:
I think we will call the meeting to order, it being now 3:30 and a bit.
Welcome to the witnesses.
Today, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), we are studying and looking at the increased participation of women in non-traditional occupations.
Our witnesses today are from the Building and Construction Trades Department, from Dig-All Construction Limited, and from the Commission scolaire de Laval.
Welcome.
Each group will have ten minutes to present, and that's ten minutes for the whole group. That will be followed by a question and answer session, in which the time allotted is for both the question and the answer. I just wanted to tell you that.
I will begin, following the order on the agenda here, with the Building and Construction Trades Department, AFL-CIO, Canadian office.
Mr. Smillie.
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Thank you, Madam Chairman. Good afternoon, members of the committee and fellow witnesses. Thank you for inviting me to share my thoughts on your important study. On behalf of my organization, I hope to bring value to the committee, and I hope this is not the last time we will see each other.
Our organization is called the Canadian Building Trades. We represent about 550,000 organized construction workers from coast to coast to coast. Our members work in 15 different craft unions and over 50 trades. These include heavy-equipment operators, carpenters, welders, bricklayers, and everything in between. We build infrastructure: heavy industrial plants such as oil refineries, nuclear plants, schools, hospitals, and houses.
In preparation for my remarks today I found formal information and sought out first-hand accounts from our members. According to a 2008 study by the Construction Sector Council, 4% of our 550,000 membership are women. Some of the trades have a much lower penetration, approximately 2%. We have quite a number of women working as insulators, carpenters, and painters. There are fewer working as bricklayers, concrete finishers, steam fitters, and electricians. These percentages have held true for a good while. But nationally, the industry has grown by 45% over the last 10 years. In B.C. and Alberta, our industry has increased 100%. This means that, proportionally, there has been an increase in people engaged in construction.
I want to give you some background on the apprenticeship challenges we face today. Then the challenges facing our female apprentices will be self-evident. In Canada, apprenticeship registrations are at an all-time high, yet graduation numbers have been stagnant since about 1995. There is a systemic problem with apprenticeship completion in Canada. In the case of women in apprenticeships, particularly in construction, the completion rate of apprentices is less than 1%. This means that one out of 100 entrants we have managed to attract to our trades successfully progresses through the curriculum and work requirements to get journey status. This would help explain low female participation in our ranks today.
I don't think gender has much to do with completing an apprentice program. I've put together a small list of challenges any apprentice would face in our industry.
First, there is the lack of stability. This is a reality in construction. We are cyclical in nature, and this leads to movement to other industries where work is more predictable. In a bad year, construction can get you 700 to 1,000 hours of work. In a good year, you could get more than 2,200 hours. In a very good year, like the last number of years, you could have as much as 3,000 hours. Our workplaces do not have flexible hours, nor are the conditions at some of the remote work camps ideal.
Second, there are life events. No one can control what life is going to throw at an apprentice. Illnesses, children, marriage, a family move to another province—all of these can affect someone's ability to finish the program of study. The committee will be aware of the 2001 and 2006 census numbers. These figures give us a road map of which trades we need to work on. No doubt these numbers are why the committee is taking a look at these important issues.
The third thing I discovered when preparing for this presentation is kind of scary. Decisions we make in high school affect the rest of our lives. Don't ask my wife about that. The Construction Sector Council surveyed a number of young women in their formative years and discovered that if young women were exposed to trade competencies and opportunities, they were more likely to go on to careers in the trades.
In some parts of Canada, trade or shop classes have lost favour and have in many cases been pulled altogether, because of cost factors or risk of injury to students. In Austria and Germany, where students have significant exposure to these competencies, the participation rate in apprenticeships is much higher than it is in Canada, the U.S., or Australia.
The fourth thing I found in preparation for my remarks today was some of the work the Canadian Apprenticeship Forum did recently on why women enter the trades. They outlined a three-pronged hypothesis explaining why the women they surveyed entered their trades. The first hypothesis was the expectation of steady work, the second was interest in their work, and the third was the desire for self-employment.
