Federal government issued billions to students at private schools, data reveal

2025/12/10 Leave a comment

Sigh….:

The Canadian government gave billions in grants to students at private, for-profit schools, a practice some critics argue has rewarded some institutions with less-than-rigorous academic standards.

Since 2017, the federal government has granted $2.7 billion to students at those schools, according to data from Employment and Social Development Can­ada (ESDC). 

The amount awarded to the students has risen dramatically in recent years, meaning a growing share of taxpayer money is indirectly flowing to for-profit institutions. 

Last month’s federal budget announced the government will no longer offer grants to students at such schools, citing unspecified “integrity issues.”…

Source: Federal government issued billions to students at private schools, data reveal

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ICYMI: Temporary foreign workers may get more flexibility to move jobs as Ottawa eyes changes to program

2025/08/02 Leave a comment

Not getting much support from worker organizations but policy is always a balance between different stakeholders:

The federal government is exploring changes to the Temporary Foreign Worker Program that would give workers more freedom to move jobs within their industry, rather than have their permits tied to a single employer.

Internal documents from Employment and Social Development Canada – the ministry in charge of the program – detail proposals to introduce a new sector-specific permit for workers in the agricultural and fish processing industries. 

The work permit, issued for two years, would allow workers to move between employers in the same sector as long as they have a new job offer from an employer. Currently, if workers lose their jobs, they also lose their permits.

The ESDC documents consist of six proposals to change aspects of the TFW program, including guidelines related to housing, wages, access to health care and transportation for workers. They were based on feedback from employer associations and labour groups and written over the past year.

The documents were provided to The Globe and Mail from Migrant Rights Network, a national advocacy organization that has long campaigned to abolish the closed work permit system and grant temporary foreign workers a direct path to permanent residency. The organization obtained the documents as part of the government’s consultation process.

On Wednesday, the group released a report criticizing the new federal proposals, characterizing the sector-specific work permits as a cosmetic change that would maintain employer control while creating an illusion of freedom and mobility for workers. The report says this is because employers would still have the ability to blacklist workers who leave their jobs. …

In November, 2024, a parliamentary committee on citizenship and immigration recommended that Ottawa get rid of the closed-work-permit system entirely, and introduce regional or sector-specific work permits that would define sectors broadly, and provide workers with access to a wide range of employers. 

The proposed changes from ESDC appear to build on recommendations from the parliamentary committee and a 2023 report from the United Nations, which branded the TFW program as a “breeding ground for contemporary forms of slavery.”

Beyond the stream-specific work permit, ESDC is proposing a redesigned LMIA process, in which employers obtain a Temporary Foreign Worker Employer Authorization (TFWEA) that they apply for every two years. A TFWEA, according to ESDC documents, will allow an employer to be approved to hire numerous foreign workers every two years, instead of the current system of applying for an LMIA approval each time employers need to fill a position with a foreign worker. “The TFWEA would be refillable, meaning that employers could re-fill a position that a TFW left with a qualified TFW who has a valid stream-specific work permit,” the document states. 

The government is touting the changes as measures that will benefit both workers and employers. The latter group, according to ESDC, would have more flexibility to replace workers. Meanwhile, those who find themselves out of work would be able to start a job more quickly with a new employer. …

Source: Temporary foreign workers may get more flexibility to move jobs as Ottawa eyes changes to program

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$4.1 million fines for violations of Canada’s temporary foreign worker program a ‘drop in the bucket’

2025/01/23 Leave a comment

Of note, an increase but still small number:

The federal government issued more than $4.1 million in penalties to employers violating the rules of the temporary foreign worker program in 2024, according to data from Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Canada. This is a 55 per cent increase from the $2.67 million handed out in 2023.

Ottawa levied 154 fines against non-compliant companies over the last calendar year, averaging $26,917 per decision, according to the Star’s analysis of the data — almost double the $13,917 average in 2023.

Use of the temporary foreign worker program by Canadian businesses has surged in recent years, particularly in low-wage sectors like construction and hospitality. Along with the increase, there have also been growing allegations of worker exploitation and abuse.

