RC106 MayJune2023 - Magazine - Page 30
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau held a town hall at the Carpenters’ District Council of Ontario training
Centre in Woodbridge, Ont. Feb. 21. Trudeau spent more than an hour answering questions from
members of the local unions.
In Ontario, the provincial government announced $224
million to build and upgrade training centres, with an
additional $75 million over the next three years earmarked
to support the operations and programing at new and
existing centres to prepare workers for in-demand careers
like electricians, welders, and mechanics.
Applications for the new Skills Development Fund
(SDF) capital stream are expected to open in late spring
and will provide eligible applicants, including unions,
Indigenous centres, businesses, and industry associations,
with funding to build new training centres or to upgrade
or convert their existing facilities into training centres with
state-of-the-art design and technology. This includes facility renovations, retrofits, expansions, repairs and building
construction.
“Ontario is facing the largest labour shortage in a generation, which means when you have a career in the skilled
trades, you have a career for life,” said Monte McNaughton, Minister of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills
Development. “We’re supporting employers, unions and
other training providers so that they can build and improve the facilities we need to attract and prepare our next
generation of skilled trades workers for better jobs and
bigger paycheques for themselves and their families.”
Training for indigenous communities, women, and underrepresented groups is also a focus across the country.
In British Columbia, the Electrical Joint Training
Committee (EJTC) has had success with multiple First
Nations cohorts currently moving through EJTC’s Red
Seal electrician training pathway, emphasizing the
success taking place in the classroom, in the field and the
recruitment process.
“We want to have, along with the IBEW and our contractor group, an inclusive and diverse workforce that is
robust and able to manage the ever-changing electrical
world, but we have pretty rigorous pre-requirements to
enter our program,” said managing director Phil Davis. “When we find bright, indigenous candidates with
those pre-requisites, they’re also being recruited by 3000
other organizations, like the RCMP, for example.
“We asked, ‘How do we get indigenous workers into
our system?’” added Davis. “Next, we designed an eightweek math and science prep program and said, ‘Come on
in.’ We let our partners do the screening—the program
sets these students up for success.”
Currently, the EJTC manages approximately 70 Indigenous apprentices and 900 apprentices overall. Indigenous
students train at EJTC’s Port Coquitlam-based campus, as
well as the Squamish Nation Training Centre.
“The growth of our Indigenous cohorts is a result
of this very focused program we developed to make
sure we’re bringing in the right candidates,” said Davis. “We’re upscaling their math and science so that we
can put them on a path to an apprenticeship with us. Our
Indigenous partners have been very glad to have that
and strongly support this model…At their request, it’s an
Indigenous-specific cohort.”
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ANGELA GISMONDI/DAILY COMMERCIAL NEWS
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