Transport Committee on Oct. 19th, 2022

[Leslyn Lewis, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

Are those warehouses paid for by the CBSA? Who pays for those warehouses?

[Maguessa Morel-Laforce]

The CBSA will provide the agents who will process the imports. That's a key part. There are a series of security requirements that need to be followed. What I have heard from members who would like to see that happen is that they're ready to commit the capital and make the investment to make this a reality. What they are waiting for is the regulatory approval.

[Leslyn Lewis, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

What are the main government policies—

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you very much, Dr. Lewis.

Next, we have Mr. Badawey.

The floor is yours. You have six minutes.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I appreciate the line of questioning from Ms. Lewis. It's nice to see the appreciation that she has for the Great Lakes. I see Mr. Masse here from the NDP, as well, who has been a real champion for the Great Lakes. Brian, I am glad to see you here.

I have to agree with the comment earlier. The bottom line is that the Great Lakes and the St. Lawrence will create the fluidity that this country needs to bring trade not only domestically but internationally, to strengthen our overall trade performance.

I have to be very specific, especially now that we're digging deeper into the CTA review that was completed in 2015 by David Emerson; the transportation and logistics strategy reports that this committee has both commissioned and completed in the interim, and hopefully in the future and the final stage; the ports modernization review, which has already been mentioned; the supply chain report that we've embarked on; and now the labour strategy. They're all part and parcel together.

The final comments before I get to my question are these. There's no doubt that we understand that the partners include the companies, the labour and the supply chain within the marine industry, the trucking industry, the rail industry and the air industry. We understand the effects on the overall supply chain when it comes to labour shortages. Ships are docking at docks with no captains, no cooks, no engineers, no deckhands and no mates. The ship's docked. That cargo is now held one day, two days, three days or maybe a week in getting to port. We also understand that the effects on the multimodal partners are great as well. It's a domino effect. The ship docks, and the trucks and trains wait. They have nothing to carry, because it's still sitting on the ship.

What do we do about it? We're moving forward now with a strategy that, I would only suspect, is not specific to one of these different methods of transportation, but is a multimodal transportation labour strategy that includes all methods of transportation.

With that, I'm going to ask all three of you the same question. Jump in as you see fit.

I'll give you an example from the Niagara region. We are now embarking on the construction and building of a Great Lakes innovation and training facility that will include education vis-à-vis the environment of the Great Lakes and its ecosystem, as well as the economic side when it comes to working with companies and the unions—such as the SIU and others—and, of course, other NGOs, to be part of that facility from the operating standpoint.

The key is to integrate the distribution and logistics, working hand in hand with up-to-date movement of goods along strategic trade corridors—such as that on the Great Lakes—integrated with road, rail and air, and aligned with up-to-date data analysis leading to integrated management. My point is that it's not just about the person driving the vehicle, truck, ship, plane or train. It's also about how it's moved and the training that goes along with that.

The question is to all three of you. How do you see that playing out? How do you see the trucks, trains, rail and boats moving, not only in terms of the product, but also in an integrated fashion and, therefore, the training that's needed to accomplish that?

[John Corey]

I'll go first, if that's okay, gentlemen.

Right now, we have a supply chain that is really silos. Each member of the supply chain does what's best for that particular company or group. What you're talking about is coordination of that supply chain so that the most effective and efficient movements are made. That's going to take a lot of political will, if I could use that term, to force the members of the supply chain to be on the same team.

Shippers want that to happen, because “what's good for me” is good initially, but if everyone pulls together, it's going to be good for Canada in the long run. We're going to become a much more effective, efficient trading partner, and that's going to be good for everyone, because it trickles down.

The question is, how do you do that? I think that's the conundrum we have. The report that came out from the supply chain task force I think is a good start. There are some interesting ideas in there. How do we do that?

A lot of things are already in place that can help us have a more effective, efficient supply chain. Strengthening the Canada Transportation Act is one of them. There is legislation already there to regulate railways, which are, in this country—let's be honest—monopolies, and there are ways to level that playing field, but there has to be some will to actually do what needs to be done to level that playing field.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Corey.