I have a couple of comments on the study. Again, we are a very cyclical economy, and construction is also a late responder to economic conditions. The recession in the trades is still coming, and the largest majority of certified people in Canada are not self-employed but work for small and medium-sized contractors.
So it seems as if we have our work cut out for us, educating people about what to expect as a tradesperson. As I move along in my remarks, we will look to this committee and the Government of Canada to assist.
The final thing I've brought to you are some ancillary remarks and experiences I collected from our trades and contractor partners when I surveyed them last week. Large construction companies—I would consider a large construction company as one with more than 100 employees—are making some inroads on the construction management side of our business. According to Tony Fanelli, manager of labour relations at Bantrell Constructors Company out of Montreal and Toronto, women have grown in numbers in his organization in roles focused on inspection services, health and safety, representative services, logistics, and engineering. These are all positive steps. I would consider a small construction company as a company with less than 100 employees. There the challenges are greater, as many of the above competencies are generally subcontracted out to other companies. In this case, you get who you get when you subcontract work to other companies.
From my survey of our membership, I discovered a few organizations adding value in many regions of the country. There are initiatives like Alberta's Women Building Futures, Saskatchewan Women in Trades and Technology, the Women Unlimited project in Nova Scotia, and the STEP program in British Columbia. The STEP program is the skilled trades employment program, which is a joint initiative between the British Columbia Construction Association and the Government of B.C. This program concentrates on matching employers and those interested in trades opportunities. These are formal, not-for-profit pre-apprentice programs for women interested in a career in our industry.
Of note, our construction trades in Nova Scotia donate three cents per hour of work to a group called Texploration. Texploration promotes careers in the sciences, trades, and technical and technology-related occupations, and they promote this among women in grades 9 to 12. We're launching a similar program to Texplorations in Newfoundland in conjunction with the Vale Inco smelter project in Long Harbour.
To wrap up, your invitation to speak today stimulated a number of questions in our organization in regard to how we can do things better. Here are some questions we are now asking ourselves as it relates to workforce diversity. Are our workplace tasks attractive to women, and what can we do to improve things? Is our construction culture attractive to women? If we're not an attractive culture, how do we get there? How do young women find out about construction jobs? The last questions that were stimulated are, where and how do these women get trained and who is going to help women stay in apprenticeship programs?
Going forward, the message I'd like to deliver to you is as follows. The Canadian building trades would be willing to partner and work collaboratively with the Government of Canada and the provincial authorities responsible, to initiate a pilot program with our contractors. Perhaps a construction sector council could be a vehicle to move this initiative forward. We need continued support in promoting our trades as a viable career choice for young men and women alike. That support comes from the Government of Canada: it comes through the EI system, the apprenticeship incentive grant, and tangible places like the Parliament of Canada.
If this committee can advocate in any way that there is a great future in the trades, our industry would be grateful. In the new year—I believe it's March, and I feel like a billboard for the Construction Sector Council—the council is having a symposium focused on this very topic. I believe it is in March 2010, and I think they would extend an invitation to everyone on this committee.
Thank you for inviting the Canadian Building Trades. I look forward to your questions.
My name is Debbie Penner. I live in Winkler, Manitoba. I am a mother of three and a wife of 20 years. I also work at Dig-All Construction, a family-run business.
The scope of our business is installing sewer and waterlines. The majority of our work is for the provincial government and the municipalities.
I am honoured to be here today to make a presentation to the Standing Committee on the Status of Women to discuss the barriers that women face in the construction industry.
Currently I am the office manager and administrator for Dig-All Construction and also a shareholder of the company. Other businesses we own are Rosebrook Ltd., which is a retailer of manufactured homes, Rosebrook Place and Minnewasta Meadows, which are mobile home parks within our community.
Humbling myself many years ago, I begged my father for a chance to work for the construction company. I started in 1991, working for minimum wage, which was $5.25 an hour. Looking after the in-house accounting and payroll, with very little knowledge or experience, slowly learning the business, I started to price jobs, order materials, and help set up the projects.
The construction companies I dealt with in the nineties were mostly family-run businesses. It is a male-oriented industry and a callous group. As a woman, I needed to be able to deal with these men on a knowledgeable level, while learning to cope with rude behaviour and discrimination against women in the industry.
