Notes for remarks by The Honourable Jane Stewart Minister of Human Resources Development Canada to the Centre for the Study of Living Standards Roundtable on "Investing in Skills, Canadians and Canada's Future"

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Notes for remarks by
The Honourable Jane Stewart
Minister of Human Resources Development Canada
to the Centre for the Study of Living Standards Roundtable
on "Investing in Skills, Canadians and Canada's Future"

Ottawa, Ontario
February 26, 2001

Check against delivery

Thank you very much Andrew Sharpe. I really appreciate that introduction. Welcome everyone and thank you for coming out this evening. I certainly do appreciate the fact that the Centre for the Study of Living Standards has agreed to give us the opportunity to come together tonight, a little more informally perhaps than you will find yourselves tomorrow. I understand you've had to turn people away so that you can keep the roundtable format in shape and I think that bodes very well for the interest and the kinds of discussions that will occur tomorrow.

Here in the crowd is my colleague, Ethel Blondin-Andrew. I'd just like to recognize the fact that you, too, are here tonight, another indication of how seriously we in the Department, and certainly the Government of Canada, take this issue, the issue of working together to build a national skills agenda.

Now you're here tonight and then tomorrow to focus on a particular aspect: working together to see if we can find some common ground or some direction to improve the efficiency of the labour market. But as you know, there are other roundtables that have been formally scheduled as well, one that will be undertaken by the Canadian Policy Research Networks focussed on learning and a third one by the Conference Board of Canada that will focus on creating new opportunities through encouraging more innovation and entrepreneurism in Canada. All this work is essentially to see if we can't as a nation come together more effectively to enhance the skills and learning culture in our country.

I was talking with Shawn McCarthy earlier this afternoon and Shawn said we've been talking about skills for years. David Slater said to me you've had so many initiatives under way and sometimes they just don't get the push. Shawn said what is different now? What's going to change now? And I said well, I think what's different is all the stakeholders are starting to appreciate and view with the same priority the need for us as a country to have a strengthened, more focussed skills agenda.

I came in and Andrew Sharpe was saying that he and Neville Nankivell are agreeing on things, which suggests an interest, and we are starting to see more economic theorists-Tom Courchesne most recently-talk about the importance of human capital. Those conversations are a bit different than they have been in the past. Certainly social policy theorists have always known how important it is to invest in people and what a difference it can make in their lives if they can participate fully in the economy.

The private sector, whether it be the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, and André Piché who issued a report just last week talking about the lack of skilled staff that their membership are finding today and expect to find into the future. The Conference Board itself who talked about the need for 950,000 new members in the labour force in the coming years. Unions, and some of you I've had the chance to speak with tonight, appreciate the importance of ensuring that your membership have got the tools that they need to continue to do the job that they need to do. And individuals themselves, recognizing the rapidity with the cycle of the creation of new knowledge, the identification and development of new technology and the application of that technology, and how quickly that circle is spinning, and how we all need more and better and faster access to the skills and tools that will ensure that we continue to participate fully in the economy.

Governments, without question. Paul Cappon is here as the representative of ministers of education. We in the federal government recognizing we need a national skills agenda. We appreciate, I think fundamentally, that the countries that are going to be successful in the 21st century are those that are able to ensure that each and every citizen is able to realize their full potential.

Now from an individual's point of view of course this is important. The dignity of work, we know how important that is. The ability to be self-sufficient for ourselves, for our families. This undertaking speaks to every single person living in the country. But there's a bigger message for all of us, the impact on our social framework, our social fabric. If we're going to deal with the issue of poverty we know the best antidote is work, jobs for every citizen.

Perhaps what economic theorists are starting to realize is that economic growth these days is not only about access to capital, it's not only about having natural resources, having a good manufacturing and service sector base. It's not only about getting the fiscal parameters right, managing inflation, having a good debt to GDP ratio and getting the dollar where it's supposed to be. It is really about having a highly talented functional labour force.

The new economy is about ideas. Ideas come from people. Those ideas have to be applied. And it's those applications that then lead to new ideas and it's not just at the high end, the high-knowledge end, although that's critically important, we have to have that research and development done. But it's all the way right through the labour market. Whether it's a server in a restaurant managing new technologies or millwrights on the shop floor.

Many of you know that I come from a background in human resources. Looking at the transitions in the last couple of decades and how we work together, moving away from the assembly line, you know with process controls and cell management and cross-training, individuals required to lead groups and have the soft skills that build teamwork, that build functioning, healthy work environments. These are all changes, moving from the top down style management to a more participatory style of management.

