Science and Research Committee on May 5th, 2022

[Stéphane Lauzon, Liberal, Argenteuil—La Petite-Nation, QC]

No, that's okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

I want to say thank you to all our witnesses. It has been a very good discussion. We're grateful.

Monsieur Blanchette-Joncas and Mr. Cannings, I'm sorry about this round. We will try to get to you the next time.

We will briefly suspend, and we will come back for our third panel.

Thank you, one and all.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Colleagues, we will call this meeting back to order.

Everyone's working hard. It's two hours in, and we're delighted to go into our third panel tonight.

We are pleased to welcome from ApplyBoard, Martin Basiri, chief executive officer and co-founder. From the Institute for Science, Society and Policy, we have Sarah Laframboise, student in biochemistry, University of Ottawa, and president of the Ottawa science policy network; and Paul Dufour, senior fellow. From Mitacs, we have John Hepburn, chief executive officer.

We're delighted to welcome you to this inaugural committee on this important study.

We will hear from each group for five minutes. At the four and a half minute mark, I will hold up a yellow card, which will let you know that there are 30 seconds to go.

With that, we will start with ApplyBoard for five minutes, please.

Welcome.

[Martin Basiri, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder, ApplyBoard]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, committee members, for engaging on this important matter. It's very encouraging to see everyone talking about talent, how to attract the best talent and retain and develop it.

My name is Martin Basiri. I came to Canada from Iran in 2010 to study at the University of Waterloo for my master's in engineering. I loved it here, so I brought my brothers, Meti and Massi, here to also study as international students. A couple of years later, exactly seven years ago today, we started ApplyBoard, the largest online platform on planet Earth to help international students go to Canada, the United States, the U.K. and Australia.

ApplyBoard is one of the fastest-growing companies in Canada and in the world. So far, we have helped over 300,000 students from 130 countries. We have about 1,500 staff globally, with almost 1,000 of them here in Canada.

I would like to make a couple of very important remarks. As the CEO of a tech company and someone who has worked with tens of thousands of talented people who come to Canada and other countries, seeing the immigration policies of other countries, I think these remarks can bring another point of view to the committee.

As you know, right now in Canada and other western countries, the talent shortage is a very big problem. In Canada especially, we have over one million jobs open, but we don't have enough people for these jobs. A lot of companies' growth is capped because of the talent shortage. From coast to coast, you can go to any type of business, from the highest grade tech companies to grocery stores, and they will have a talent shortage. What's the solution for that?

I believe Canada has the best immigration system in the whole world. There are three to four programs that are very targeted to solve this talent shortage problem. One of them is visas: the study permit, the student visa, the work visa, the skilled worker permanent residency and the start-up visa. By the way, I got my permanent residency through a start-up visa and was able to stay here in Canada and, along with my brothers, build our company.

These programs, by policy, are the best in the whole world, but other countries are catching up, and they're trying to attract the best talent. These days talent can go to any country in the world. If you are the best developer, you can go to almost any country, from Singapore to the UAE, to France, Germany, the Netherlands, the U.K. and Sweden. It's no longer only countries like Canada or the United States that benefit from inbound immigration and attracting the best talent.

We need to continue to invest in our immigration, especially the systems and the policy, to make sure that it's the most seamless. If you are a top talent, if you are a top developer, if you are a good doctor or if you are a good nurse, you can literally go anywhere. Everywhere you go, they want you. We are in a global village right now, and you want to have the best and most seamless system.

Our immigration system right now, even though it has a very good policy, has a lot of things we need to continue to invest in. One of them is the predictability of time. If someone wants to come to Canada, and at the first moment, they are.... Basically, instead of waiting for months, they need to deal with two years of waiting. These people, even if they come to Canada, don't have the confidence that they can apply for their permanent residency after that, because they don't know how long it takes. They don't know how long it will take to bring their family, wife, husband or partner here. Speed and reliability in terms of predictability are very important.

The other thing is that we have a huge labour market. We have data. We know in real time exactly what job openings there are and which jobs are having a hard time being filled, though we don't steer our study permits and skilled workers in real time to these programs. We know, for example, what jobs they need filled in literally every single town in this country.

We need our skilled worker and study permits to be more aligned with the labour market, so that as we bring in the talent.... It's better for the students, because they can study what the market needs and find jobs, rather than come here, study something and be hit with the reality that they should have studied something else.

