HUMA Committee Meeting

37th PARLIAMENT, 2nd SESSION

Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities

EVIDENCE

CONTENTS

Tuesday, April 8, 2003

º

1615

The Chair (Mrs. Judi Longfield (Whitby—Ajax, Lib.))

Ms. Laurell Ritchie (National representative, Training & Work Organization Department, Canadian Auto Workers Union)

º

1620

º

1625

The Chair

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti (President, Canadian Labour Congress)

º

1630

º

1635

The Chair

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

The Chair

Mr. Gary Grenman (Executive Director, The Alliance of Sector Councils)

º

1640

º

1645

The Chair

Mr. Dick Proctor (Palliser, NDP)

Ms. Tamara Levine (Co-ordinator, Workplace Literacy Project, As Individual)

Mr. Dick Proctor

º

1650

Ms. Laurell Ritchie

The Chair

Mr. Gurbax Malhi (Bramalea—Gore—Malton—Springdale, Lib.)

Ms. Laurell Ritchie

Mr. Gurbax Malhi

Ms. Tamara Levine

º

1655

Mr. Gurbax Malhi

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

Mr. Gurbax Malhi

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

»

1700

Ms. Laurell Ritchie

The Chair

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold (Jonquière, BQ)

»

1705

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

Ms. Tamara Levine

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold

Ms. Laurell Ritchie

»

1710

The Chair

Mr. Raymond Simard (Saint Boniface, Lib.)

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

Mr. Raymond Simard

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

Mr. Raymond Simard

Ms. Laurell Ritchie

»

1715

Mr. Raymond Simard

Ms. Tamara Levine

Ms. Laurell Ritchie

Mr. Raymond Simard

Ms. Laurell Ritchie

Mr. Raymond Simard

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

Mr. Raymond Simard

The Chair

Mr. Raymond Simard

Mr. Gary Grenman

Mr. Raymond Simard

Mr. Gary Grenman

Mr. Raymond Simard

Mr. Gary Grenman

The Chair

Mr. John Finlay (Oxford, Lib.)

»

1720

Ms. Laurell Ritchie

»

1725

Mr. John Finlay

Ms. Laurell Ritchie

Ms. Tamara Levine

The Chair

Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold

»

1730

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

The Chair

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

The Chair

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

The Chair

Mr. Raymond Simard

Mr. Gary Grenman

Mr. Kenneth Georgetti

The Chair

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CANADA

Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities

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NUMBER 023

l

2nd SESSION

l

37th PARLIAMENT

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EVIDENCE

Tuesday, April 8, 2003

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

º  (1615)  

[English]

    The Chair (Mrs. Judi Longfield (Whitby—Ajax, Lib.)): I call to order the 23rd meeting of the Standing Committee on Human Resources Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities.

    Thank you, Mr. Tonks, for assisting us in making a quorum this afternoon.

    We are continuing our study of literacy, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2). We have witnesses before us, and I'm going to ask the witnesses to introduce themselves as they take the podium.

    Ms. Ritchie, you are first.

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie (National representative, Training & Work Organization Department, Canadian Auto Workers Union): I am Laurell Ritchie, and I am with the research department and work on training and work organization issues at the Canadian Auto Workers.

    We welcome the opportunity to make a presentation here on workplace literacy, especially given that 2003 is the UN year of the adult learner, which comes on the heels of the government in Ottawa having announced its commitment to a 25% increase in literacy levels of adult Canadians as part of a skills and learning agenda.

    I want to take the first part of the presentation to quickly review some of the key elements of the literacy workplace program we have in the big three auto firms. You may have received copies of one of the contractual agreements, the one with DaimlerChrysler. There are similar ones with GM, or General Motors, and with Ford. This model comes out of a model that has been used across the country for workplace, union-based programming. In Ontario, which was the grandaddy of them, it was known as BEST, basic education for skills training. There were other variations on that theme developed elsewhere. There was one called WEST, and there was one called EAST, and so on. The largest of these, however, was in Ontario. At the time, the CAW had the largest number of agreements using the BEST program. However, there were certainly other unions using the BEST program.

    What happened is that the BEST program had the rug pulled out from under it, which is very important for understanding how we're going to secure long-term and continuing supports for programs of literacy based in the workplace. The rug was pulled out in 1997, when the government of Michael Harris announced on May 27 that literacy and basic skills training provided in the workplace, or organized through the workplace, would no longer be eligible for funding. So there went the infrastructures for the program that we had in place, and that many other organized workers had used to build up their own programs in their workplaces.

    In the intervening time, we have tried to secure that program. We still have that program, as of the bargaining this past fall. While we're very proud of it, there is no doubt that it is a fragile program. It is one that we are constantly having to defend in bargaining, and it becomes all the more problematic where there are no external supports for this kind of a program. There's no message that there is a public policy and a public infrastructure to support this kind of delivery.

    I just want to outline a few of its key elements, which are listed in various of these documents in front of you. First of all, it is embedded in our collective agreement; it's not something that can be given one day and taken away the next. We would like to see that kind of entitlement built into laws, so that this is not just something for the privileged few who have a collective agreement—and who, frankly, have the bargaining power to negotiate it. By no means does this program exist throughout the large numbers of our members across the country. It is embedded in our collective agreement.

    It operates for 37 weeks a year and runs for four hours weekly during those 37 weeks. It's basically a 50-50 program; two of those hours are contributed by the worker on their own unpaid time, and two of those hours are contributed by the employer as paid time.

As you can imagine, some of the difficulties are around negotiating time in the workplace, so that this can be done on work time and not as an add-on to an already long work day and week. Certainly, without this kind of provision, some of the people who are most in need and most desiring of this kind of assistance could simply not participate. I'm thinking of women with kids—and for that matter, these days we even talk about men with kids—who use this kind of program. It would certainly discourage participation.

    The other aspect is that it involves peer instructors, who are co-workers who are trained through train-the-trainer programs to do the instruction and to use adult or learner-directed models. There is an emphasis on critical thinking skills as well as some of the basics of literacy and maths—and in some cases on assisting people to complete the GED or grade 12.

    As part of the agreement, the employer commits to funding not only the cost at the front end of needs assessments and interviews but also the train-the-trainer time for the instructor—not the actual instruction, which is part of what we lost with the BEST program—and the time they spend in preparing for class and actually instructing. This is in addition to the two hours of the individual learners.