At the turn of the century, the construction industry started to change. It was becoming more professional and organized, at least in the administrative and engineering departments. It continues to progress further, from the offices to the construction fields, at a very prolonged pace. As these changes take place, the opportunities continue to grow for women in the construction industry, and today there are women who fill the roles of engineers, on-site inspectors, and administrators, but as for the actual work in the construction field, there are very few. Field work is typically based on physical attributes, where men will hire men.
There used to be a large percentage of men who thought women had no place in the construction industry. This has also changed over the years. There are still the select few who feel intimidated by a woman sitting in on the construction meetings or who glare when a woman shows up at the test holes. The other day, someone asked me why the change in attitude; why is it more acceptable today than it was 20 or even 10 years ago to have women working in the construction field? I believe it has changed for many reasons.
The industry has become more professional and organized through legislation, technology, education, and training. The younger generations are now stepping into management positions, and in some cases have become owners themselves. They are raised with different ideals and standards. The economy has pressured the younger generations to realize it is very difficult to make a living as a one-income family. And technology is also making it easier for women to work in physically demanding positions.
For these barriers to be broken down, the industry has to evolve. Too many old-school employers are still against women entering the construction field. As the younger generations enter the workforce, women are becoming more prevalent in man-made environments, and I see this more and more as each year passes. Whether it is due to the development of educational courses or economic pressures for a family to have two incomes, the overall population has been forced to acknowledge that women are capable of working in male-oriented positions.
I have been a part of the industry for nearly 18 years, and since then I've become knowledgeable and have developed many lasting working relationships. I have a great deal of respect for my fellow industry partners, but when it comes to the contractors, there are still very few women involved. I hope they will encourage women who are seeking to enter the construction industry to come forward. I love the construction industry, and over the years, through a great deal of hard work, long hours, and dedication, I have proven to the construction industry that women are capable of working in this field.
Thank you.
This is how the ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport of Quebec defines a non-traditional curriculum: “A curriculum is considered to be non-traditional when the corresponding professions under the Code national des professions (CNP) indicate a rate of female participation of under 33 1/3 %.” The Commission scolaire de Laval currently offers 21 professional training programs in non-traditional trades.
The reasons for which women choose to enter trades which are traditionally male-dominated are not different from those of men. Many women choose to enter a trade because they prefer manual work, they wish to engage in physical work, they wish to create things with their hands, and they need a job in which they can move around. They are looking for concrete rather than theoretical work and they feel at ease working in a male environment. Other reasons why girls and women choose to enter a trade are relatively short training periods, high salaries and good job prospects.
When it realized that some of its female students wished to enter non-traditional areas of work, the Commission scolaire de Laval undertook several initiatives to encourage women to train in non-traditional trades, to support them in their training, and to help them enter the workforce.
We will begin by telling you about how we help women validate their choice of a non-traditional career and the training that goes with it. We will then tell you about the different measures we have taken to make room for women in non-traditional trades, and we will conclude by explaining the importance of partnerships in developing a winning strategy to help women enter trades and thrive in them.
We have several activities to validate the training given to women, and there will be more.
Information and one-day placement. Although there is a high demand for some training programs, recruitment remains a challenge. Therefore, each school year, staff and teachers from vocational training centres set up information booths in schools and give talks to students. Of course, both boys and girls are invited to meet with the professionals who are there to answer their questions. If they show clear interest in a trade, the young people are invited to the vocational training centres to be “one-day students”. They interact with the teachers and regular students in the classrooms and workshops. This allows them to try their hand at a trade and talk to people firsthand. It gives them a better idea of what they would like to do professionally and it validates their interest.
