Status of Women Committee on June 6th, 2017

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Pam Damoff]

Thank you.

We'll now go to Ms. Vecchio for seven minutes.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Thank you very much.

Jennifer, I will be coming back to you, so we'll be discussing some of those great things.

Thank you also, Tanya.

I'm going to focus especially on the immigrant women coming into Canada, because I think this is something that we're missing here.

I just sat down with a lady from Medicine Hat the other day, who explained that they had about 15 new families come to their area. One of the biggest issues that they have is the language barrier. Some of the women are actually pulling their children out of school so they can take an interpreter with them to help them throughout the community.

Jennifer, I want to focus on things like the prior learning assessment tools that you may have, as well as what sorts of language barriers they have. What are we doing to get over those barriers? I think the number one thing is if they want to integrate, we have to help them understand the language. Can you advise me on what your association is doing when it comes to language skills?

[Jennifer Watts]

We try to provide a whole suite of language opportunities. Again, it's not the one-size-fits-all that needs to be understood. It's sometimes very difficult for women who have come into the country, who have large families, and are really struggling. Again, this is the child care issue: finding spaces for babies, spaces for toddlers, and needing to get home to pick up kids after school because of schedules. It's very complex, and if you have eight kids, and are trying to negotiate that, it's very difficult.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

I totally agree with you, but what I'm really looking at is the language barrier. We recognize that a lot of children are now being put in a role of interpreter. Within my own community we have a very strong Mennonite community. We have had a number of young girls who will come and interpret for their mothers on a child tax benefit application, and they're between the ages of 10 and 12. I see that within our own communities, regardless of where people are coming from.

I think we know that one of the barriers is getting the language requirements. What can we do? I know funding is lacking, but what sorts of programs are available to them now? We could look at it as an entire wraparound program, where you come in, and the children can have play dates and things like that while the mothers are interacting with other women trying to learn the language. What sorts of programs do you have that help?

[Jennifer Watts]

I think one of the critical things is the actual language training with trained EAL staff, who are constantly trained. If anyone is going to advance through to get the competency and to get their CLB 4 or 5, to be able to move into the workplace and work, it's going to require specifically being in classes with trained educators. That's number one—

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Okay, I appreciate that. I think sometimes we have to look at formal, but also informal education.

[Jennifer Watts]

Yes.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

I know for myself I'm looking at learning French. One of the things is I will be put into a family's home, where that informal education is also strong. I do understand where we need to get them to, but what sorts of informal, affordable programs are we currently setting up in those communities, where the children can be a part of that as well?

[Jennifer Watts]

We have conversation circles that are run by volunteers. We're also beginning the HIPPY program, which is looking at having trained staff go into the home and work with women and their children. It's working with children in terms of literacy, but also helping women. There are a variety of different options in doing that. We also promote programs such as sewing classes and gathering places where women can come with a focus, and even gardening projects. All of these things bring people out into the community, help them link with Canadians who were born here, and support their language development as well. There's a series of things that we can do.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Awesome. I don't mean to be rude about child care. I'm just trying to stray away from that because that has been a huge focus of our entire study.

When we're looking at the prior learning, at the skills.... I know a lot of times these are associations under the province. If someone comes in as a doctor, he or she has to come under the Ontario Medical Association to get licensing. Can you share with me what sorts of skill sets you see coming in that we can build upon with our immigrant women? What sorts of association barriers do we have to break down, so that maybe their credentials are recognized and they have a chance for greater employment? Or do we see a lack of any employability there? What do you see?

[Jennifer Watts]

Women are coming in with a variety of different experiences and backgrounds. Certainly the issue of international qualification recognition is very important. I must say that Nova Scotia has been a leader. I think we now have 13 specific groups we work with in engineering, pharmacy, health, financial services. They help not just women, but men as well, in terms of looking at their previous skills and experience in their country of origin and how that may translate into the pathway of options. There's not necessarily one specific way. If you were a dentist in another country or becoming a dentist here, there are certainly many pathways. We have had a lot of success, and I must say we're unique in looking at the program that supports that international qualification recognition.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

When I was travelling with the HUMA committee, I recall being out in Medicine Hat talking about immigration. There's a fund there that immigrants can get to help them for one year. Can you share a little bit with the committee so they understand what the fund does, and can you tell me what the uptake in your community for that fund would be?