Go ahead, Mr. Buy.

[Serge Buy]

You talked about coordination, and indeed, there needs to be better coordination of the supply chain. Some recommendations were made to the task force. Other committees are also studying the supply chain, so I'm going to focus on the labour shortage, if you don't mind, which is the study of this committee.

You talked about training. You don't train a marine worker in the same way that you train a truck driver. While you can coordinate certain things in training, on that side it's a little more difficult to coordinate training. However, the coordination of the supply chain is essential. I will give you that.

What the government can do to help at the present time is to look at some of the legislation it has on the training side and modernize some of that legislation. The Canada Shipping Act can be looked at, to be modernized a bit, to enable more flexibility for training institutions to look at foreign students, as an example, or to enable virtual hybrid training. You can train a doctor virtually, partially, in a hybrid model, but you can't train a marine worker in a hybrid model right now.

We know that there were some movements made, but the movements are very slow, sir. I think your help and the help of this committee on the labour shortage is essential to drive the agenda a bit faster.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Buy.

You're next, Mr. Morel-Laforce.

[Maguessa Morel-Laforce]

I think the supply chain task force report that was released recently highlights the need for more data sharing. I think that if funding is made available and there's support for doing more of it, and you link that to an updated curriculum where you have seafarers who can handle the information that's provided to them, we can be more efficient. We can deliver faster—absolutely.

[Vance Badawey, Liberal, Niagara Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Morel-Laforce.

That is exactly what I'm drilling down to. It's basically not working in silos, not training people to just simply drive trucks, steer ships or navigate ships, trains or planes. It's also the next layer, which is in fact that data integration. They're being trained to do what they are actually disciplined to do with respect to driving, navigating, flying or engineering, but also, on top of that, the next layer is that integration of distribution logistics systems so that they're being trained to do that as well. Then, of course, it means working all together in a multimodal fashion to get the word out there so that people are actually interested in getting into the industry.

Would you find that an advantage?

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you very much, Mr. Badawey.

Now we have Mr. Barsalou‑Duval.

Mr. Barsalou‑Duval, you have six minutes.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My first question is for Mr. Morel‑Laforce and Mr. Buy.

During the last legislature, my colleague from the Bloc Québécois, Maxime Blanchette‑Joncas, the MP for Rimouski‑Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, sponsored Bill C‑281, An Act to amend the Canada Shipping Act, 2001 (certificate of competency), after listening to the grievances of the Institut maritime du Québec, which is based in Rimouski. A good number of international students were coming to Canada to learn how to pilot our boats and then, sadly, once they had finished their training, they had to go back to their home countries because they needed a permanent residency visa or a certificate of competency in order to work in their field.

I think we should amend the act, especially in light of the labour shortage, because those students learned how to use our system and were trained here. They could easily pilot our boats.

I would like to know if you would be in favour of amending the Canada Shipping Act, 2001, in order to allow people who have been trained here to stay.

[Serge Buy]

Thank you, Mr. Barsalou‑Duval.

Actually, that is one of the 10 recommendations contained in the document submitted to your committee. That bill contained some interesting measures. I spoke recently with representatives from the Institut maritime du Québec, the IMQ. The Canadian Association of Marine Training Institutes made a request to Transport Canada in June and is waiting for a reply. There will definitely be discussions concerning hybrid projects.

That said, in the case of foreign students, we need to amend the Canada Shipping Act, 2001. That is one of our recommendations and I think it is an excellent one. This is not a problem for other professions. Why should it be in the marine sector? We would welcome such an amendment.