Femmes et métiers gagnants: orientation and exploration. Several times a year, groups of about 15 women visit our vocational training centres. These women are participating in the “Femmes et métiers gagnants“ program, which is subsidized by the Laurentians branch of Emploi-Québec. For seven weeks, the women take stock of their personal and professional situations and explore job opportunities and training in male-dominated professions. Each group is invited to our centres to explore, learn about and become familiar with our programs. They visit every department and talk to teachers about the reality and expectations of the trade they have chosen. Those who are interested can register for a one-day placement. Last year, two such participants graduated from the Centre de formation Le Chantier, one of them in brick-laying and masonry, the other in glass assembly and installation. This year, following their participation in the “Femmes et métiers gagnants” program, two women registered for the carpentry and woodworking program at the Centre de formation Le Chantier.
“Chapeau, les filles!“ is a competition in Quebec which recognizes women who have chosen to enter non-traditional fields of work.
For 14 years, the ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport and its partners have held the “Chapeau, les filles!” contest, which seeks to make women aware of the many career opportunities available to them and which support women who are training in male-dominated professions until they graduate.
The objectives are: to help women who have chosen to work in a non-traditional field to feel good about their choice; to reward their efforts; to help students overcome problems related to the fact that they are in a male-dominated environment; to help women make unconventional career choices by providing successful female role models.
To enter this contest, the young women have to write a letter describing their background, their commitment to working in a non-traditional trade, their aptitudes and what they intend to do to stay in the field. There are two tiers to the contest: the regional tier, with prizes of between $500 and $1,000, and the national tier, with prizes of between $2,000 and $5,000.
To attract participants, it is important that the centres advertise the contest, recruit participants and support them through each stage of the contest. Last year, four students from the Commission scolaire de Laval won regional awards, and one of them received a national award.
In order to continue to encourage women to enter non-traditional fields of work, the Commission scolaire de Laval will implement three activities in 2009-2010. The first is a “hands on“ workshop, which will be given by the Centre de formation Le Chantier. It will be called “Madame bricole tout”. The purpose of the workshop is to help women become more independent by letting them try manual skills. During the workshops, the women will learn the basics, such as how to paint a wall, how to handle screws, nails, drills, how to put up shelves and so on. The workshop is taught by the female teachers and students at the Centre de formation Le Chantier.
Another project, called “Parcours extrême”, consists of a professional exploration kit developed by the people at Femmes et production industrielle. It is aimed at students in the grade 9 and teaches them about non-traditional trades. This year, workshops will be given in high school classes in the Commission scolaire de Laval in collaboration with the Table de concertation lavalloise pour l'emploi des femmes dans les emplois non traditonnels, the Commission scolaire de Laval and the ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport. This partnership is not yet in place.
The “Défi touche à tout“ is an hands-on laboratory in a vocational training centre. This is a pilot project that allows students to “find their way”. The objective of this project is to help girls and boys become interested in occupations taught at the vocational training centre. This happens in a mini-laboratory setting. Learning activities are offered to students in grade 9. The activities help students find out what best suits them and which career choice is most appropriate for them. The students also receive information about the academic aspects and the nature of the course.
The three “Place aux femmes” initiatives were implemented to help women complete their courses and find a job after graduation. The first initiative helps women stick with their training. It has been available since January 2007 to any woman who is registered in a program or who has graduated from a non-traditional trade course with the Commission scolaire de Laval. Its aim is to support these women, to help them network and share their experiences. A facilitator, along with a female tradesperson, leads the activity. Telephone support and sharing opportunities are also available.
In 2007-2008, two groups were created and subsidized by Service Canada and the ministère de l'Éducation, du Loisir et du Sport.
One group was made up of women graduates in various non-traditional occupations, while the other was made up of women enrolled in the fire safety intervention program. Following this success and based on confirmed needs, the Commission scolaire de Laval continued to offer this program with the financial participation of the Commission de la construction du Québec. Since the spring of 2008, three groups have been created.
The second measure allows access to professional resources. Two career counsellors are available for all of the professional training programs at the Commission scolaire de Laval. Also, in order to ensure that girls remain in training courses, one of our facilities, the Le Chantier Training Centre, has a professional training counsellor available to meet with all female students, starting in their first week of classes. This resource is also available, as needed, throughout the training of females students. Bianka is a counsellor herself and she looks after the girls attending the Centre de formation Le Chantier.
The third measure is an awareness activity for teachers, and all staff and students at the Centre de formation Le Chantier. It takes the form of a play that is intended to educate the public about the role of women in non-traditional occupations.