This was indeed one of the things that was recommended to us in this important document Stepping Up: Skills and Opportunities in the Knowledge Economy done by the expert panel on skills for the Prime Minister, for me, and for the Minister of Industry, focussing on the soft skills and how important those are and where we have a dearth and a need to do better. Jackie Sayer-Scott did a tremendous job. And Noah Meltz, a tremendous job in putting this together, but it's quite expansive and broad. And what we hope to occur as a result of your work tomorrow and the subsequent workings, both in these roundtables and in other interventions and exchanges that we are encouraging, is some kind of common thinking.

We won't always agree, unions, the private sector, and governments. But we've got to talk. We've got to have the conversations. We've got to get our understanding to a point where we can agree on the appropriate next step, short term, medium term and long term because our future depends on it economically, socially and for all of us as individuals.

Now when we start to look at where the skilled workforce is going to come from, that becomes pretty interesting. We've always, in the past, counted on the next generation or future generations. And indeed we will again. The young people coming up have had the benefit of a very solid, formal education system. And we are proud of that in Canada. Elementary school, secondary school, post-secondary education-a good solid basis that has allowed us to build a labour force, really which is second to none in terms of the numbers of people who have post-secondary education.

But we have to be cognizant of changes and the provinces are concerned about their ability to provide access. They're concerned about bricks and mortars. They're concerned about new strategies, e-learning and how they integrate that into the future and use new technology to provide opportunities in remote and rural parts of Canada and for those of us sitting at home. What are the impacts of that kind of technology on our educational institutions and how do we use it? We've got to think about apprenticeship, how we support that kind of formal learning and are there things that we should do in a modern Canada that we haven't done in the past to recognize the skills shortage indeed? Also there are fewer opportunities for apprentices in Canada now than there have been in the past. Ken Georgetti never lets me forget that. But working on the panel, as you discuss that very important piece of the skills and learning agenda.

When we look at our youth we count on them to be there for our workforce in the coming years, and they will be. But we look at future generations as well and ladies and gentlemen I remind you of the important agreement that we struck with the provinces and territories in September on early childhood development. We know that the wiring happens in those first five years of life. And if we are able to provide a better start for our youngest citizens, their readiness to learn when they come to that formal system is going to be improved. And hopefully one of the things that we will benefit from, amongst others, is the fact that as our kids go through the formal learning processes, they won't have to go back and revisit them. A lot of our education dollars are spent on taking citizens through the formal system a second time who didn't get everything they needed out of it the first time. We've got to reduce that. And we've got to make sure we take advantage of the system as we work our way through it.

From my point of view I think that will possibly be one of the positive outcomes of investing in the early years and I feel very positively about that undertaking. It does have a direct relationship to what we're doing here today, tomorrow and in the near term.

Our kids know something though: they can't do it all. We just aren't having enough of them to satisfy what we believe will be our labour market requirements in the not-so-distant future. So we've started to look outside and I was struck by an incredible statistic. Did you know that between 1981 and 1995 70% of the new entrants in the Canadian labour market were immigrants? Seventy percent. That means we have got to be very sensitive and cognizant of our need in this regard. We've got to be a country that is a country of choice for people who want to travel, leave their home countries and go somewhere else. We have to be conscious absolutely about the issue of the brain drain.

We are here at home, as are other countries, particularly Third World countries. But if people are going to move, we want them to come here because by and large we know that the education levels of new Canadians are in fact higher than those of Canadians who are born and raised here. One of the challenges we face, and I hear it from all different corners, is that we've got to do a better job at integrating new Canadians into our labour force. The Prime Minister recently challenged, encouraged the provinces, who have the jurisdiction on accreditation, to look at this issue and see if we can't find better ways and means of recognizing credentials from other domains. If we can't integrate new Canadians more rapidly and quickly into our workforce and if there is a role for the federal government to play with the provinces, we want to play it because this is a significant piece of the puzzle that we have to solve if we're going to have a more efficient, qualified labour force.

But we can't always look outside. We need to also look back home. Two out of every three Canadians are able bodied, working, are participating or want to participate in the workforce. But there are others who are on the margin, sole parents and families, youths at risk who didn't find their direct "ah ha" in the formal education system, Aboriginal people, Canadians with disabilities, Canadians whose literacy levels are not at the level they need to be for them to fully participate in Canadian society and the Canadian economy. We have to look at these opportunities for inclusion in the Canadian labour force. We have to find and work together, whether it be in focussing on our young people who, as I say, are at risk but do ultimately want to play a role, be self-sufficient, make a contribution.

We have to work together and recognize the needs, the challenges, facing Aboriginal people in Canada, provide more direct funding for economic development, continue to support training and education, do what we can with unions to recognize there may be new and creative ways of engaging Aboriginal people in the union halls, continuing to focus on the mores and the culture in the workplace so there is a respect and a recognition of our individual differences. Working with the provinces to focus on building a labour market strategy for Canadians with disabilities-technology helps us incredibly in this regard.

