Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Absolutely. The work we do on improving labour mobility is done through the Forum of Labour Market Ministers. It is done at the ministerial level and at the officials level. All three territories are active participants. Whether it's the negotiations and the implementation of the

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Why don't I start on that one? The collaboration takes place at various levels and stages in the process. We work very closely with our partners at Indian and Northern Affairs, particularly the economic development branch of Indian and Northern Affairs, where we've been coordin

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  There will be projects announced in the coming weeks around those. They are the ones that were recently approved and that will be rolled out in the coming weeks, but there are a number of strong projects in the north, including in all three territories.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  This component of the economic action plan was intended to capture some of the approaches in ASEP, but where there are immediate, concrete employment opportunities on the ground and where there is an ability to train people in a very short timeframe. They're shorter in duration a

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  They are at the community level, yes.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  We have 34 sector councils. Most of these are industry specific. One of them is a horizontal council that focuses on aboriginal issues. Their major initiative is on aboriginal inclusion. It essentially provides major employers with tool kits and strategies on how to approach and

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  It is to improve mutual understanding of aboriginal needs and business needs.

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  We deal directly with a number of significant companies, but if approached by a company, we would immediately encourage them to go on the ground to build the partnerships they need and then to come back to us with a partnership-based proposal as to how all of the players are goin

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I'm just going to add one point. Having an understanding of the specific job opportunities that are emerging is a critical foundational piece of information. If you have a sense of where the jobs are going to be in the future, and if you have that information early enough to actu

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes, a number of our programs have particular application to the north. As I was indicating earlier, one of our largest investments is indeed through AHRDS, in which we have over $340 million per year across the country in aboriginal labour market development. You cited the numbe

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  In any of the partnership projects under ASEP that I mentioned, the local training providers like Yukon College would be key players in delivering the training. We don't want to develop a training capacity from scratch when there's a training provider on the spot. They are a key

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  I've mentioned a number of the ASEP projects that we already have in place. There is some new funding, and we're continuing to look at proposals. There remain further opportunities for investment in the north. We're optimistic in particular about the future of the natural resourc

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  There's a suite of measures that are delivered collaboratively with provincial and territorial governments around student financial assistance and the Canada student loans. They underwent a significant reform and renewal in budget 2008, with the availability of a much larger gran

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Absolutely. We're seeing some very innovative approaches being developed across the country, developments that blur the lines between formal classroom training followed by an abrupt transition into the workplace. That's not the model that generates results all the time, so we a

Indigenous and Northern Affairs committee  Yes, there is flexibility, as well as measures to fully understand the needs of residents and employers, and to try to find solutions that are acceptable to both parties. I mentioned our sector council on aboriginal labour. It works very closely with large companies to understand