A few words about partnerships. Ensuring the retention, recruitment and integration of women in non-traditional occupations requires cooperation with various partners. Here are a few examples of projects that bring together various stakeholders for the same cause. First, an innovative project to create and provide promotional, awareness and intervention tools designed to facilitate better access by women to non-traditional occupations and fields, particularly in the construction industry. It allows us to determine the profile of the women registered and the main difficulties they experience throughout their training.
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You are talking more specifically about the women in the training modules.
Ms. Lise Zarac: Yes, I am.
Mr. René Barrette: I may not have the statistics for all of the school board's 21 programs. I have more experience with the Centre de formation Le Chantier. These are specifically construction programs, five of which are with Mr. Smillie. They are pretty similar, including brickwork, masonry, electricity, carpentry, woodworking, etc.
Over the years, there has been an increase in the number of women taking these programs. As you emphasized earlier, it is not just the commitment that counts but also the establishment of support structures for these students. It is not always easy for women to enter the construction industry. We heard someone talk about this today.
Congratulations, Madam, for your efforts; you know that it is not always easy.
Our girls experience this on a daily basis when they register in programs. So we need to believe in them and give them the resources, allocate the resources they need to assist them in that career path.
As soon as I took this position three years ago, we immediately hired a full-time career counsellor in order to get women placed in those occupations.
Heaven knows, the construction industry needs women to set its practices straight and to clean them up. You are aware of what has been happening in the Quebec construction industry for the past few weeks. I will not go into details, because it is not what we are talking about today. I think that women have a place in this industry that is not only expected but also deserved. So we have to believe in them and put the appropriate structures in place.
With regard to numbers, the best incentive— depending on the number of applications—is to constantly adapt to what women ask for. When I have a lot of them over a given year, in traditionally male-dominated programs, we get positive discrimination. We automatically reserve up to two spots for women in programs where there are 20 to 22 spots. So, if I have enough applications to justify it, I make room for two women right away, no matter what the results of the selection test are.
:
Good afternoon, everyone.
What I am hearing today is extremely interesting. Some non-traditional trades are known, but not by young women. I have two daughters, two young women actually, at home. I am encouraging them to pick non-traditional occupations. I do not know whether I will succeed. There is not enough information on the subject. In fact, they do not really know where to turn.
In the high schools, students hear about nurses, paramedics, but there are very few posters encouraging our girls to go into the construction trades, for example, in masonry or mechanics.
I remember, 35 years ago, I wanted to study mechanics. But I was told that I needed to take a secretarial course first. That was not what I wanted to do at all. At the time, that was how things were, but things have changed.
Could you tell us about the programs you have developed at the Centre de formation Le Chantier, in order to recruit young women?
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Over the years, we have realized that the information, although available, was not ending up in the right places. Always targeting the same audience, meaning grade 9 and 10 students, was perhaps not the best idea. We might need to tell young girls what is available much earlier.
This year, we have decided to hold workshops for kids in elementary school. For example, we talked to children in grades 5 or 6 at two different schools in the board. They come and spend a day with us. We pay for lunch and the school bus, and we get them working with mortar, with professional teachers all around. We have them do some electrical work with electricians. They get a day's training with an elementary school teacher who will review what she saw during the day and will link it with what she teaches at school with her students afterwards. In that way, any math that can be done with reference to brickwork, or calculations about volume or mass, she can do that with them in math class. If there are instructions to read in French, so that they can do the electrical work, she will go over it with them.
Ultimately, it is not just a fun time for these elementary school kids. The girls also have to put on the gear, wear a hard-hat, learn how to do things like laying bricks or spreading mortar. We are starting this year.
In my opinion, if we strike early, perhaps we will see better results over the next few years. Kids will know right from elementary school that it is possible because they will have been part of it themselves. There is nothing better than learning by doing.
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I can give you a personal example.
I have a son who looked like he was heading to university. He was a computer analyst. He was really good, I must say. He was employed by National Defence, but one day, the budget was cut and his position was eliminated. He came home and announced that he was going to attend Le Chantier. Physically, he really was not the type to be working in construction. He spent his time inside, sitting at a computer.
