tell us, Mr. Nilsen, where you think this gap of old jobs versus new jobs is, because the Conference Board says there are 27 jobs in the new green economy for every 100 jobs we're going to lose in the other economy.
President and Chief Executive Officer, Environmental Careers Organization of Canada
Sorry; I didn't quite get what the question was there. Was it about a math question? Because we have support—
President and Chief Executive Officer, Environmental Careers Organization of Canada
Yes, we offer up to $20,000 in wage subsidy placements to support job creation and training, but the average might be lower because sometimes the jobs don't last for the full 12 months. They are shorter in duration; therefore, the average might be lower, if that's what you're referring to in the $10,000 versus $20,000.
The environmental sector has grown at such a tremendously rapid rate that we need to do whatever we can to support job growth. That's what we're focusing on. Employers come to us all the time saying they don't have enough people. They have started reducing the skills requirement of the people they hire because they're desperate.
We're postpandemic now when it comes to the economy. More and more organizations have more project volume than they can handle, and they need people. That's why they come to us. That's why these wage subsidy programs are really great. It's because they help them get the people they want, help them train them, help them bring them up and take away a little of the development costs they are faced with.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John Aldag
We're over time on that one, so I'm going to jump right over to Ms. Lapointe for her five minutes.
Liberal
Viviane LaPointe Liberal Sudbury, ON
Thank you.
My questions are for Mr. Burt.
You made some interesting comments during your opening remarks that I would like you to expand upon.
In terms of skilled and general labour needs for the clean economy, you said with regard to people who are still in school that we need to build green skills into the educational programs so that those entering the workforce will have the appropriate building blocks to either—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John Aldag
If I could stop here, the bells light is flashing. Is there something happening?
Just so the witnesses know, if we end up with votes, we get notice, and in order to continue, we need unanimous consent of the committee. I wasn't aware of anything happening, but we need to check.
Do we have notice?
Liberal
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John Aldag
How much time do people need to get to the House—15 minutes, 10 minutes?
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John Aldag
I can't make people do that. They need the option to get to the House if they want to. I think it's 10 minutes, and I need three to—
Liberal
The Chair Liberal John Aldag
We will go another 20 minutes.
Okay, where were we?
Please continue, Ms. Lapointe. You have four and a half minutes left.
Liberal
Viviane LaPointe Liberal Sudbury, ON
We were talking about building green skills into educational programs so those entering the workforce will have the appropriate building blocks to either enter green-collar jobs or move along the green continuum over the course of their careers.
What are your thoughts on early partnerships between educators and industry to ensure that the training or academic programs on offer will provide the skills needed for the sectors in the green economy?
Vice President, The Conference Board of Canada
I think it's critical. We can't be developing these programs without understanding what the employers' needs are.
We have a number of colleagues here from the different colleges who could probably speak a little bit more to the program development that they're doing, but I think it's very important for the needs of the employers to be built into these programs.
I think flexibility is the key. It's hard for us to say what the skills will be 10 years or 20 years from now. That's why I focused on building blocks, because those will enable people to be able to adapt over the course of their careers.
Liberal
Viviane LaPointe Liberal Sudbury, ON
You also stated that the clean energy transition will look different across communities, depending on local conditions, and that opportunities vary widely by region.
Can you expand on or give examples of regional differences and how we can plan to have infrastructure and training in place to accommodate regional needs? For example, my riding is in northern Ontario, in Sudbury, where resources are plentiful but people and infrastructure are lacking.
How do we plan now, so that we have what we need later on?