    There are other elements of the program that we could take time on, but we will not use our time that way at this point. I will simply say that this is an excellent program, but the difficulty is that it is so fragile and it is so difficult to extend into other workplaces. We and other unions had this program in other workplaces. When the not terribly generous, but needed, supports of BEST were eliminated, the programs were eliminated along with them.

    In closing, the big question for us is how the government is going to deliver on its commitment to a 25% increase in adult literacy as part of its skills and learning agenda. There is no doubt that there's a critical need here. If we were to have a genuine labour market development strategy in this country, this would be a very big piece of it.

    We want to be clear that when we talk about literacy and basic or fundamental skills, we're not talking about essential skills. For those familiar with the terrain of literacy, these are very different concepts. Essential skills are used more often than not to describe skills that are not really incremental but which tend to be very job specific. That's not really the kind of program we are talking about here.

    We most certainly need a pan-Canadian model. Maybe we need to go back and revisit what I think was a private member's bill roughly a decade ago, a Canada literacy act, which looked at a right to literacy, or we need some form of adult learner act. It could do a number of things, everything from amendments needed to the EI Act and the extension of Work Sharing While Learning—which is a very promising program—through to contract compliance requirements for federal contract companies in the area of training and adjustment. Part of this has to be literacy.

    We will negotiate what we can, where we can, when we can. But without the public supports, that will not be a widespread possibility, nor will it be something that is a very secure piece of what we're trying to do on literacy. We've learned in too many fields that when those infrastructures aren't there, the commitment of most employers is on a wing and a prayer.

º  (1620)  

    We know that other models have been looked at. We know that in Quebec there is the 1% training tax program, which has its weaknesses but in other respects is a good model.

    We want to emphasize that there has to be a key rule for labour as a partner in both developing the content and delivering a worker-centred program.

    I guess that the final point here is that we need a model that will not place the burden of the costs on individual workers. There should be a right to this kind of learning, education, and upgrading.

    There are obviously pieces like strengthening the public education system; free adult learning centres; and post-secondary transfers with accountability measures, not the least of which will be to strengthen the funding for the National Literacy Secretariat. We do not want to see all of this fobbed off onto the social union talks with the provinces, where everybody gets to walk away from any commitments made. In particular, the National Literacy Secretariat is now having to play zero-sum game. Guess what? You promoted literacy, we've all been promoting literacy, and the people came, and said, we need to do that work, so here are our projects. Yet everybody's budgets are now being cut to meet the zero-sum game. That's not the game you can play if you're going to deliver on a 25% increase in literacy.

    Thank you.

º  (1625)  

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Mr. Georgetti.

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti (President, Canadian Labour Congress): Thank you.

    I, too, am pleased to be here today representing 2.5 million members of the Canadian Labour Congress and our affiliate unions.

    Literacy is an issue that I care passionately about. I've witnessed personally both the limitations and the heartache experienced by my co-workers with literacy difficulties in my own workplace a long time ago in Trail, B.C.--it was under transformation--and also the incredible transformations that can take place when workers also have the chance to learn.

    I want to say that while it's encouraging that the government has recognized literacy as an important issue and as the basis for further education and training in two throne speeches, the skills and learning agenda, and its innovation strategy, we say the time has come for urgent action.

    Our labour movement has a long history of involvement with education and training and lifelong learning. In fact, 19th century unions are the ones who pushed and got universal public education and libraries and began to promote skills training through our craft unions. Today, our union movement offers the largest adult education program through wide delivery of labour education courses across this country--larger than any other organization in Canada, I might add.

    As unions, we are in a unique position to bargain employer support for literacy, as you heard from Laurell on the excellent program in the CAW, but we need support to raise the awareness to develop our capacity to do so.

    We've been active in literacy programs for our members for over the last 15 years specifically and we've often been at the cutting edge of workplace literacy as a way for workers to enhance their skills and to participate more effectively in the workplace, as well as in society and their own unions. And they're citizens, of course. As unions, we are found in every kind of workplace in every region in Canada and we offer ourselves as a vehicle to reach workers with literacy and other training.

    As unions, we're recognized for the legitimate role we play in the workplace and for our important role in bringing issues such as literacy to the bargaining table for employers. We've had numerous successes in this area, and again, Laurell has shown you one of them.

    We're also committed to making our organizations more accessible to our members through our efforts in the area of clear language. To that end, we are creating resources now, offering courses to rank-and-file members and training for our staff, so that our communications and our programming are more inclusive and accessible.

    There are various models of employer support for literacy that unions have won at the bargaining table, including paid time for training--so many cents per hour worked into a fund--hours of training for employees, a percentage of payroll, paid leave programs, tuition advances, etc. Often union-initiated programming can demonstrate models and help raise the standard that will, in turn, have a positive impact on non-unionized workplaces as well.

    We know what happens now with workplace training. Essentially, those who have the most education and training and are in the administrative and technical jobs get most of the new training offered, while those at the bottom of the ladder generally get little or none while, at the same time, they watch their skills atrophy because they don't have any enhancement programs. We, as labour, are key players in promoting and designing and delivering adult literacy, particularly in the workplace, and ensuring equity and access to training for all elements of the workforce, not only the top. This is particularly critical for the most vulnerable members of the workforce, including women, workers of colour, aboriginal workers and, of course, workers with disabilities.

    Literacy is an important aspect of dealing with the workplace. It is now undergoing constant and continuous change.

    The workplace is an important venue for learning because it's convenient and workers are already there. For vulnerable workers who risk lay-off and displacement, there's no question, in my mind, that learning will be more effective if workers have the dignity of a job and a pay-cheque at the same time. But the learning must be worker centred. It must be centred around the citizen, the individual, not based simply on the needs of the employer or the workplace but on the needs of the worker as a citizen, as a parent, as a member of the community. It works best when literacy is often not a stand-alone program but is integrated into other training.

    We also need to remember that literacy is not a quick fix. It takes considerable time to build awareness and trust and foster partnerships and create delivery mechanisms. Often we're talking about workers who have had pretty rough experiences at school and they will need time to learn to believe in themselves and to believe in their ability to learn.

º  (1630)  

    Most importantly, we need strong and vital public education systems that provide all our children with a sound education from their early years through to the post-secondary levels. For adults with literacy needs, though, there has to be public infrastructure with adequate funding for delivery of programs. As I'm told by my key staff, Tamara, after you're 21 years old there is no guarantee or access to education, even if you need it.

