Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Madawaska—Restigouche for giving me this five minutes to address an issue which is probably the most serious one that faces the province of Newfoundland and Labrador, and probably all of Canada.
The resolution simply asks in a very non-partisan way to allow the House of Commons to assess, to evaluate and to appraise the 250 different programs to help young people get involved in the labour force in Canada.
I congratulate the NDP member for Vancouver East who had some excellent suggestions on how we should go about this. Obviously education is key to what any of us would understand as creating a higher employment rate in Canada.
The member for the Reform is a little misguided and could easily support this resolution. We believe, as does the Reform member, that there are better ways. Probably we could in a non-partisan way finds ways to help young people in Canada. The Liberal member obviously thinks that everything they are doing is absolutely perfect. That is just simply not the truth or the reality in Canada today.
There are a lot of good programs. I read a memo from the Minister for Human Resources Development the other day. It mentioned a whole range of programs and some with success ratios that are very high, like the youth internship program. Some 88% of the people who took part in that program are either presently working or are back in studies.
That is a very successful program, but we wonder if all the 250 programs handled by several different departments are as equally successful. We believe a review should be done. The review could be very simple. It could be done by an all party parliamentary committee of the House, or it could be done by an outside person who is non-partisan, just to find out if these programs are getting to the people who really deserve them.
Some of the programs are excellent. There is no question that in St. John's West this summer we had over 1,200 students working in student programs. The Government of Canada saw it as a high priority to make sure there was student employment so that some students could actually save money toward their education.
The training allowances for adults and young adults are very meaningful. In our office in Newfoundland the highest ratio of phone calls that we get is from people trying to get assistance in training and to get back to school. They have come to the realization that without better education there is not much chance of a better job or a better life.
We do not know what is the success rate of all the other programs. We would like to know and the Government of Canada should want to know. If we have 250 programs obviously some might not be as productive and some might not be targeted to the right groups.
Another concern in our caucus is that if there is 250 programs spread over six or seven different government departments, what are the administration costs? If $2 billion is being spent on 250 programs with several government departments, what are the administrative costs? Is it 10% or $200 million? Is it 30% or $600 million? We want a review to find out how much money is spent on administration and to make sure that as much money as possible is directed to the three groups of Canadians the programs are designed for.
When it comes to the labour force basically there are three groups in Canada. The first is young Canadians working within Canada who are contributing to our country, their provinces and their family. Many of these workers were assisted by programs such as the Canada student loans program and training allowances. Many are also so heavily in debt that for many years they cannot contribute fully to the Canadian economy. They will not be able to buy homes and new cars and start their own businesses. Maybe there is a better way to set up the student loan system to allow Canadians to get an education, to work here and not be so heavily in debt.
Another group of young Canadians are those who are working outside the country. Why are they working outside the country? It is because of the lack of opportunities in Canada, the high tax rate and those kinds of problems.
Another group I want to touch on, especially in Newfoundland, is the vast number of young Canadians who are living unemployed in Canada. Often they are undereducated and living on temporary assistance programs from the government which really become permanent assistance programs from their parents and family.
I had a call today from one of my constituents who contributed to the EI surplus and is now on welfare. That EI surplus could be used to help get Canadians back to work, which was the original intent of the EI program.
I am delighted to be able to second this motion to ask for a non-partisan evaluation of these 250 government programs and I seek the unanimous consent to make this motion votable.