Science and Research committee  Good evening, Chair, Vice-Chairs and members of the Standing Committee on Science and Research. Thank you for the opportunity to present today on the study of top talent, research and innovation. As you know, my name is Nicholas Schiavo, and I'm appearing this evening as the dir

Science and Research committee  When it comes to international or alternative credentials, highly skilled tech workers may not have the formal credentials or that formal education that we typically look for. I think more than that, what we're seeing is innovative companies may actually require a wide range of t

Science and Research committee  Thank you, Ben. I'll follow up on where I think Ben was going to go, which is to say that the federal government can absolutely play a role in upskilling and retraining as well. There are examples across Canada of Canadian companies that have already developed these curricula th

Science and Research committee  That's a great question. In terms of provincial-level programs, I would have to get back to you on that. I'm very happy to follow up with your office. What I will say, to give some concrete examples, is we have the Montreal-based FX Innovation. This is a company that partnered w

Science and Research committee  Absolutely. I think honestly it comes down to urgency. When we speak to our members, what we hear is we need talent now, if not two years ago. While we're very adamant to throw everything at the wall, and we talk about upskilling and retraining, I think immigration in terms of to

Science and Research committee  Thank you, Mr. Blanchette-Joncas. If I may, I'm going to answer in English. I think what we're seeing is when we have these major multinational firms come into Canada, often what's happening is they are sucking up the tech talent, and driving up wage inflation, but then at the

Science and Research committee  I'm not familiar with the index. Having not seen it myself yet, I will take it with a grain of salt. What I would say is I think Canada struggles to support scale-ups, and that's really why CCI was established, that kind of high-growth Canadian firm that is looking to scale up a

Science and Research committee  I'm sorry, Monsieur Blanchette-Joncas, but could you expand on that question?

Science and Research committee  Right. At this time I don't have a clear answer for you, so I'm very happy to follow up. What I would say is typically in speaking with our members and the ecosystem at large from a more qualitative standpoint we like to keep our finger on the pulse of innovation here and see w

Science and Research committee  That is a great question, and it's a question we should all be asking. I will say on behalf of CCI we were very pleased to see several investments in innovation in budget 2022, and think that is absolutely a step in the right direction. That's great. Really what is missing in

Science and Research committee  That's a great question. We are absolutely seeing the exact same thing. One of the problems again comes back to those high wages and the global competitive nature. Retention is incredibly important. Some of the recommendations that we have put forward include not messing with e

Science and Research committee  It's the nature of the global labour market. Again, being able to work remotely means there are a lot more options on the table. That's a huge factor. Again, when you are up against the Metas and Amazons of the world, it is hard for Canadian SMEs, Canadian scale-ups, to compete

Science and Research committee  One of the key ones would be committing to a national summit on skilled labour. This is a non-partisan exercise. We would love to see all sectors, colleges and universities, of course, innovators and entrepreneurs, and the federal government as well as provinces at the table to r

Science and Research committee  There's a lot in there. Thank you for that question. It's very important. I would say get talent here as soon as possible. Look at the innovative programs I mentioned, the high-tech visa and the digital nomad strategy. Digitize the entirety of IRCC and the global talent stream

Finance committee  Good morning to the chair, vice-chairs and members of the Standing Committee on Finance. Thank you for the opportunity to present today on Bill C-19 and the implementation of certain provisions in budget 2022. My name is Nick Schiavo and I am appearing today as the director of f