    What we have now is an uneven patchwork of provincial support to literacy and little funding for workplace literacy at all, yet millions of adult Canadians fall into that wide chasm between K to 12 and the post-secondary systems. Minimally, we need a comprehensive system to support free and accessible adult education until the end of high school completion as a right for all.

    There have been too many examples of provincial funds cut off and labour and other workplace initiatives forced to fold. As you heard, they include the Ontario Federation of Labour's BEST program in 1977 and training adjustment programs in B.C. supported by Forest Renewal B.C. and the Healthcare Labour Adjustment Agency in the past couple of years.

    We know what can work when the resources are there. We know that. We also know that government funding to labour has the power to lever considerable resources from employers through bargaining. I think that's a very important point, because often we can use a little bit of that money to lever a lot more from the other players and partners in this program.

    There's a role for the federal government, though, as literacy straddles education and training. We need a pan-Canadian strategy to address adult literacy needs. No single level of government has the sole jurisdiction or the mandate here. We need to pursue a partnership model with federal, provincial and territorial governments, with the business community, labour and the community sector with the federal government, we hope, taking the lead.

    We've proposed a training insurance plan that would see employment insurance funds go to support workers to learn while they earn, suggesting a pilot within the health care sector. This would include, we suggest, an EI premium rebate for those employers who make a bona fide training investment with an arrangement that is co-managed with unions with the assurance of equity.

    Surely it makes sense for us to grow our own by investing in workers at lower levels of the workplace so they can gain skills, the credentials they need to assume positions of greater responsibility, and greater pay. Perhaps it makes sense to explore demonstration projects in workplaces under federal jurisdiction.

    We often hear--at least I do--about foreign investors coming to Canada whose primary attraction is not our tax system, not our medicare system, but the skill and education of our workforce. Our workforce is aging. The average age of the Canadian Labour Congress members is 49. The average age of a skilled tradesperson is 52. There is a huge and crying need to give family supporting occupations to those who desperately need them and, we think, for those investors who will desperately come when they see the skill of our workforce.

    The National Literacy Secretariat, HRDC, I must be on the record to say, deserves praise and commendation. It has been an important vehicle of financial and technical support to our Canadian Labour Congress, its affiliated unions and provincial and territorial federations of labour involved in literacy initiatives since 1988. It has provided critical support to building the capacity of unions to move forward on literacy in the workplace and on the public policy front. However, it no longer has the resources to meet the current demand.

    Perhaps we've all become victims of our own success. As awareness of literacy issues has grown, there are many more organizations involved in literacy work, yet the NLS budget has stayed the same for the past seven years. That is a crying shame. In the most recent round of funding applications, some labour organizations received no funding at all, while others were significantly cut back, necessitating a cut in their work.

    We close by saying the federal government needs to expand the capacity of the NLS to support labour and other literacy initiatives if we're serious about moving forward on the workplace literacy agenda.

    Thank you.

º  (1635)  

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Mr. Georgetti, you're no stranger to this committee as president of CLC, but you've brought someone with you and, perhaps to help other members of the committee--

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: With me is our staff member responsible for the literacy program at the Canadian Labour Congress, Tamara Levine.

    The Chair: I understand, Tamara, you are prepared to answer questions as well when it comes around to that.

    Our final presentation today is from the Alliance of Sector Councils, Gary Greenman. Thank you, Gary.

    Mr. Gary Grenman (Executive Director, The Alliance of Sector Councils): Thank you for the opportunity to participate in this round table on workplace literacy issues and to bring some perspective from the network of sector councils that we have created in Canada. You are addressing an issue that is critical to many Canadian companies and workers and to many people who are in the process of making a transition into the labour market.

    Let me briefly tell you about sector councils. They are industry partnerships that are created when representatives of employers and employees come together on a national basis to form partnerships to address common human resources and skills development issues on a national basis for those particular sectors. Representatives of government and education also participate in most of these councils.

    An overarching objective is to ensure that we have the right mix of skills to succeed in the current and future labour market and contribute to competitive advantage in the global economy. It is estimated that sector councils currently cover only about 25% of the labour force in Canada.

    The issues addressed by sector councils can include occupational skills, competency standards, and essential skills that are reflective of the current and future work environment; the development and delivery of skills training programs; industry certification and accreditation programs; recruitment, retention, and transition programs; relevant career information; literacy; e-learning and innovative means of delivering training and skills programs in a diverse and large country.

    Sector councils represent employers and workers in a given sector and therefore have an ability to establish the need, priority, development, and implementation of programs and services on a national basis. This approach can serve to implement more national coordination and more effective and efficient uses of limited resources.

    Sector councils are a successful model of industry partnerships addressing human resource and skills issues. We need this network to cover a larger percentage of the workforce and to have the resources to implement national industry standards and approaches.

    We are all aware of the data that show the major impacts of the exit of the baby boomers from the labour market, the dramatic aging of the workforce, and the major challenges we face without a sufficient youth cohort to fill this gap. The competition will be intense for labour force entrants. It is projected that within ten years, 100% of the growth in the labour force in Canada will have to come from immigration.

    It's a given that we live in a world of rapidly changing technology that is having major impacts on our workplace. I have heard some CEOs speak of major technological change every 24 months and the need for continual skills upgrading and transitions. The ability of workers to compete and make successful transitions is limited where there are problems with basic literacy.

    Literacy can be an issue for both employed workers and those one million or so unemployed or underemployed Canadians for whom transition assistance and programs are required to make them job-ready. We have all heard stories of the empowerment and liberation that can come when an individual gains new literacy skills. Improved literacy skills can certainly contribute to the productivity of an employee and their ability to communicate and transit up the career ladder, and it can help some of the impact of technological change in the new economy and global environment. Governments, educators, employers, and individuals all share some accountability in ensuring that literacy rates increase for those most in need.

    Employers can be provided with tools to deal with workplace literacy issues. We can accomplish this in a more coordinated way by working through sector councils and providing some industry leadership in partnership with other major stakeholders.

º  (1640)  

    What are sector councils currently doing in this field? At this point, many are developing or have put in place literacy and essential skills programs for their industry. This can include integrating essential skills into occupational analysis; developing approaches to upgrading skills; integrating literacy and essential skills into training programs; revising training manuals in a more adult-friendly manner; developing effective tools for employers that can be used either in selection processes or with existing workers to access levels of literacy, numeracy, and other essential skills; partnering with community groups or colleges to adjust training programs and integrate core skills, or adjust literacy programs specifically for a particular workplace; and conducting industry assessments of literacy and essential skill needs.