I asked him if he was sure about his choice and he said that he was. He was sure of himself and off he went to enrol at Le Chantier where was trained. Now he is the happiest guy in the world. He works year round on a construction site. I was blown away by it all.
This is a concrete example of a kid who came out of grade 11 with an overall average of 94%, who got a $3,000 scholarship for college, but who ended up not going to university. He has made a success of himself by taking this training and today he is earning a living and building his own house. He is as happy as a clam.
As for women, we trained female electricians at the Commission scolaire de Laval and then we hired them. They work for us. Two years ago, as part of a staff recognition evening, one of those women was recognized for the quality of her work, by her peers, no less. That is quite the achievement. I say that we need to keep doing this. We really must value women all the time.
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It is somewhat systemic.
Ms. Penner, we're both from Manitoba, where we have a shortage of skilled labourers, and we brought in a lot of new Canadians to help fill that shortage. In Winkler and the surrounding areas, the Chamber of Commerce has identified one of the main problems as a shortage of skilled labour. They have partnered with the school divisions, so that high school kids who aren't going to university will go on the trades track. After they get through grade 12, they actually have the first part of their ticket. We find that the majority of young women are choosing the cosmetology route, which is fine. It is interesting to know why they're choosing that as opposed to the trades.
I have a 15-year-old daughter, and it's the same sort of thing. She was forced to go to a presentation on women in non-traditional roles, but she did not seem at all interested in it. I think we have to accept that some girls just aren't going to be interested.
A previous presenter was here and talked about the need for more women role models, so that young women can see that they can do it, can see what a woman looks like in a non-traditional role. I think you are a role model, and that is important. I appreciate your being here and telling your story.
Did you have a role model before you got into the construction business?
:
Thank you very much, Madam Chair.
I would like to thank you very much for being here today. I cannot tell you how proud I am to be from Laval and to be able to say that Le Chantier is in my riding. The work being done there is exceptional.
You referred to a training course which is scheduled for 2010, “Madame bricole tout”. That is of particular interest to me because, in my opinion, one of the factors that makes young women take the plunge and choose a non-traditional occupation is when their mothers talk to them about it.
Now I am almost 60 and I am still afraid of hammers. I have five paintings on a desk at my home here in Hull. I bought a hammer and nails but the five paintings have been on my desk for three months. I am not going to hang them up, someone else will have to do it.
As girls we learned how to play with dolls while our brothers were learning how to play with hammers, screwdrivers, pliers and so on. I think that, by offering this kind of training, and by building awareness among women's groups like Les cercles de fermières, we may have a chance of convincing more young women to opt for the non-traditional occupations.
I do not know. I am just putting the idea out there. You are already so busy that it would not be right for us to find more projects for you. But I want your success to be even greater. I am thinking in terms of a network. There are networks for business women, but is there a network for women in non-traditional occupations where they can work collaboratively and encourage each other once they get a job?
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Would it be possible to set up a pilot project? Actually, there is a Status of Women Canada program, a partnership program. It could help in keeping young women in non-traditional occupations. You can speak to Sylvie after the meeting.
We are doing this because we want to find solutions to your problems. We need you to tell us what your challenges are, your recommendations, and how we can best help you. As female members of Parliament, we are engaged in a non-traditional occupation ourselves. It is a constant struggle to effect change. We are aware of the fact that, until 30% of members of Parliament are women, there will be no change. The same was true of female cashiers: until there were women doing the job, nothing changed. We really have to work together, to cooperate, and that is why we invited you here today. We want to have as much information as possible so that we can help you to continue your excellent work.
Ms. Penner, I congratulate you, you worked in the construction sector in 1990, in Manitoba. I was working on a farm in Saskatchewan at the time. And believe me, I know what you went through. I commend you, you really are an exceptional woman. As Ms. Hoeppner said, it is good to have women, role models like you, but we need to see and get to know these role models. We would never have met you. How is that possible? Are there no newspapers, magazines, that talk about women in non-traditional occupations? I do not know.