Evidence of meeting #130 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was students.
A recording is available from Parliament.
NDP
Robert Aubin NDP Trois-Rivières, QC
Thank you.
You are certainly too young to have gone through the crisis in the aviation industry in the 1970s. It was all about language. With your approach involving women in careers in aviation, is there still a difference with regard to language or has that been resolved?
February 19th, 2019 / 11:30 a.m.
Founder and Chair, Elevate Aviation
I don't think so. I could be wrong about that, but I don't think so. English is the language of aviation we have to speak on the radio around the world, so you do have to speak English for the most part if you're a pilot or an air traffic controller.
In Quebec you can be an air traffic controller, and you can speak French on the frequency, which is wonderful. When I go in there, I'm one of the only.... Most people speak French, and I'm trying to, but I don't think it's a big issue.
NDP
Robert Aubin NDP Trois-Rivières, QC
Thank you.
Mr. Doiron, we have not had the opportunity to hear about your recommendations. I will give you the floor so that you can tell us about them.
Aviation Safety Officer, EVAS Air Charters, Gander Flight Training Aerospace
In my opinion, the biggest problem for flight schools lies in the difficulty of attracting and retaining students, as you said earlier.
Finances are an important factor. I know a number of students who would like to become involved in the industry as pilots, engineers or in other roles. But they do not have the financial means to do so, since the cost of the training is very high. It is a major problem.
Another point I would like to emphasize is regulation. I firmly believe that there has to be a good regulatory oversight system, but the government has limited resources for work of that kind. Transport Canada would help a number of companies if it provided them with studies and product information and if it enforced very stringent regulatory oversight. At the moment, the greatest obstacle we have to face in Gander is the difficulty in obtaining good service from Transport Canada, both for our students and for our company.
Liberal
Vance Badawey Liberal Niagara Centre, ON
Thank you, Madam Chair.
I have a few questions I'm going to put up front, and you guys can share the time to answer.
First off, to Ms. Kincade, you do a great job, great work. It's nice to see that someone has the passion for the industry that you do. We all—I can speak for at least us on this side of the table—appreciate that.
I want to direct my questions to the diversity of pilot examiners, controllers and pilots, and shortages. With that, there's equality with respect to gender, linguistic and ethnic equality, and, of course, the needs of the different areas throughout Canada.
We see the grant funding of $426,000 to Elevate Aviation to examine why more women don't look at aviation to create economic security and to collect data to see if the environment is attractive and inclusive of women.
Ms. Kincade, with that program, are you looking at including in the dialogue you're having throughout the nation—and Mr. Aubin touched on this with the linguistic side of it, but I'll touch on it with the indigenous side of it—folks like those in the indigenous community, so that the results include that equality?
Founder and Chair, Elevate Aviation
The focus of that program was just women. As we're growing, we are learning that we need to focus more on indigenous people, so at our learning centre, we have two weeks that are indigenous only. The focus of that is women, whether they are indigenous or non-indigenous. We're going to work together and do a focus group, I hope.
We're also working with NATA. At the conference in Yellowknife in April we are going to do a focus group with them and hope to capture some thoughts from northern Canada. We really want everyone's voice heard in this.
The same things that are stopping women in general from looking at aviation are perhaps the same things that are stopping the indigenous community. Whether we find that out or not with this grant, we can still use the recommendations that we find, work together with the companies and hope to be inclusive of everybody in Canada.
Liberal
Vance Badawey Liberal Niagara Centre, ON
Ms. Tabobandung, do you see that as an opportunity to tap into the same program and work, so that when recommendations do come forward for companies to find and retain women in the workforce, you're going to be a big part of that?
Chief Flight Instructor and Director of Aviation, First Nations Technical Institute
Of course. We will work with all groups. It's interesting, because we don't have a difficult time attracting applicants to our program. We just don't have the capacity to train them. We don't target women. Indigenous people make up 4% to 5% of the population. Half of that is women. All our people are under-represented, so we don't target one specific group, but by all means, we'll work with anybody we can to increase the interest. Even if they don't train at First Nations, it's important that they pursue post-secondary education to continue studies in aviation or anything else.
Liberal
Vance Badawey Liberal Niagara Centre, ON
Speaking of post-secondary education, currently the federal government is a steward, for lack of a better word, of the Canada student loans program. Other than that, the provincial levels of government throughout the country are all different, unfortunately, but hopefully we can get more of a consistency. They also offer programs for education at the post-secondary level. Do you see a greater contrast with what's available to post-secondary students in other programs as compared to the aviation programs?
I guess I'll ask that question of all of you.