    Canada has been doing some groundbreaking research on essential skills at the national level. Continuing these research activities can benefit literacy programs, activities, and approaches as well as point the way to a more national coordinated approach.

    The sector council community would welcome a more coordinated approach to literacy and essential skills programs. As you are fully aware, this becomes a major challenge in a country with split jurisdiction in areas like education and training, where a national approach or policy on education training or literacy is lacking.

    The following 10 points would help to assist sector councils in this important area:

    One is a national campaign to raise awareness of literacy and learning as a government, social, education, corporate, and individual priority.

    Two is an ability to determine what literacy and learning approaches work best for the new economy and for a particular industry.

    Three is development of user-friendly tools that employers can use to determine literacy and learning needs, and programs to upgrade these skills in a manner that is complementary to the workplace, the sector and the employees.

    Four, perhaps most difficult, is federal-provincial concurrence and cooperation on approaches and policies to actively increase levels of literacy in the workforce. How do we move forward with national priorities and leadership?

    Five is recognition that a lot is happening in the literacy field, there are many successful programs in operation, and there are many passionate individuals and organizations providing good literacy service in this country,

    Six, the challenge may be how to better coordinate what is happening and more effectively move some of this to the workplace and to a national agenda.

    Seven is a national commitment to program and funding support on a long-term and sustainable basis to permit sector councils and others to design and implement more workplace literacy programs on a national and sectoral basis, including an ability to assess effectiveness and results.

    Eight, sector councils have experience managing youth transition programs. This program model could be expanded or altered to include transition and literacy assistance for the unemployed and underemployed.

    Nine is an expansion of the funding and number of sector councils to cover a larger percentage of the labour force.

    Ten, sector councils may provide an important vehicle for a coordinated and national approach to workplace literacy.

    Thank you.

º  (1645)  

    The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Greenman.

    We'll now move to our question and answer portion.

    I'm going to start with Mr. Proctor, for seven minutes. You were here first, so I will allow for you to go, followed by Mr. Malhi and then Madame Girard-Bujold.

    Mr. Dick Proctor (Palliser, NDP): Okay. Thanks very much, Madam Chair.

    Thanks to the presenters for a very interesting discussion.

    I guess what jumps out at me--you perhaps haven't seen this--is that in the background notes that have been provided by research, they say if you take two categories together, almost half of Canada's population 16 years of age or over have difficulty reading at level one, the lowest level of prose, or the second-lowest level of prose on the literacy scale.

    We've probably had basic education in this country for the last 50 years, and students are supposed to be in school until age 16. Yet I have an acquaintance who teaches introductory English at the university level and he insists that the level of ability in the English language--and I don't know whether it applies to the French language or not--is getting worse, not better. It's falling behind.

    I'm looking at Ms. Ritchie and Ms. Levine, who work in this field, and I'm just wondering what their observations are in that area. Would you concur that we have ourselves in a pretty big hole here? For a country that has a lot of things going for it, it doesn't seem to be going well in this field.

    Ms. Tamara Levine (Co-ordinator, Workplace Literacy Project, As Individual):

    I think a lot of people were really surprised by the statistics that came out as a result of the international adult literacy survey in the mid-nineties. That looked at the adult population totals from age 16 right to the top.

    There are a number of reasons for it. One is that among the older population, there wasn't necessarily a chance to go as far as people would have liked with school. People had to drop out for economic or family reasons. You also have immigrant populations in there who may be literate in a mother tongue but not necessarily in English or French.

    Then you have the younger population, which is, as you say, the most surprising. There are certainly gaps in the school system. The school system hasn't worked very well for a lot of young adult Canadians as well as older ones. There are also disparities in terms of language. Certainly francophone minorities outside Quebec haven't always had access to schooling in their mother tongue--in New Brunswick, Ontario, and other provinces. That's been problematic.

    There are also the income levels. The single most determining factor in how well a child does in school is the income of the parents. We all know kids who live in poorer neighbourhoods don't have access to the same quality of teachers or education. As public education is supposed to be the great equalizer, those disparities are still there when kids don't have enough to eat and when the quality of education isn't there.

    That's the education side of it.

    The other side is what happens once people leave school. Sometimes when we leave school and we're in the workplace for a number of years, we don't have a chance to use those skills. Our workplaces aren't necessarily literacy rich, as some people have said. While the skills might have been intact on leaving school, they get rusty as we move through our adult lives and don't necessarily use them, and we don't have the opportunities for workplace training and education that would serve to enhance them.

    I don't know if other people want to speak to that.

    Mr. Dick Proctor: Let me just ask a supplementary question.

    Obviously the unions are heavily committed, heavily involved in this. Ms. Ritchie, you represent auto workers. I know the auto workers represent a lot more than the big three. What about the auto makers, are they committed to this? Do you work with the employers on this?

    I don't know whether that's for you or for Mr. Georgetti.

º  (1650)  

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie: Well, we work with them, but as I said earlier, this is a fragile state of affairs. There are other priorities and this often isn't among them.

    The experience on the ground is very different from one workplace to the next. We went through the closure of the third shift at the Brampton plant, and that group generally had a higher level of education.

    On the other hand, we're going through another closure at the Ajax trim plant with DaimlerChrysler now, and I'm just putting a profile together there with people. We have a lot more women, a lot more people who originally come from outside Canada, and a majority of people who have not completed grade 12. So it's a very different picture.

    I do deal with our closures and our layoff situations. That's part of my job. And I can tell you that as I go through, almost mechanically, the questions about what the workforce looks like so that we have some sense of adjustment needs, more often than not I ask the workplace committee if there are any literacy issues, and very often I'll be told, no, there are no issues. Then a few weeks later we'll receive phone calls from panicked committee members saying they have all these people who can't fill out their EI report cards because they can't comprehend a lot of it.

    As we know, it's still very embarrassing for people to talk about this. We have this even with grade 12. One of the things that often come out in an adjustment program is that all those people who said, yes, I have high school, are suddenly absolutely panicked and terrorized that they will be asked to complete some kind of test. For older workers, grade 12 is from very long ago, and as we all know, I'm sure, unless you use math and other things such as that often...you either use it or lose it.

    Also, as a country, we have a shameful history around immigration policy, where for years it was only the head of household, typically the man, who was given the opportunity to take language training in English or in French. So we're still dealing with the consequences of that approach. That is not the case any longer, but those folks are still out in the labour market.

