Health committee  Yes. Many of our members do as individual members. I myself am a professor at the University of Victoria and I hold a CIHR-funded research chair, so I am funded there in my role at the university. The Public Health Association has received money from the Public Health Agency of Canada around workforce development and developing the competencies of public health professionals.

Health committee  I can't speak to that. We don't track what all of our individual members may be funded for, so I'm sorry, I can't answer that.

Health committee  Thank you very much for that. Dr. MacDonald, could you let the committee know how much your organization spends every year on technological innovation?

Health committee  It's a difficult question because of the fact that in Canada, health care is a provincial responsibility, so transforming the primary health care system is particularly difficult for that reason, and the role of the federal government then is somewhat difficult. As does my colleague here, I think the health accord itself could be a useful strategy.

Health committee  That's not our role. We don't do that. We do not develop technologies.

Health committee  Yes. Our members are primarily public health practitioners and leaders, and so in their roles as health care providers they may in fact utilize technologies.

Human Resources committee  The first one is a complex one. We start with the employers bringing forward their need for the Red Seal. I think there are about 55 in the country now. We need that to occur, and then it spreads out through the governments and through the training institutions. There is some level of irony there, because it starts by defining the common outcomes that we want at a Red Seal level, but the further away we get from that decision as we roll it out through the provinces, the more the curriculum then begins to change.

Human Resources committee  We have tried to embed business-type learning outcomes where we can. At the college we have looked at doing that within all of our programs—apprenticeship and regular programming—because even if you don't go through the apprenticeship—if you're in our chef program, our electrical program, and others—those are entrepreneurial types of things that are incredibly important in supporting small and medium-sized enterprises.

Human Resources committee  Cape Breton really does that.

Human Resources committee  You've raised a number of points, several of which I hinted at earlier, and I only wish I had a little more time. The book, which I hope you do read, gets at that. This is a phenomenon. How we value specific work has resonated into the cuts we've made in our district school boards, and that includes removing most trades-related training at an early age.

Human Resources committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair. I want to follow up with a military piece. I think the former Chief of the Defence Staff was wise, and his team was wise, when he started to look at this disconnect between the excellent training that our military members have and not having civilian credentials.

Human Resources committee  They have not been positive. I think Ottawa's key differentiator is the quality of having four outstanding academic institutions: Ottawa U, Carleton, La Cité Collégiale, and Algonquin. To your colleague to your left, unlike this province, Alberta has made a significant difference in the recognition of previous learning among academic institutions.

Human Resources committee  In my comments, I referred to the myth that exists in higher education, and it's real. There are many reports. This is not just a Canadian problem; it's an American and European problem. Individuals are underemployed there too. Rick Miner talks about jobs without people and people without jobs.

Human Resources committee  I'd be happy to begin. In my view, these students are under the same pressures as other students. A number of barriers keep them from completing their studies. The biggest one, I would say, is students being underprepared. It goes well beyond just being academically unprepared.

Human Resources committee  I have. I have four children and I've spoken to the youngest one. I was a teacher here in Ottawa, out in Orleans, at St. Matthew High School, and in that role never once did I have a conversation with students about what they wanted to do. In my mind, having gone through a university system, my conversation was more self-reflective of “That's a university student and that's a college student.”