The second piece is government funding—

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Mr. Basiri, I'm so sorry to interrupt. Thank you for sharing a bit of your story. I have to be fair to everyone. I know that colleagues will want to ask you questions.

Thank you.

[Martin Basiri]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Now we will go to the Institute for Science, Society and Policy for five minutes, please.

[Paul Dufour, Senior Fellow, Institute for Science, Society and Policy]

Thank you, Madam Chair, members of the committee.

Thank you for inviting us this evening. My name is Paul Dufour.

I'm a senior fellow—emphasis on “senior”—with the Institute for Science, Society and Policy at the University of Ottawa. With me is Sarah Laframboise. She is associated with ISSP and is a Ph.D. student in biochemistry. She will have some quick remarks immediately after mine.

Before we make our short remarks, permit us to congratulate you, Madam Chair, for your considerable efforts in establishing with colleagues this new House of Commons Standing Committee on Science and Research. It is indeed a welcome addition to our parliamentary House.

My own career path has been an eclectic one in the science policy world, but suffice it to say that at the ISSP, the issue of talent training remains critical, whether it is here in Canada throughout our educational institutions, labour market, and federal labs, or around the globe.

Our institute, led by Dr. Monica Gattinger, is well known for the work at the intersection of science with policy and society. We've just released a strategic plan that builds on our research work over the past decade and outlines new directions. At the heart of this vision is providing students with the opportunities, skills and tools centred on the rapidly evolving knowledge space of science and research policy.

I've had the privilege of teaching at the institute and interacting with the next generation of talent in our science, society and policy world. This includes the Ottawa Science Policy Network but also working closely with such others as the student-led Science & Policy Exchange in Montreal, the Canadian Science Policy Centre and the Students on Ice team based in Quebec, not to mention the fabulous cohort of Mitacs science policy fellows. I'm also monitoring and mentoring the diverse and creative youth council that is advising the government's chief science adviser and her office on next-generation issues associated with science policy.

I can honestly say that all of these networks of talented students and researchers want to make a difference and, like my oldest granddaughter, who's about to start her university studies in pharmacy in Quebec, are passionate about learning so that they can apply their skills, entrepreneurship and knowledge to build a better society.

But they will need your support. They will also need a better understanding of how the public policy world works. I do hope you can help provide them with some of the necessary tools and guidance to make this happen with your recommendations in your report and with your own efforts in your own respective constituencies.

Who knows? Maybe a new pairing scheme of science students with members of Parliament can be contemplated here, or perhaps some of our emerging talents may even find their way onto this very committee in the future.

Thank you.

If I could, with the chair's permission, let me now turn this over to my colleague Sarah Laframboise, who will speak briefly about a very important survey result.

Sarah.

[Sarah Laframboise, Student in Biochemistry, University of Ottawa, President of the Ottawa Science Policy Network, Institute for Science, Society and Policy]

Thank you, Paul.

As mentioned, my name is Sarah Laframboise. I am a Ph.D. student in biochemistry at the University of Ottawa. I want to thank the members of the committee for having me today. I hope to provide a student perspective on graduate student life and funding.

While pursuing my Ph.D., I've been heavily involved in the science policy landscape, where I was fortunate to meet Paul from the ISSP. I am also a member of the leadership council for the institute. Last year I founded the Ottawa Science Policy Network, where I've been investigating graduate student funding in Canada.

As we heard in the committee already, there are significant challenges to being a graduate student in Canada. Only 33% of graduate students are actually supported directly through tri-council awards from one of the three federal granting agencies. The rest are supported indirectly through stipends provided from their supervisors' research grants or departments. This leaves students vulnerable to financial instability and creates a financial barrier of entry to pursue graduate degrees in science.

In December of last year, we launched a national graduate student finance survey. Over the last four months, I have met with graduate student associations across Canada. We've listened to countless stories of struggles, inequalities and crippling debt. Simply put, graduate students need more support.

It's important to note that these students are young adults, typically between the ages of 20 and 30, who care about things like housing, savings and starting a family. Currently, an average student in Canada makes $19,000 at the masters level and $21,000 at the Ph.D. level. After paying tuition and compulsory fees, this leaves a master's student with about $10,000 and a Ph.D. student with only $12,000 to live off of for the rest of the year. This is hardly enough to pay rent in most major cities in Canada, let alone other necessities like food, transportation or hydro.