    I would also agree with Tamara that in a lot of workplaces there is a very narrow range of skills actually used as part of the work. For all the hoo-ha that you have to have this, that, and the other in a lot of jobs, that's simply not...it may be part of a weeding process for hiring, but it's not part of what's required on the job.

    The Chair: Mr. Malhi.

    Mr. Gurbax Malhi (Bramalea—Gore—Malton—Springdale, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    What incentive program does the union provide to the employee and what type of cooperation are you getting from the employees?

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie: I'm sorry, do you mean from the employer?

    Mr. Gurbax Malhi: No, from the union point of view. What type of incentive do they provide to the employee and what type of cooperation are they getting from the employee?

    Ms. Tamara Levine: I think what's really exciting about what is possible here is the time to learn. We all know how busy our lives are. As adults we have jobs, we have families, we have responsibilities, and it is very difficult to make time in our lives to go to night school to take a course, even though we may desperately want to do that. That's compounded in a situation where people do shift work, especially rotating shifts or night shifts, where that just doesn't fit with courses that may be offered through the community college, the school board, or other adult upgrading programs.

    What the union can do is negotiate terms that are conducive to learning, and a lot of that is time. The program Laurell described with the big three was negotiated to run four hours a week, two hours on work time and two hours on worker time, and that's a huge incentive.

    Being able to do some of the learning on work time at a place you've already got yourself to, where you've already dealt with the transportation issues, you've already dealt with child care issues, and you've already dealt with all the things you have to deal with to go out to learn, is the very biggest incentive. If people have the opportunity to learn in a convenient way, in a positive way, with their friends, with their co-workers, that's the very biggest incentive.

º  (1655)  

    Mr. Gurbax Malhi: What incentive do you think the federal government can provide for these literacy programs in the workplace?

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: Well, they can provide us with some financial support so we can build some capacity. As we said, we can lever a lot of capacity at the bargaining table in terms of support from the employer if we have the capacity to deliver the programs. We have a very good network of trainers who can provide this service and get it forward.

    I'll just go back to your first question as well. There is a huge incentive on the other side, yet we find it a bit distracting and disconcerting that it doesn't attract the employer. There's research available from the Conference Board that shows the measurable productivity lifts are actually very quick after they embark on these programs. Also, it affects the incidence of workplace accidents, which particularly members of Parliament and legislative assemblies know from visits from their constituents are very debilitating and harmful. There's a huge upside in here that doesn't seem to attract employers, for some reason, and I find that confusing.

    With some support from the federal government for our capacity and very little investment by the employer, a couple of hours a week...they can get that back, we're told, in less than three years.

    From our perspective, with the limited capacity we have, we invest about 5% of our budget in literacy itself. If you measure it from a business model, there's no upside for our movement. I'd be better served by selfishly paying that money to hire organizers than I would literacy trainers. But what we get back is not only the capacity of our own members to understand what we're talking about, to understand us at the bargaining table, but to be better citizens as well. I see nothing but upsides in this, because everybody wins on it.

    The struggle you have as the federal government is that the provinces essentially control education, and what you seem to get back from the provinces any time you put anything forward, even this new $100 million innovation grant, is this resistance from the provinces because you're going to interfere in their jurisdiction.

    What the federal government can do is set some standards, set some benchmarks, and put some funding out there that's available if you want to meet those benchmarks with some accountability and reporting. If you want to start increasing the literacy level, set some benchmarks for the provinces and employers to meet. If the money is there, well, it's sort of like saying, if you build it, they'll come.

    Mr. Gurbax Malhi: You're talking about funding from the federal government, but what form are you talking about? Is it a tax break, subsidies, or...?

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: Again, there are a couple of areas. I've talked to Judi about this pilot project we're looking at. There's been a move to change, if you will, unemployment insurance from a reactive to a proactive fund--they now call it EI. We think that's a perfect fund to set up to say, use some of that as a training fund that employees can access to offset the cost of their lost wages to take training.

    I'll use myself as an example. When I took my apprenticeship, I was 25 years old and I had two children. I could not have afforded to take that apprenticeship if my wages hadn't been subsidized at school through EI.

    If we took some of that money and provided workers with a training fund of their own that they could access, it would do a couple of things. One is that it's contributed to by both employees and employers, and those employers who provide training will be able to offset the wage loss with EI funding.

    There's also a mechanism in the EI provision under maternity leave, for example, and employers who provide maternity benefits superior to those contained in the act actually get a reduction in their EI premiums. We would argue that employers who provide training, literacy and other training superior to the benchmarks set by the government could receive a de facto tax break by having their EI premiums reduced to a certain extent to recognize the contribution they're making to the skill set of the citizens of Canada.

    We think the whole thing is built in there. You wouldn't have to invent anything or use that nasty word “taxes”; you could use an existing fund in a very proactive way to help to offset the training needs of Canada. You would also increase the skill sets of Canadians with some of their own money and with some of the employer's money, who would ultimately gain the most out of this exercise.

»  (1700)  

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie: If I could, I'll just say something on this question. Some of us who participated in the innovation forums that were held on various subjects, including literacy, were actually quite disturbed by the focus some organizations had on tax credits. Essentially, we don't think that's going to deliver the promised outcomes. We know that for some period of time Quebec tried this kind of voluntary approach with tax credits. It simply wasn't getting them the promised results, so they switched to another model.

    There's no accountability that goes with that different from, say, something like an expanded version of Work Sharing While Learning under the EI program, where there are a number of stakeholders who sign on. The government has to sign on, the conditions have to satisfy the government, the company that's involved has to sign on, and the workers or the union representatives have to sign on to the agreement and agree on the terms and conditions. We need a mechanism like that, where the various stakeholders can agree on the original terms and kind of watchdog the system.

    With tax credits, frankly, I think it's just handing money away for no good end, so I know that would not be the route unions would support here.

    The Chair: Thank you.

    Madame Girard-Bujold.

[Translation]

    Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold (Jonquière, BQ): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    Mr. Georgetti, I must say that I grimaced when I heard you state that the federal government should get involved in a matter that comes under provincial jurisdiction, namely education.

    I believe you will find this entrenched in the Canadian Constitution.