Chief Flight Instructor and Director of Aviation, First Nations Technical Institute
Yes. Our students have a different base to secure funds for post-secondary education. A common misconception is that all indigenous people have their education paid for. That's not correct. It depends on the size of the communities they live in. FNTI supports bursaries, and there's also Indspire, through the federal government, where our students can apply to help support their education.
Liberal
Vance Badawey Liberal Niagara Centre, ON
I'm assuming, Ms. Kincade, that when you come back with your recommendations, they are going to include indigenous-related concerns and/or mechanisms that can include the indigenous community as well as linguistic and other ethnicities. Perhaps there will be recommendations that the federal government expand its Canada student loans program to include aviation education and that the provincial government make other programs available to the aviation industry, especially in the diverse areas that you're looking at—pilots being the most obvious, but also controllers and others who are seeing the shortage as well.
Would I be correct to assume that?
Liberal
Vance Badawey Liberal Niagara Centre, ON
We're here with you, but at the same time it's important that it's more than just us at the committee level, that it's the folks in the industry who in fact know a heck of a lot more than we do. I look forward to seeing that final report, and hopefully we can then move it forward and help alleviate some of these challenges.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Judy Sgro
Just for the information of the committee, if you have recommendations and have submitted a brief, the analyst will have those, but if you have any other recommendations, please submit them very quickly so that they can be considered in the report.
We'll go on to Mr. Rogers.
Churence Rogers Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, Lib.
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Welcome to our witnesses.
I want to focus on the labour market information report of March 2018, which identified that only 7% of pilots are women. There's also, of course, the indigenous side in terms of under-representation. I want to ask this of Kendra, first of all, given that we've seen the work that you're doing with your organization, trying to elevate the profile of training and so on for females and indigenous people. What do you think we could do as MPs, as a committee, to support the work you're trying to accomplish?
Founder and Chair, Elevate Aviation
Bring awareness to the community would help. For instance, we're trying to take our learning centre in Edmonton across Canada. Anything that can be done to help us take it across Canada and secure funds would help. We can take it across Canada; we just need the funds to help us do it.
We work with many businesses, such as Canadian North and North Caribou Air. We're working with a number of them out in Edmonton that do in-kind things to help us. Nav Canada has an entire day, Canadian North has a half a day, the military has half a day. There are a bunch of different things. We have drones, for example.
Helping to link us up to other organizations; helping us find funding so that we can take that learning centre across Canada, talking to the community to say that we're here and that other organizations are here would help. Northern Lights Aero Foundation is an organization, and there is the Canadian Women in Aviation conference, which is coming up in June. There are things that the public just doesn't know about.
If you are ever out talking and there is opportunity to bring people out to speak about aviation at events you're doing, that's a wonderful thing that can be done. If you're speaking, ask, “Have you ever heard about aviation? Here are some organizations that can help you.”
If you or if someone from a different part of the country contacts us at Elevate Aviation, we hook them up with a mentor from various areas. If you want to be a pilot, we'll hook you up with a pilot; it could be a chief flight instructor, a WestJet pilot, an Air Canada pilot or an Air Inuit pilot. It's the same with air traffic control: we'll bring you in, let you plug in for an hour and listen to an air traffic controller—a “try before you buy” kind of thing.
Letting people know that all of these organizations are here would be a wonderful step—and funding.
Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, Lib.
Ms. Tabobandung, you mentioned the lack of investment in infrastructure. Do you mean in new infrastructure, in maintaining current infrastructure, or both?
Chief Flight Instructor and Director of Aviation, First Nations Technical Institute
It's beyond maintenance, at this time; it's repair. The runways we use now are 78 years old. They're deteriorating; they're crumbling.
We had three runways. One was decommissioned because it had degraded too much, so we're left with two runways with the grass growing through them, and we don't have a perimeter fence. It's just a matter of time before they get to the point that we can no longer use them.
We need infrastructure dollars to help support our program so that we can continue to train indigenous pilots.
Bonavista—Burin—Trinity, Lib.
And do you believe that's the most effective way of addressing the critical shortage of pilots in the north, to train indigenous people?
Chief Flight Instructor and Director of Aviation, First Nations Technical Institute
Oh, absolutely. Among our admissions criteria, because we have so many applications, is a pretty comprehensive admissions process.
One criterion, most importantly, is a letter of intent. The letter of intent tells us who they are. I'll share with you what I read in a letter of intent last week from a young woman in the Northwest Territories. She's 28 years old. She's the only person in her family who graduated from high school and she wants to stay in the north. She pointed out two carriers that she wants to fly with so that she can help support the community she grew up in.