These are all aspects of the survey that we wanted to investigate. The survey closed just a few weeks ago, with over 1,300 responses from graduate students across Canada. While the results are still preliminary, I'd like to share some key highlights with you.

We found that almost 45% of students—

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Ms. Laframboise, I am so sorry to do this just as you're giving us the results that—

[Sarah Laframboise]

It's okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

I have tremendous colleagues who are going to ask really good questions.

Monsieur Dufour and Ms. Laframboise, thank you both.

Now we will go to Mitacs for five minutes.

[Dr. John Hepburn, Chief Executive Officer, Mitacs]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

My name is John Hepburn and I am currently in Vancouver. Since it will soon be evening here, I will say good evening to everyone. Given that my French leaves a bit to be desired, I'm going to speak in English.

The chair of this committee knows us very well, but many of you probably don't know us. Somebody was telling me in a recent meeting that Mitacs is Canada's largest not-for-profit. That's close. We're somewhere behind World Vision Canada, but we're certainly many times larger than most of the not-for-profits, health charities and the like that support innovation in this country.

I'm not here to beg for money from the federal government. The federal government is very generously supporting us, with two long-term funding agreements for just under $1 billion. That money is matched by all 10 provinces plus Yukon territory, plus industry support.

What do we do with all this money? We provide work-integrated learning opportunities based on innovation partnerships between post-secondary institutions, industry and not-for-profits, and also we have expanded to include municipalities and hospitals. Our goal and our stated purpose are to increase innovation and prosperity in this country, to increase social innovation, basically for the good of all Canadian.

Our activity is 20% in international programs. We bring very talented students, like Mr. Basiri, to Canada under our Globalink programs. Success for us is to have a senior undergraduate student arrive from someplace that's not Canada to spend a stage in a Canadian university before they make their decisions about graduate school. The goal is to convince them to come to a great Canadian university for their Ph.D., at which point they can get a Mitacs internship—we provide about 20,000 of these per year—to work on a joint research project between Canadian industry and a Canadian university. That student is then eligible for support through our e-accelerate program to start a company. We have examples of students who have done exactly that.

How do we retain students? The answer is that we first of all take advantage of our fabulous universities, which attract talent from around the world. We work with them to provide them with opportunities to work, between the university and industry. We do this at Mitacs. I won't say most, but almost half of the students we deal with have come to Canada to study Ph.D.s as international students. Of these students who get Mitacs internships, 75% remain in Canada after their degree—master's, Ph.D. or post-doc—to work and apply their talents to the benefit of Canadians, and obviously to their own benefit. This retention rate is 30% higher than the retention rate for students who come as international students and don't do a Mitacs internship.

We have an agreement with the Government of Manitoba that anybody who does a Mitacs internship is automatically registered in the provincial nominee program for fast track to permanent residency. We're talking with other provinces about doing the same thing.

However, what I'd like to say is that, in addition to supporting organizations like Mitacs, one thing the federal government can do—and I know that innovation is a big part of the current agenda—is support innovation in this country. Talented students are not going to come and stay in Canada unless they have great jobs to go to post-graduation, unless they can start their own companies, like Mr. Basiri, or unless they can work for existing companies. That's why students go to Stanford. Let's not fool ourselves: Stanford is a great university, but they go there because they know they are going to get a fantastic job when they graduate. That's critical.

One way the government can do this, and I think I'm running out of time.... I was just in Edmonton, Alberta, for an announcement of a partnership between us and AltaML, which is an artificial intelligence company, and the Government of Alberta, which is going to establish something called GovLab.AI, actually using a Canadian company to solve government problems using machine learning.

If they are successful, these problem-solving solutions, which are intended—their first project will be predicting wildfires, for example, something we care about a lot in British Columbia.... They are also going to work with health data to provide more efficient health care for Albertans. If they develop these solutions, and they will, because AltaML is a very successful, rapidly growing company that we've been working with for years—well, they're not that old, it's been for four years—they can commercialize these products. They can build their company and, using the government procurement process, they can become a successful company which will then employ loads of students and attract more students.

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Thank you, Mr. Hepburn. We appreciate it.

You've all given the committee so much to think about. They're eager to get started. You have a really interested committee.

With that, we will go for our six-minute round, and we will begin with Mr. Williams.

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

I'm going to start with Mr. Basiri.

You were talking about a few recommendations. I'd like to get you to continue that. Specifically, what specific recommendations can you make for Canada to be the best at talent and immigration attraction for the future?