    Ms. Ritchie made some comments about labour over the past 30 years. We must not forget that this is a step back in time, a step back to the situation 30 years ago. At that time, in Quebec, those who went to school finished elementary school, either grade six or grade seven, and then entered the labour market. There were lots of jobs. Now, you provided some statistics on 49-year-old plant workers and on other workers who were 52 years old and did slightly more technical work. It cannot be denied that work has changed. The way that work is performed has changed, but the illiteracy rate is still very high, whether in Quebec or elsewhere in Canada.

    In Quebec, we have what we refer to as the CAMO, in other words IAS committees. These organizations take action when, for example, changes are being made in plants; they come under the local employment centre. A worker and representatives from the union and the Government of Quebec—the federal government used to be in attendance as well, but it transferred the manpower file to Quebec—meet in order to decide how these workers are to be trained.

    A type of cooperation already exists which, as Ms. Ritchie was saying, is not perfect. However, I think that they do not have enough money for training. Jobs are becoming increasingly more specialized, but these workers have not received any specialized training. In my riding office, I meet workers who can neither read nor write. Let's not put our head in the sand. This situation even applies to some young people presently leaving our schools. That's the reality. We try to have the best social net possible for education, but some people always slip through the cracks.

    You said that the Canada Labour Congress had carried a literacy project in the workplace. I do not know whether or not this project was modeled on the one used in Quebec, or if the project was carried out in another way.

    Did a lot of workers participate in this program? Who funded these projects? Was there participation from the federal government, provincial government, union or employer? How did you carry out this project? What was the success rate?

    I have other questions I would like to ask later on.

»  (1705)  

[English]

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: I just want to answer one aspect. I hope I wasn't suggesting that the federal government give back into education. What I think I suggested is that the federal government could provide income support and capacity support in terms of financing so that we can deliver that education. I think it's too late to go back and mix up jurisdictions on who delivers education, but clearly the federal government has always played a role in subsidizing the wages, for example, of apprentices in Canada through the EI system, and I think that's a really good model that we should use elsewhere.

[Translation]

    Ms. Tamara Levine: First of all, I must say that, in my opinion, in the area of training, Quebec is well ahead of the other provinces. The one per cent rule, which forces employers to provide training to their employees, as well as the issue tables that you described demonstrate that this is so.

    Those who take part in the project currently being carried out by the Canadian Labour Congress are our own members.

    For example, the CAW, in the automobile sector, is part of the CLC. We are therefore conducting a project in cooperation with our unions which is aimed at promoting literacy. Indeed, we are the federation of the other unions. We speak on behalf of our 2.5 million members, but in actual fact these are members of the CAW, CUPE and so on and so forth.

    Together with our unions, we really promote this issue. We have established resources and training materials. Our round-table meets twice a year, which enables us, among other things, to share information and to avoid reinventing the wheel. That is what the CLC literacy project is all about.

    The results are very interesting. The unions, working directly with the employers and with the members in their workplace, have achieved tremendous progress with respect to bargaining and providing literacy programs in the workplace.

    Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: Are both government levels contributing to this pilot project or has the union taken the sole initiative and is providing this to its members?

    In Quebec, we have these issue tables. These are manpower assistance committees. As soon as there is any significant technological change, the unions work with the employer and provincial government representatives and decide, through a study, how to retrain employees who are losing their jobs. Do you also work through cooperation and, when necessary, does the province get involved in the process?

[English]

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie: If we get into the labour market agreements, we're into describing chaos. It's so uneven across the country, and it's so uneven within. But I think your reference to a pilot project might have been the reference that Mr. Georgetti made about a pilot project under unemployment insurance, or EI, to look at some work with health care workers. That's not a pilot project specific to literacy, but it is a pilot project that would be looking at other ways of providing income supports for people who are training, whether it be literacy or other types.

»  (1710)  

    The Chair: Mr. Simard.

    Mr. Raymond Simard (Saint Boniface, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    Welcome, witnesses. Those were great presentations.

    My first question will be directed to Mr. Georgetti. I know you spoke about literacy being focused on the person--maybe the individual, as opposed to more the employer or the employer's needs. It seems to me that you need both to have a win-win situation.

    I'm just wondering if you've been able to convince the employers of the advantages of these literacy programs, because from the witnesses we've had here, we do know there is an improvement, there are increased profits, if you will, and in the end it's good for both parties.

    So, first of all, have you managed to measure these improvements; and secondly, do the employers realize it?

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: Do you mean, the productivity improvement?

    Mr. Raymond Simard: Yes.

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: There is some research available from the Conference Board, and we were going to bring it but forgot. We can provide it, if you want. There's good research on that.

    The answer to your question is yes. The measurement is by the amount of pickup by our affiliates who want and have asked and made application for some grant money to provide us with some capacity to put it out in the field. There seems to be and is continually a lot more pickup to take on these projects.

    Unfortunately, as I mentioned, we're running out of money, and our grant applications have been cut back because the NLS has been frozen for seven years. But there is more pickup, and the more we get at this with our affiliates, the more people like the CAW and Buzz Hargrove will take it to a bargaining table and say, this is good for you and it's good for our members, and we're going to put it all on the table and argue it there.

    If you can get it to that level, there's pickup. It's getting it up to that level. The quickest way, we find, is at the bargaining table. But if we can get at a CEO, which I do all the time, and tug on their arms to try to persuade them, if we can get them to focus on it--like Syncrude, for example--they pick it up right away. It's just a matter of exposure and a little bit of arm-twisting for them to spend some time paying attention to it. Their issues are usually bigger than that, they think.

    Mr. Raymond Simard: Right.

    My second question is to Ms. Ritchie.

    You mentioned that some of the older employees were sometimes terrorized when they had to go through tests, or whatever, and I can understand that. I guess it made me realize that with limited resources, is there an age group on which we should be focusing, or should we just be doing this across the board? Should we be spending a lot of money on a 60-year-old person who will be retiring in two years, that type of thing, or have you thought about that in terms of the strategy?

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie: To really scare you, don't forget that the last older worker project we had was anybody aged 45 and older.

»  (1715)  

    Mr. Raymond Simard: That's fine. I qualify for that.

    Ms. Tamara Levine: That's when that felt a long way off.

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie: The labour movement and a lot of other organizations in the community would want to talk about anyone's entitlement to this, whatever their age might be, and dare I say, into retirement. This is not simply an issue of those in the active labour market.

    If we were talking about some exciting new approach that we thought might work to support this and maintain it, then we might be talking about piloting or testing with a particular group. There's no doubt that there are groups where this would be very much needed. It's not necessarily a class of workers--say, immigrant women--but it may be in certain sectors where there is very significant change and restructuring going on.

