HUMA Committee Report

Employability in Canada:  Preparing for the Future -- Report of the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities

Bloc Québécois Dissenting Opinion

First of all, the Bloc Québécois would like to thank the stakeholders and witnesses who took part in this study on employability for their invaluable contribution.

In the view of the Bloc Québécois, the Committee’s report, Employability in Canada:  Preparing for the Future, largely fails to respect the areas of jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces.

The Committee’s proceedings extended from June 2006 to March 2008.  The resulting report covers worker mobility, seasonal workers, Aboriginal workers, older workers, the shortage of skilled labour, workplace illiteracy, and recognition of foreign credentials.

Some of the recommendations do apply to responsibilities of the Canadian government, such as employment insurance benefits, the national dimensions of the Labour Market Information System and the placement service, activities that occur Canada-wide and measures that could apply to the First Nations.

But the Report also contains recommendations dealing with areas that are not the responsibility of the federal government:  literacy, health, education, negotiations between the provinces, recognition of credentials and diplomas...

The Bloc Québécois vigorously rejects the recommendations designed to establish a national strategy involving strengthened accountability mechanisms and performance indicators tied to federal transfers.  Quebec and the provinces must be able to set their own priorities and orient their own employability activities within those priorities, which are defined on the basis of their own unique needs.

Obviously there are differences between the policies and legislation of Quebec and those of the provinces, but the differences reflect political, economic and social priorities specific to Quebec and to each province.  A national employability strategy would encroach on areas of jurisdiction proper to Quebec and the provinces and transform Quebec from a program innovator and designer into a simple program manager.

Although the members of the Standing Committee conceded from the start that “[e]ducation, training and many other matters related to Canadian workplaces are areas of responsibility that fall primarily within the purview of the provincial and territorial governments”, they then proceeded to ignore this fact despite the Bloc Québécois’s repeated reminders and protests, as the following quotation from the Report shows:

It is our intent that the recommendations in this report will contribute to the development of an effective pan-Canadian employability strategy that will, in the years ahead, meet the labour market needs of employers and of all segments of the working-age population, particularly those with low skills, low incomes and low workforce participation rates.  Members of the Committee realize that the development of a pan-Canadian employability strategy will require an ongoing commitment and greater cooperation between federal, provincial and territorial governments.  Although some of the recommendations in our report may fall within the purview of provincial/territorial responsibility, this should not be construed as an attempt to extend the reach of the federal government into areas of provincial/territorial jurisdiction.  Rather, we simply believe that there is a need for federal leadership in areas of national importance.

When it speaks of “federal leadership” in its report, the Committee is effectively proposing a levelling-down in Quebec in areas where its progress has been widely recognized.  In defiance of Quebec’s prerogatives, the Committee thinks the federal government should assume leadership by interfering in the following areas:

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The Bloc Québécois would like to point out that recommendations in committee and Senate reports are often used by the federal government as a basis for new measures.  It is thus crucial that the reports target areas in which the federal government has the constitutional right to intervene.

For example, the Canadian Mental Health Commission was set up in 2007 in response to a Senate report entitled Out of the Shadows at Last (May 2006).  The Senate committee recognized that neither the provider groups nor the provincial and territorial governments to which many of its recommendations were addressed were under any obligation to respond to those recommendations.  Its members wondered “how to maximize the chances of this report’s recommendations being acted upon.  It has become clear that a mechanism of some sort is needed both to undertake certain critical tasks at a national level and also to maintain a needed national focus on mental health issues.”[1]

So the Senate committee conceded that the Commission would be an instrument for federal intrusion.  The Harper government, for all its talk of “open federalism”, did not hesitate to implement the measure, even though Quebec had already set out its priorities for 2005-2010 in its own action plan on mental health.[2]

Under sections 92(7) and (16) of the Constitution Act, 1867, health and social services are the exclusive responsibility of Quebec and the provinces.  And yet, since as far back as 1919, Ottawa has been doing more and more in these sectors, forcing Quebec and the provinces to respect so-called “national” standards and objectives.

Quebec has exclusive jurisdiction over education.  Sections 93 and 93A of the Constitution Act, 1867 are explicit about this.  However, despite the straightforwardness of these provisions, federal intrusions in education have been proliferating, and Ottawa is trying by every possible means to impose its own priorities.

The federal government’s health and education initiatives (apart from a handful of exceptions applying to Aboriginal people, veterans and so forth) have no constitutional basis at all; they rest on nothing but Ottawa’s spending power, which it uses to justify ever more intrusive intervention.