[Jennifer Watts]

I'm not sure about this exact fund, but we do have a fund that is supported through the government to allow people who have come, who don't have the funds, to be able to get their qualifications to study for exams, or to do certain things. It's a loan fund: they can receive a loan to be able to work on their qualifications whether through exams, tests, or whatever, and then pay that back. It's been very useful and successful and there have been practically no issues in terms of payback. That's been a huge resource.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

I know my time is getting very limited. That's one thing I understood as well, that the payback is extremely high.

[Jennifer Watts]

It's very good.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Very good. Is there enough money there? Is that something that the federal government should look at bumping up, so that we have resources like that? We do know there has been excellent success from that program.

[Jennifer Watts]

We would certainly support the continued use of that resource. I think we're entering into some negotiations right now, but that has been very valuable. Also I would say support around the international qualification recognition program is really critical as well. I understand that will be reviewed over the next year.

[Karen Vecchio, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Vice-Chair, Liberal, Pam Damoff]

That's your time. We'll now turn to Ms. Malcolmson for seven minutes.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you to both of the witnesses. This is extremely helpful and will inform our final recommendations.

I want to turn to Ms. Watts from the Immigrant Services Association of Nova Scotia.

I'm elected on Vancouver Island, so exactly the other side of the country, but the stories you're telling are resonating with me. In my riding of Nanaimo—Ladysmith, I've heard that the language barrier is one of the biggest challenges facing new Canadians, and women in particular. The Central Vancouver Island Multicultural Society is doing fantastic work and they are providing language training, but we're seeing that it's just not up to them alone to carry the whole load, and, as you say, they're not funded to do this.

We're also hearing from them that, even if language training is available, their female clients have difficulty finding transportation to be able to access that training and have difficulty accessing child care. I would like to hear you say really clearly whether you see that increased federal investment in both public transportation and the universal child care system would remove some of those barriers to immigrant women being able to attend language training class, which would then allow them to get into the workforce.

[Jennifer Watts]

Certainly we would see great public transit systems as being very important in supporting all Canadians, but particularly people who are coming into our country as newcomers and being able to access resources and child care as fundamental things that help support women integrating into the workforce. We'd definitely support those advancements in looking at greater economic security, not only for immigrant populations but for Canadians as well.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Where does language rank as far as the hurdles that immigrant women are facing in accessing reliable employment go?

[Jennifer Watts]

It would rank very much at the top, absolutely.

[Sheila Malcolmson, NDP, Nanaimo—Ladysmith, BC]

Thank you.

You also talked a little bit about domestic violence. We've been hearing from previous witnesses at this panel that paid domestic violence leave is starting to be implemented by some unions such as the United Steelworkers in Manitoba, and it's starting to unfold, we're hearing, somewhere in the Atlantic region. I can't remember where, but certainly in British Columbia and Ontario domestic violence leave has been proposed so that women can get paid time away from work to resettle their lives and families and perhaps not have to leave that job while they are making this transition in their life. Is that something you're hearing about from your client base? Do you agree that paid domestic violence leave as a protected right would allow women to avoid some of the discontinuity that results from employment in relation to domestic violence?

[Jennifer Watts]

I certainly think that we'd support that. Probably what we're hearing about most right now, in terms of immigrant women facing domestic violence, is the lack of resources within the shelter community to be able to respond adequately to their situations. Immigrant women may be choosing not to leave situations because, as much as they would like to, the shelters are just unable to provide adequate resources for their cultural context. That's probably what we hear most of right now. Certainly I think the program you're speaking of would be of benefit, but I think for us right now the critical aspects in those situations are having adequate supports, cultural competency training, and interpretation services for shelters. There are also the complexities of having very large families that include young men, and not wanting to split those up but the shelters not being able to respond to the family unit. Understanding that complexity but not being able to respond is very problematic.