Human Resources committee  Thanks very much, Chair. Thank you for the opportunity to be here with you all today and for undertaking this important work. My name is Matthew Chater. I'm the president and CEO for Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada. I suspect that many of you know what we do, but in short,

Human Resources committee  Monitoring the match relationships and bringing those relationships together in the virtual space is only one element of our business, but also having to look at training our volunteers in the virtual space and undertaking enrolments as well. We've also had to look at the diffi

Human Resources committee  A lot of it comes from upskilling our mentors in being able to have those deep conversations around what it feels like to be socially isolated, because there are behaviours and emotions that are coming up that even a young person might not recognize as being a result of being dis

Human Resources committee  I think the greatest challenges will be the skills, as my colleague and the witness before me spoke to. It will be the skills for young people and what they need coming into this post-pandemic world. It means ensuring that they're at the forefront of decision-making for this new

Human Resources committee  We've seen some supports at the local level through individual granting initiatives. We are also looking to pursue a virtual platform, as we had noted. One of our partners in this space, the Canadian Mentoring Partnership, has undertaken a significant piece of work to look at e-m

Human Resources committee  Yes. The national organization has not applied and wouldn't be eligible within that funding the way it's been structured. Big Brothers Big Sisters worked closely with United Way Canada to look at a cohesive response to the application process for our Big Brothers Big Sisters agen

Human Resources committee  The local chapters can, absolutely.

Human Resources committee  Absolutely.

Human Resources committee  Prior to the pandemic, we had 1,400 staff across the country. With the initial impact analysis we did, we saw a 25% reduction, and that could either be terminations, short-term layoffs or long-term layoffs. We do know that agencies have been applying for the wage subsidy to get t

Human Resources committee  I like that idea, and yes, we're certainly open to it.

Human Resources committee  Yes, we would support that. We stand behind many of the solutions that Imagine Canada has put forward.

Human Resources committee  Our agencies are very much aware and are doing wellness checks as well, which is well beyond our mandate. We are checking in on families to ensure that they have the appropriate supports there and are connected to the other community services to get support where they need it.

Human Resources committee  Yes, we were. Many of our member agencies, as well, have been able to navigate it. There was some confusion around the eligibility criteria initially, but we were able to get that clarified.

Human Resources committee  Yes. I would like to mention that coming in to this meeting to talk about the dire situation that Big Brothers Big Sisters is facing considers all of the government programs that are currently in place. As I noted in my opening remarks, we are very grateful for the efforts of t

Human Resources committee  Yes.