[Martin Basiri]

Yes, absolutely. I tried to cover it very fast so there would be time for others as well.

The second recommendation I wanted to cover is on procurement, as that is very important. If you ask all the CEOs, the majority of them will tell you that a dollar of revenue is far better for a company than a dollar of grants or funding. If government buys the products we create, even the ones they fund themselves.... Sometimes, or the majority of the time, they don't buy them. If government buys the products that companies in Canada create, we can create big companies, and innovation in Canada would then grow much faster.

Government is the biggest spender in Canada, but when it comes to procurement, the majority of those dollars, for example, in technology, in software technology, are going to big companies in the United States, because they're just being safer. But isn't innovation all about risk? If we have companies in Canada that are innovating, instead of a free grant I would just buy the product from them. Yes, it has some risks, but it creates very sustainable innovation.

On the third one, you asked about our immigration. I think we need to solve the technology aspect of it. Instead of government trying to solve everything themselves, there are so many software technologies in the market, in the business world, that can solve a lot of these problems that we're dealing with in our immigration system. I don't know how other ministries are solving their technology problems, but the whole Canadian immigration system can be built very fast if there is a will for using the current technologies in the market.

I would recommend this, and then, connect it with a good AIML that gets the labour data and gives a very good alignment between our immigration and our market. For example, right now, our immigration—

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Mr. Basiri, I'm sorry. I'm short of time, so I'm going to stop you there, but thank you very much. If you, and all witnesses, have anything else, please submit it in writing to the committee, and then we can get the rest of your data.

Mr. Hepburn, you've talked about the shortages of labour. Even back in 2020, certainly, in an interview, you talked about Canada shifting to a knowledge-based economy and the shortage of labour. Do we find that this labour shortage is across the board and knowledge based? Is that something you're looking to solve through Mitacs right now? What kinds of labour shortages are you seeing?

[Dr. John Hepburn]

We're seeing a lot of labour shortages with all the companies we're dealing with. The labour shortages are actually pretty much across the board. Even in skilled trades there's a labour shortage, but certainly, at the high end in the tech economy and the knowledge economy, companies are crying out for talent. They're competing with the Americans. An artificial intelligence graduate can work for an American company with a starting salary up to and including $300,000 a year, so there's a real arms race on for talent.

Our goal is to keep the talent in Canada. We have unbelievably good universities, so the talent is here. People like Mr. Basiri come to Canada because of our great universities. Mitacs' job is to keep them here, and we've been working with companies like 1QBit, Xanadu and AltaML to provide them with a—

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Hepburn.

Through the chair, you talked about a program you have where 75% of your scholarships through the program stay in Canada. We had a witness in another study—one of the reps from the University of Waterloo—who said that we lose 75% of our software engineers to the U.S. Through your program, what are we doing, just like that scholarship program, to keep talent? What can we do better to keep that talent in Canada?

[Dr. John Hepburn]

Connect them to industry before they graduate. It's as simple as that. The reason we're so successful keeping students is that they come to Canada with no Canadian experience, no Canadian connections, and they enter into a strong academic program. If they graduate without building the industry connections in Canada, why not go to the United States? Why not return back to the country they come from? If they get the industry experience and the industry connections, then they'll be offered a job before they graduate and they'll stay. It's as simple as that. That's why we're successful.

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Mr. Hepburn, thank you very much.

One thing that you mentioned, which I think you were getting close to talking about, was an incubator system, and maybe Mr. Basiri was talking about that as well. If we have immigrants who want to come to Canada, who might have an idea. The incubator might be something whereby we bring those entrepreneurs here to start that.

Is starting an international incubator something that you've looked at through your programs at Mitacs? I guess that's how we'd classify it.

[Dr. John Hepburn]

It is. We have agreements with most of the university-based incubators across the country. We also have agreements with international incubators. We have a program to send entrepreneurs abroad to incubators that we have agreements with so they can develop international markets, but we work with all the Canadian incubators. We have a program to support start-up companies once they actually become companies and we can actually support them with Mitacs' incubators.

[Ryan Williams, Conservative, Bay of Quinte, ON]

Thank you very much.

If you have any examples of those, could you please submit them in writing to the committee so we can put them into our study?

Thank you so much.

[Dr. John Hepburn]

Okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Kirsty Duncan]

Thank you, Mr. Williams. You're right on time.

We will now go to Ms. Diab for six minutes.