[Maguessa Morel-Laforce]

I completely agree, and I would add that we should look at the immigration system, whether that means recognizing foreign credentials or simply identifying foreign candidates and bringing them into the system. We are seeing that the process takes an inordinate amount of time. Even if many positions on a ship are given priority status by Immigration Canada, in reality, it takes over two years between the time a candidate is selected by a company that would like to hire that person and the moment when that person has the right to work in Canada. It's essentially a problem of resources.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

If I understand you correctly, you are also talking about a problem with processing times for foreign worker applications. I don't know if we can establish this conclusively, but there are few businesses in the marine sector in my riding, even though it includes the St. Lawrence River shoreline. However, my office gets calls from many agricultural and industrial businesses that are desperate, because they are trying to get foreign workers and it takes forever. By the time these businesses get the green light to bring the workers over, those workers have found jobs elsewhere and no longer want to come.

Do you believe that the timelines for processing files in the federal system are a problem?

[Maguessa Morel-Laforce]

Absolutely. That is what we are seeing in our industry. We recruit the workers, the businesses want to bring them over, but because the files get bogged down in Ottawa, the workers find other jobs.

[Serge Buy]

It's the same story in our industry. I saw statistics this morning talking about processing delays for 2.6 million applications at Immigration Canada. It seems that is the problem. I would say that there is a personnel issue with Immigration Canada. They can't do the work quickly anymore. I could give you similar examples of people who are offered jobs but unfortunately, other countries will give them immigrant status much more quickly.

I would, however, like to thank Transport Canada for signing bilateral agreements with different countries to recognize diplomas and certificates, which will allow workers to access the Canadian labour market more quickly. It's important, and we would like to see more of this.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

My next question is for all three witnesses. I don't know how much time I have left, Mr. Chair.

You spoke quite a bit about the aging workforce in the marine sector as well as the trucking sector. Other witnesses from the trucking sector have also provided testimony. Have you thought of ways that would encourage workers to stay on the job longer? That could also be part of the solution. The Bloc Québécois has proposed tax credits for experienced workers, but there are most certainly other good incentives.

I would like to hear your thoughts, starting with Mr. Corey, because he hasn't spoken yet.

[John Corey]

Certainly. I think it is apparent that people are working longer, and that is a good thing. We should take advantage of that. There is one area where I find an incongruity: that as we digitize the environment people work in, there's a potential that younger workers are much better suited for those kinds of technological changes. Older workers can learn new tricks, but I'm not sure that's a place we should be focusing our energies.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Mr. Barsalou‑Duval, you have 15 seconds.

[Xavier Barsalou-Duval, Bloc, Pierre-Boucher—Les Patriotes—Verchères, QC]

Anyone else?

[Serge Buy]

We have workers who are getting on in years. The chief engineer of one of our operators is over 73 years old. How much longer can we ask them to stay on? I don't know, it's hard to say.

[The Chair, Liberal, Peter Schiefke]

Thank you, Mr. Barsalou‑Duval.

Mr. Masse, the floor is yours. You have six minutes, unless Mr. Bachrach has returned.

[Brian Masse, NDP, Windsor West, ON]

Thank you. Yes, he's just behind me, but he's going to let you be subjected to me for the first round here. You can get him back later.

Thanks for having me, Mr. Chair. It's good to be back here.

To our witnesses, actually, on the international trade committee we are studying the container issue and shortages too, so maybe we'll forward some information that might be helpful for the committee.

Mr. Badawey has done some really good work on the Canada-United States Inter-Parliamentary Group initiative. We're carving out a special spot for the Great Lakes, so we now focus on other political contacts, NGOs and businesses on the Great Lakes side. It was an initiative that he started. It has formalized and created another level of opportunity.

I'm wondering what you're hearing from American counterparts, and whether or not a similar strategy with labour might be a way to go if they're suffering the same kinds of pains we are, since many of our markets are integrated. In ridings like mine and Mr. Lewis's here, we have about 10,000 trucks per day that go through our communities. He probably actually gets more, because they go back and forth within his riding even more, even though I have the border.

Do you have any thoughts on reaching out to our American and perhaps even Mexican counterparts about some of the labour shortages that we have, as a unified approach to making sure that's in place?

Maybe we can start with Mr. Corey and go across the table.