Thank you, Mr. Chair and committee members.
My name is Andrew Brown, and I am the senior assistant deputy minister for the skills and development branch at Employment and Social Development Canada.
I would like to note that I am joining you today from the traditional unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe people.
I am pleased to be here to discuss labour shortages.
Labour market pressures are affecting practically all sectors of the economy in most regions of the country. As of July 2022 there were nearly a million job vacancies across Canada, which means twice as many occupations are now showing strong labour shortages compared to back in 2019.
For example, the trucking industry is a significant contributor to the national economy, with a GDP of $20 billion in 2021, or about one-third of that for the entire transportation sector. The industry employs roughly 278,000 employees and has a vacancy rate of 9.4%, which is significantly higher than that of the labour market as a whole, at roughly 5.9%.
For truck drivers, this means roughly 28,000 unfilled positions, and this figure is in line with what we're hearing from the Canadian Trucking Alliance, which forecasts that the trucking industry will have a shortage of 55,000 workers at the end of 2023.
Demographic shifts that are rooted in aging populations and retirement are adding pressures by limiting available workers. As of August, occupations related to transportation had, on average, some of the highest-aged workers in the economy.
As the government looks to address labour shortages in Canada, we recognize that there are four potential avenues for increasing labour supply. One is supporting the transition of new entrants into the labour market, principally youth. The second is welcoming talent from around the world, more specifically immigrants and temporary foreign workers. The third is increasing the participation of groups that are under-represented in the labour market, and fourth is helping individuals already working who need some upskilling or re-skilling to adapt and stay in the labour force for longer, though to address labour shortages in the Canadian economy, it's going to be necessary to maximize all sources of labour in the short and longer term.
Youth are Canada's largest source of new entrants to labour markets. About 4.9 million young jobseekers are expected to enter the labour force between 2019 and 2028. To help youth and students build job skills and connect with employers, budget 2021 offered over $720 million in additional funding for the youth employment and skills strategy, the student work placement program, and the Canada summer jobs program.
As you would have heard from my colleague, immigration is a source of new labour supply, and as a complement to permanent immigration, approximately 100,000 temporary foreign workers enter Canada every year. Recent changes allow employers to hire up to 30% of their workforce through the temporary foreign worker program for low-wage positions, for one year, in sectors that are experiencing significant shortages. Other employers are allowed to hire up to 20% of their workforce for low-wage positions until further notice, an increase from the former 10% cap for many employers.
Another source of labour supply is under-represented groups. Increasing the participation rate of women, indigenous people, persons with disabilities and Black and racialized Canadians in the workplace would significantly help to boost labour supply.
Equally as important to our labour market initiatives, the government's recent and ambitious investments in childcare, affordable housing, transportation, and broadband create the systems and supports needed to help increase Canadians' participation in the labour market.
Reducing skills mismatches and a better utilization of available talent will be critical to meet employment needs and shortages. To this end, the Government of Canada has taken concrete measures to help reduce shortages across the economy.
The sectoral workforce solutions program is one noteworthy example of recent investments through Budget 2021. That program, which provides $960 million over three years, assists key sectors by funding industry-driven activities. That will assist workers through training and reskilling, and help employers attract and retain a skilled workforce.
Budget 2021 also made significant investments to...