    Mr. Raymond Simard: As opposed to age groups....

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie: You could just cut it different ways.

    The general answer is that I think everybody has that right. More specifically, if we were talking about having to take a narrower focus for piloting or testing it, then I'd say there are a number of ways of cutting that.

    Because I'm old enough to remember when it was the 45-year cut-off, I would say that's a good one.

    Mr. Raymond Simard: Mr. Georgetti, you indicated that it was important to invest in workers at the lower level. We have substantial concerns here in terms of the workplace changing and getting even more complex and the gap widening even more. I'm thinking, the people who are at the top end now also have to be trained to keep up with those changes and those advancements. How do you answer that problem?

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: The one thing I say is that people at the managerial level really don't need our help, because they understand it and they get it. Largely, when they're polled, they get more than an adequate amount of skill building to keep their skill sets current, and they're satisfied with that. In fact, when they're not, that's when you see people migrating away from employers.

    Part of the problem of the “brain drain”, particularly in health care, is that wages are not the main reason they go to work in the States. It's because they provide them with ongoing skill building and keep their skill sets current. So that's not the area where the problem is; the problem area is the people who have a low skill set.

    Sometimes I get pretty glib answers from employers when I talk about training programs. They say, if I train them, they'll want more money; or if I train them, they'll leave and go work somewhere else.

    I toured a work site just a while ago. It was a fast-food outlet. All the instructions to all the employees were pictorial; there was no writing. That's part of the problem. A lot of employers see and are fearful of skill building for monetary purposes or mobility. We have to get through that somehow.

    I think that's going to be a bit of a daunting task. Again, there has to be some incentive or reward there for those who provide it. That's why we're looking for a way to incent the employers.

    The employers who provide training right now essentially get no reward for it other than the chance that their employees might go somewhere else. That's why we talk about looking at rebating EI premiums or something, so that the employers who are doing it get recognized for doing it.

    Mr. Raymond Simard: Do I have any time?

    The Chair: You have about 30 seconds.

    Mr. Raymond Simard: I have a quick question for Mr. Greenman.

    I'm not sure what the percentage is. I missed the number. Did you say 100% of our new workforce in 20 years will be dependent on immigration?

    Mr. Gary Grenman: I was quoting a figure provided by Human Resources Development Canada, which says that within 10 years 100% of the growth will be through immigration.

    Mr. Raymond Simard: Yes.

    Mr. Gary Grenman: The youth cohort will only replace people currently in the labour market. It won't allow for any growth.

    Mr. Raymond Simard: That's the number I've been hearing as well.

    That poses a whole different set of challenges and problems. I'm just wondering, in terms of you people here, have you thought about that and how you're going to deal with that? You will have people coming into the workforce who probably won't even be at the basic level, because they might have to learn a language from scratch, and all that. So that's a whole different challenge coming up within the next 10 years.

    Mr. Gary Grenman: It's a huge challenge for workers; it's a huge challenge for employers; and it's a huge challenge for government. If it's really true, we have to make sure that Canada remains a favoured destination on the immigration front.

    I've been at sessions where immigration specialists will stand up and say there is a war on at the moment for the best and brightest, and there are six countries lined up to get these people when they're available. If Canada does not remain a favoured place for them to come to, our economy is going to suffer badly.

    You're right that not only do we have to rely on immigration, but we also have to look internally. We supposedly have a million Canadians who require upskilling to be productive in the labour market, and we're going to have to look at older workers and at being reskilled, if we want our economy to remain robust.

    The Chair: Mr. Finlay.

    Mr. John Finlay (Oxford, Lib.): Thank you, Madam Chair.

    It's very interesting, and I must apologize for not getting here earlier.

    While we were told just last week that 2.5 million workers were at level one, two, or just three on the literacy scale, we did hear some very good stories too. Although this was in a much smaller industry, they had really put workplace literacy to work. Of course, they coupled it with some encouragement vis-à-vis the company, and they were competitive. As I recall, they had two people even.... In the last two or three years since they put this project in, they had 30-some employees in the project. It was really quite a story, because they found that people could go with the training, and they started to branch out with their product and to design it themselves right there. The people who did it designed it, and so on. It was just excellent.

    I was at a 15-year celebration of the CAW at CAMI Automotive in Ingersoll, in my riding, on Saturday. I talked to the president, who is a young man I used to teach in school. I said to him, I'm on this committee, and we had heard about workplace literacy; what do you have for them here at CAMI? He said that they had very little right now. They were big on it, promoted it, and advertised it each year to get a new class going. It's one of their things, but for the last two years they haven't had anybody take it up.

    He suggested that meant their level of skill training was a good deal higher than in some other industries, which maybe it is. But I wondered whether he was missing something that we should add to this program, or something to keep people coming. I think it's very good if he's right, and I couldn't say he wasn't right, because they're not going to the project. It's split into two hours and two hours and has all of the things you suggested, Tamara, and a little pay too--so many cents an hour for their education and training.

    When I last went through the plant, I noticed a lot of advertising on health care, human development, and so on. So they're really paying attention to this sort of thing, and I think it's going to become far more important in the future.

»  (1720)  

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie: CAMI is an example of a workplace where we have actually not been able to negotiate any commitments from the employers. There have been attempts to promote this idea, but as I said, you don't always have the bargaining power to deliver.

    One of the things we have done in some workplaces in southern Ontario, where English is not the issue, is to address the other basic or foundational skills that people are very anxious to develop if they are given the opportunity and accessible classes. For example, as I mentioned earlier, people want some help with a peer group to upgrade their education or to take a refresher on their high school education if they are older. In some cases, we have even done programs to develop people's skills in using the computer, or what is often called computer literacy—though I'm not always comfortable with that terminology.

    Even with our airline and aviation adjustment action centre coming out of the Canada 3000 bankruptcy, we found that there's an assumption that young people know everything about computers because they were raised with a joystick in their hand. Well, the problem is that they were raised with a joystick in their hand, which is what they know about computers. They don't necessarily know about word processing; they don't necessarily know about how to navigate the Internet, other than making a hit on Workopolis; and they don't know how to use e-mail.

    Some of you will have seen the report this week about Canada being one of the highest, if not the highest, user of the Internet for online applications for jobs—

»  (1725)  

    Mr. John Finlay: And for fraud, where we are one of the highest users of online....