I was recently at a meeting of the National Council on Welfare and one of the council members said are we really such a rich country that we can allow so many of our fellow citizens not to participate in our economy? Are we really that rich? Well no, we aren't. We are not. And it is up to us to find the structures, the ways, the strategies, to make sure that all Canadians participate for their individual benefit, for the improvement of our social fabric and for the benefit of our economy and its growth.

We've got some ideas in that regard. We've been talking about building on some pilots that we've had in New Brunswick and British Columbia, self-sufficiency projects we call them where we recognize that particularly sole parents who want to get into the workforce are doubly challenged trying to look after their families, take a low paying job, support their family members, and we've got some ideas and some strategies that are proven to work. We'd like to expand that and offer it in terms of a partnership with other provinces.

The literacy challenge is a big one. We have to get creative. We have to recognize that two out of every five Canadian citizens do not have the skills needed to participate in our economy, essentially lower than Grade 9 standard. Not good enough. Can't come into the workplace and read a safety manual, get the bus to work. This is a challenge for us. We have to turn our attention to it and working with the provinces we'll do our best but we need your support in that regard.

I suppose when we look at the biggest pool of labour force we go right to those who are working today. Fifty percent of the workforce that will be in and still working in 2015 are working today. Things are changing rapidly. How is it that we work together to recognize the need for lifelong learning, for constant upgrading? How do we do that and what's the role that we can play as a government to instill that culture of lifelong learning, learning while we earn? What's the role of the private sector and what are the tools and the mechanisms that will allow those who have done such a good job, because there are many companies and corporations who really are learning, companies that are providing the time to train, the tools to train to their employees. But how do we broaden that? How do we do it for small- and medium-sized companies that are struggling to keep ahead but also know that they have to keep their workforce upgraded? What are the things that we can do together? What's the role of government there? How do the colleges and universities play a role? What are the things we do to recognize that this is a huge new and important dynamic in the Canadian economy, that they are equally requiring capacity to keep the skills base current and moving forward amongst their employees? These are challenges for us.

Some of you tonight were talking to me about our suggestion for individual learning accounts, the idea that if an individual decides to set some money aside for their own continuous learning, the Government of Canada, as we do with the Canada Education Saving Grants, provides some top-up into those accounts so individuals have access to funding. They've still got to find the time and in these busy days that's a challenge.

But that's one tool that we're suggesting. Now members of the sector councils are saying that's okay but that goes to the individual and don't forget there are things that the sector can do itself and we've got to look at strategies where industrial sections can also have an impact. I think that will be part of the discussion tomorrow because there is a roundtable particularly on the role of sector councils and the job they can do.

I must say I've been most interested in the development that we've seen in many of the sectors, whether it be cars, the idea of developing training packages that can be provided to the partnering employers for their employees to have on their own time in their own workplace so they're not being selected out to go to a training course. A bunch of new ideas coming about that we have to continue to encourage, instill and broaden.

But focussing on today's workforce is an appropriate thing for us to do. Focussing on adult learning is an area where as a country we don't have a solid track record. We talk about continuous learning, adult education. Traditionally that really is about helping those who didn't get their high school diploma or, particularly, high school diploma upgraded. We've made our focus on adult education. But we have to grow from that because we all recognize now the importance of lifelong learning, continuous experience.

From my point of view that kind of undertaking is valuable for us all. As I say when we talk about soft landings, one of the things as the economy comes up and down over the course of years to come that I think will help us with softer landings is increasing and improving the skill base of all citizens. The more skills we have, the more skills that are transferable, the more likely we are to be able to move from one sector to another depending on the cyclical movements. These are wise investments. And they really do fundamentally bring us back to an appreciation that we are living in a knowledge-based economy.

From 1961 to 1996 there's a 25% increase in the gross domestic product of Canada specifically attributable to an increased quality in the labour market. Now ladies and gentlemen, that was not necessarily, maybe in the back end, a knowledge-based economy. A 25% impact. I think the message from that is as we move into this full blown economy that essentially grows as a result of new ideas and new technologies and their applications, we can see the impact of the labour force on our gross domestic product being ever greater.

We see that as a challenge. We recognize it as your government. We believe that we have to reach out, identify the stakeholders, bring them together, work together to identify a plan of action so that together we can be the jurisdiction, one of the jurisdictions that does make it solidly into the 21st century because we recognize the importance of ensuring that everyone of our citizens should have the ability to realize their full potential.

Ladies and gentlemen, we live in the best country in the world. Our challenge right now is to recognize that to ensure that continues to be the truth that we work together to identify the things that will ensure that our citizens have what they need to be self-sufficient and to contribute as they will to our great country.

Thank you for being here.