First of all, thank you to the standing committee for allowing the Professional Truck Training Alliance of Canada to present its remarks today.
I would like to start by talking about what the Professional Truck Training Alliance of Canada is. PTTAC is the unified voice of commercial truck training in Canada, with a mandate to standardize and support programs offered in each province and territory. The PTTAC movement began in early 2022 when a group of like-minded professionals and stakeholders connected to share a vision: to see truck driver training be accessible, consistent and a valued profession in Canada.
PTTAC is the only national group in Canada that represents commercial truck driver training businesses, and it will drive progress and education training in road safety through expertise and influence. The Professional Truck Training Alliance of Canada's key objectives are to make commercial truck driver training a recognized Red Seal trade in Canada; to create national, approved truck training instructor programs; to remove barriers and bring accessibility to [Technical difficulty—Editor] Transportation Specialists Inc. has been a business since 1989, a company that I founded. To date, we've graduated, through our three different facilities, over 17,000 commercial drivers.
I'm here to tell you, on behalf of PTTAC and our industry, that the HR pipeline is a problem. It's spreading across every sector of our industry, and it's not just drivers. We have improper oversight, improper compliance and improper regulations. The federal government needs to play more of a leadership role to correct this.
Transport Canada has dumped responsibilities onto the provinces, and we encourage you to change this. As a proud member of the Ontario Trucking Association for 35 years and as a past chairman of its allied trades division, I have been lobbying since 2018 against the misclassified drivers model initiative, better known as Driver Inc.
The driver industry is the number one contributor to tax evasion, and it's growing every day. The misclassified model encourages drivers to use trucks as cash registers, with road safety not being a priority.
The Professional Truck Training Alliance of Canada is also bringing solutions to the table. Through our partnership with our schools and our insurance and carrier members, we have created education on the misclassified driver model that every school in every province can share with its entry-level drivers. Tens of thousands of entry-level drivers in Canada will receive this information so that they are better informed.
The next step is to develop online education that can be used for entry-level drivers and existing drivers about the misclassified driver model. The vision for this online education is that it can be used by the entire industry: schools, carriers, insurers, associations and government.
What else can we do to stop the infection of poorly educated drivers? We can step up with regulation and enforcement. The industry needs to create some sort of self-policing mechanism that harmonizes and works with government on enforcement and regulation.
Make no mistake—there is not a shortage of commercial drivers. There is a shortage of qualified drivers, and that number is increasing every day in Canada.
A national instructor accreditation course is being worked on by PTTAC. We have partnered with technology experts. Our technology partner, Bluedrop, is helping to develop this education and testing so that the nation can be harmonized. This should be ready by Q1 of 2026.
We need to start at the foundational roots of the industry. That starts with education. The recipe is a good school, a good carrier and a good insurer. The results are safer roads and long-time, sustainable careers. As feds, you need to be strategic with your investments in education nationally. Enabling students to access the Canada student financial assistance program is necessary and vital to the success of our industry.
I will leave you with this: Many in our industry are in support, in principle, of a Red Seal for the professional driver. PTTAC and its school members are major supporters and drivers of the Red Seal component. Carriers for hire and private carriers, insurers, associations and existing drivers are in support of a Red Seal, and so are some provinces.
It is time to legitimize the profession. It is time to clean up our mess, and it's time for the federal government to step up to the plate. Let's put an end to the misclassified driver model. This is the first step in doing so.
Thank you for your time.