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie: Okay. I didn't know about that one; I was looking at a different article.

    Voices: Oh, oh!

    Ms. Laurell Ritchie: That was a surprise to many of us, so we actually worked on a program and taught people how to use the computer with access to the Internet. They were looking for work, and maybe looking for training in some cases. As they were doing so, they were also learning all kinds of skills, which they were crying for. It was unexpected.

    We don't want to go too far afield here, because there must be a priority for people who do not have some of the very basic skills. In a way, I guess this takes us back full-circle to one of the things that we were saying earlier, the need for a labour force development strategy in this country, because of the looming skills shortage and all of the explanations for it and how we're going to address it.

    Some of us are not comfortable using the literacy program, which could be stretched in some different directions, to deliver all of the missing pieces in the system right now. You have people at large aerospace firms and elsewhere who everybody thinks, oh, they're technical people; they've got a lot of skills on the computer; boy, they're whizzes. Yet a lot of what they know is job specific and certainly workplace specific. Their entry to the computer is to a locked intranet system, and they only have so many options. They are not people who have a whole range of computer skills. There's a real misnomer about that.

    I don't want to take the discussion off onto computers, but if you're asking if there are unmet needs, which could make for a lot more interest and excitement in some programs that could be delivered in the workplace and that are not workplace specific, believe me, there's no end of pieces that we could be working on.

    Ms. Tamara Levine: Perhaps I could just add, John, that one of the really important things about workplace literacy is that it's a ramp; it's no different from a ramp for wheelchairs. It's an access or a way to other things. If we have the foundational or basic skills, then there's no end to where the learning can take us. I'll bet my bottom dollar that a lot of the people who participated in that CAMI program over the last number of years have probably gone on to programs at a college or at night school and have continued to increase their skills and their learning because they've caught the bug. They have learned how to learn, they believe in themselves, and the sky is the limit.

    Maybe some of those programs could also come to the workplace to make them more accessible, but workplace literacy is the key. It's the rent.

    The Chair: We're quickly approaching the end of the time. I would like to give all four of you three minutes each, if you have anything that you wanted to add or to leave us with that didn't come out in the questioning.

[Translation]

    Ms. Jocelyne Girard-Bujold: Ladies and gentlemen, you have outlined the growing needs in the area of literacy. But where are we going to find the money? Employees and employers contribute to employment insurance; is that where we are going to find the money, or will we have to increase taxes to make up for this shortfall? I would like to hear your opinion on the matter.

»  (1730)  

[English]

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: I think it will come from both. First of all, where workers and employers pay EI premiums, some of that money can be used for training. The issue of literacy, though, is a broader issue; it's a tax base issue. Again, I think that with very small investments, we can lever a lot at the bargaining table and build a lot of capacity. The broader issue of training needs to be discussed on a broader basis.

    The culture of lifelong learning is no longer just the purview of people with PhDs and MAs, but it's everyone's purview. But as Tamara said, there is a whole group out there who we have to get up the ramp to the start before we can start into the process. I would predict that in the next 10 years the training and skilling of the workforce, prior learning assessments, immigrations issues, and skills will be the number one public policy issue in the country.

    The Chair: Wouldn't you also agree that if we don't address the literacy skills of that population, they will lose the capacity to interact with their children or grandchildren in terms of quality too?

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: As I said, I have personal experience with that from where I came from. Where you really see the issue of literacy come forward is not in voluntary programs but when you're making a transition in a plant, from an old plant like we had to a modern and technologically advanced plant. All of the senior people who were being displaced were opting to go to the lowest jobs—not because they wanted to, but because they didn't have the skills. That's when it finally hit home to us.

    As Tamara said, when we finally put the programs on, some of these people, after working for awhile, decided that they wanted to go back to school because they understood the need for learning. The most poignant part was seeing an old guy--who was angry at me because he thought he was going to become a janitor from being a contract employee--sitting on a park bench reading to his granddaughter. He said the pay was nothing; he got to read to his grandchild. It was more rewarding to him than the new pay structure he got.

    So there are huge public policy benefits there societally. Again, I think that we are in a very good position as a union, because there's nothing in it for us in terms of a bottom-line return. It's all expenditure, but we get a great return in terms of satisfaction that we've done the right thing.

    The Chair: That's quite a return; it's quality of life for the people who you represent.

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: Yes, they are who we represent.

    The Chair: Mr. Simard.

    Mr. Raymond Simard: I just have one quick question about something that Mr. Greenman said, which piqued my curiosity.

    I know that we've been talking here about a national strategy, but we know at the same time that within that national strategy—if that's the way we decide to go—we have to customize it to a certain extent, because what's good for southern Ontario may not be good for the Northwest Territories. We've seen that from the witnesses who have appeared here. But I believe Mr. Greenman said that you would even customize the programs to fit a particular industry. I thought that was really interesting.

    I just want to know how you see that. In other words, will somebody working in the car industry not have the same program as somebody working in a textile industry? Is that what you're thinking?

    Mr. Gary Grenman: I guess I'm thinking more in terms of relating some literacy or essential skills to the skills required to do the job, which then makes it easier for us to basket those together according to sectors of the economy and to have industry do it. Perhaps industry could do it once, if there's a sector council where there are some economies of investment, and then have it flow out to the member industries of that particular sector. I really do believe there are different requirements at different worksites.

    As one of the other presenters said, I also think there are differences in literacy ratings among some geographic sectors in the country. For most of us, myself included, literacy rates are not equal. I came from a very rural area, where I'm sure the literacy rates would not be equal to the literacy rates in a place that has a university or a college close by.

    So there will be variations by industry, and there'll be variations by provinces and regions. But that doesn't allow us to give the baby away with the bathwater on the importance of this as a national issue. It's very significant on a long-term basis if we want workers in this country to be competitive and to have meaningful lives. It's very important if we want to be able to feed what I think are going to be the demands for workers.

    Mr. Kenneth Georgetti: If I can just add to this, our experience is exactly that. These literacy programs work better when they're coupled with partial workplace training and are shared at the same venue. We see better results that way than with just a pure training program.

    The Chair: I want to thank our representatives from the CAW, the CLC, and the Alliance of Sector Councils.

    In my years here at Parliament, I always know that when you folks appear before whatever committee, you come prepared, you give us good information, and you make excellent suggestions. I'm hoping you're going to see some of your recommendations in our report, and furthermore that government will act upon them. I thank each and every one of you for coming today.

    The meeting is adjourned.