By Preeteesh Peetabh Singh
DIALOG REPORTER
On March 21, Canada’s Minister of Finance Jim Flaherty announced the Economic Action Plan 2013. Returning to balanced books by 2016 by eliminating the deficit; closing tax loopholes; tax relief and lower taxes for manufacturers and small businesses; infrastructure funds and creation of job grants were some of the highlights of the federal budget.
The budget addresses the issue of skill shortage in Canada. Some of the jobs available in the market are not matched with the set of skills required to do it, and these positions remain vacant. This is where creation of job grants comes in.
With the introduction of job grants, Canadians will be eligible to receive a maximum of $15,000 per employee for training. A maximum of $5,000 will come from the federal government and the province and employers will match it equally. The job grant will use $300 million from the current $500 million Labour Market Agreements (LMA) for provinces. It will be introduced as a part of LMA in 2015 since the current LMA expires in 2014.
Ken Georgetti, president of the Canadian Labour Congress, said, “It’s disappointing that only 16 per cent of investments for skills and jobs is new money, with the rest an extension or reallocation of existing funds. Money has been taken out of the hands of provinces and low-skilled workers, and put into the hands of employers to do what they should have been doing already. Money is being channeled to specific employers with no guarantee that training will meet broader labour market needs.”
According to the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS) the budget focuses predominantly on shuffling around existing investments in an attempt to continue to pay down the deficit without taking any meaningful steps to address a significant skills shortage and high unemployment rates for youth. It transfers money formerly allocated to support unemployed workers to employers, in order to subsidize training that the CFS thinks employers should already be paying for.
David Valentin, national vice-president communications for the Young Liberals of Canada said, “The job grant does not have any new money attached to it. The problem is no one is going to get a single grant from this program for the next two years. The job grant is also contingent on the provinces and territories agreeing to match funding. Apart from that, it has not been indexed to inflation.”
The federal budget includes a reallocation of $4 million over three years to encourage apprenticeship across the country. The Apprenticeship Incentive Grant of $1,000 per year, up to a maximum of $2,000 per person will be available to registered apprentices.
The budget also includes supporting job opportunities for all Canadians with $70 million over three years to support an additional 5,000 paid internships for post-graduate students. It reallocates $19 million towards educating youth about high-demand fields. The government has managed to provide research funding and aboriginal funding.
Recruitment of international students in post-secondary institutions; new money for expansion of temporary resident and citizenship program; and $45 million to increase the processing capacity of visa applications were some of the other highlights of the federal budget.