By invoking good causes, the federal government finds pretexts to worm its way into areas of Quebec’s jurisdiction such as service management, quality criteria, activity coordination, the national strategy and now employability and labour force mobility.

By establishing special-use funds to be applied uniformly all across Canada, the federal government sets priorities that do not necessarily correspond to those of the Quebec government, even though the latter has effective management of its own education network and thus a true understanding of the needs of its educational institutions.

Is this blatant display of its desire to play a leading role in education the federal government’s way of trying to make an end run around the 1997 agreement giving Quebec exclusive jurisdiction over vocational training?  Whether the subject at issue is education, training or learning, they all fall solely within the exclusive jurisdiction of Quebec and the provinces.

Training:  one example of a provincial jurisdiction

Employability in Canada:  Preparing for the Future puts forward a number of ideas and proposals for what should be done about training; yet the agreements between Canada and Quebec (and some of the provinces) on Part II of the Employment Insurance Act have proven their effectiveness.

In the 2007 budget, the government offered, based on these same agreements, to negotiate the integral transfer of labour market development programs to the provinces that are currently participating in co-management agreements:  Prince Edward Island, Yukon, Nova Scotia, British Columbia and Newfoundland and Labrador.

Also in the 2007 budget, the government discussed the possibility of transferring to Quebec and the provinces responsibility for carrying out training programs for the three clienteles that still come within Ottawa’s jurisdiction:  young people, older workers and persons with disabilities.

Signed in December 1997, the Canada-Quebec Labour Market Development Implementation Agreement spelled out the rules and responsibilities of the Quebec and Canadian governments.  Quebec is responsible for designing and carrying out active employment assistance measures similar to the Employment Benefits and Support Measures (EBSM) described in Part II of the Act.

Such agreements enable the provinces and territories to shoulder greater responsibility for introducing active measures, creating programs adapted to the needs of their populations and regions, and eliminating pointless overlap and duplication.  The present report casts all of this into question.

It is vital that the Canadian government recognize that each region and province has unique needs, reflecting its natural resources, its economy, its labour force, its priorities and characteristics, and so forth.  Each region and each province has its own special features and ways of doing things.

Quebec and the provinces are carrying out their responsibilities for labour force mobility without any need for federal involvement.  The Quebec government agreed with the other provinces last August at the Council of the Federation on ensuring labour force mobility throughout the entire country by April 2009.

Quebec and Ontario have announced that they will be collaborating on eliminating barriers to trade and improving labour force mobility between them.  Following the cooperation agreement signed in 2006, Quebec and Ontario are preparing an up-to-date, comprehensive economic and trade agreement based on the existing bilateral agreements on public procurement and labour force mobility in the sectors of construction, transportation and health.  Alberta and British Columbia have already lowered trade barriers between them.

Quebec has also launched negotiations for mutual recognition of all skilled trade qualifications between itself and France.  This France-Quebec agreement could be of significant help in achieving a similar transatlantic treaty, which is currently under discussion between Ottawa and the European Union.  While the France-Quebec cooperation would fit into the framework of such a treaty, it is also independent of it and can go ahead autonomously.  This kind of negotiation between Quebec and a European country is possible because it reflects the areas of jurisdiction of Canada’s provinces.

Immigrant and foreign workers:  specifying each party’s roles

In 1991, Canada and Quebec signed an agreement under which Quebec accepted responsibility for selecting skilled workers from abroad.  The agreement also included new responsibilities for Quebec with regard to immigration.

Recognition of immigrant and foreign workers’ credentials also falls under Quebec’s jurisdiction, as does the assessment of what additional training is needed for such recognition.

In this context, the Canadian government’s role should be to make sure before workers arrive in Canada that their skills and credentials are suitable for the province where they wish to settle.  In this way, new arrivals would not be faced with unpleasant surprises.

The Canadian government could also accelerate the process of obtaining work permits, so that this part of the process would not be a drag on skilled workers’ entry into the labour market.

In conclusion

The Bloc Québécois considers that the report the Committee has produced is disrespectful and irresponsible, because it recommends to the federal government that it invade areas of jurisdiction exclusive to Quebec and the provinces.  The Bloc Québécois repeatedly advised the Committee to redirect its proposed measures toward areas of federal jurisdiction, but the Committee’s members preferred to call for duplication and interference.