A Toronto Star investigation into the program’s application process found that in January 2022, the government directed staff to implement “streamlining measures” when evaluating the legitimacy of applications by employers seeking temporary foreign workers. Routine checks meant to ensure the system is not abused by unscrupulous employers were suspended in an effort to process applications faster.

“Workers in Canada deserve and expect to feel safe and protected in the workplace. That’s why we’re taking steps to further protect temporary foreign workers and hold bad actors accountable,” said Labour Minister Steven MacKinnon in a statement last week.

From April to September, Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC) — responsible for processing applications for temporary foreign workers — said it conducted 649 employer compliance inspections. Of these, 11 per cent were found to be non-compliant. 

Inspections in this six month period also resulted in 20 employers being banned from the temporary foreign worker program, a fivefold increase compared to the same time the previous year, ESDC said.

“Eleven per cent — one in 10 companies misusing the program — is extremely high,” said Catherine Connelly, a professor at McMaster University’s DeGroote School of Business, and an expert on the temporary foreign worker program.

The government’s data underscores the need for stronger oversight of the program and for more investigations and greater deterrents than current fines, Connelly says, noting that several employers remain listed as having an “unpaid monetary penalty.”

Source: $4.1 million fines for violations of Canada’s temporary foreign worker program a ‘drop in the bucket’

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Advocates, union applaud legislative commitment for groups for Black, LGBTQ+ workers, Sarkonak: Liberals to mandate reverse discrimination with job quotas for Black, LGBT people

2023/12/14 Leave a comment

Two contrasting takes, starting with predictable support from advocates:

…

A news release by Employment and Social Development Canada said that, on top of creating the two new groups, “initial commitments to modernize the Act” included replacing the term “Aboriginal Peoples” with “Indigenous Peoples,” replacing “members of visible minorities” with “racialized people” and making the definition of “persons with disabilities” more inclusive.

Adelle Blackett, chair of the 12-member Employment Equity Act Review Task Force, said the recommendations were designed to address a lack of resources, consultation and understanding of how legislation should be applied.

Blackett noted that the report offered a framework to help workplaces identify and eradicate barriers to employment equity.

Nicolas Marcus Thompson, executive director of the Black Class Action Secretariat, a group that in 2020 filed a lawsuit against the federal government claiming systemic workplace discrimination against Black Canadians, said the commitment marked a “historic win” for workers.

He added this could not have been done without the work of the Black Class Action.

…….

Jason Bett of the Public Service Pride Network said that group “wholeheartedly” endorsed the report’s recommendation to designate Black people and 2SLGBTQIA+ people as designated groups under the Employment Equity Act.

“Our network has been actively engaged in the consultation process with the Employment Equity Review Task Force, and we are pleased to note our contribution to the report,” Bett said. “The PSPN is committed to collaborating on the effective implementation of the recommendations, contributing to a more inclusive and equitable employment landscape in the federal public service.”

Source: Advocates, union applaud legislative commitment for groups for Black, LGBTQ+ workers

Equally predictably, the National Post’s Jamie Sarkonak has criticized the analysis and recommendations (valid with respect to a separate category for Black public servants given that disaggregated data in both employment equity and public service surveys highlight that 2017-22 hiring, promotion and separation rates are stronger than many other visible minorities groups and indeed, not visible minorities: see ee-analysis-of-disaggregated-data-by-group-and-gender-2022-submission-1):

Why would the task force recommend a special category for Black people when the law already privileges visible minorities? The report writers largely cited history (slavery and segregation), as well as employment data. Drawing attention to hiring stats, it said that when comparing Black people to other visible minorities in the federal government, “representation between the period of job application, through automated screening, through organizational screening, assessment and ultimately appointment fell from 10.3 per cent down to 6.6 per cent.”

This analysis ignored the fact Black people, accounting for only four per cent of the population, apply and are hired at higher rates compared to Chinese (five per cent of the population) and Indian minorities (seven per cent). Because Black people are comparatively overrepresented in hiring, this should satisfy DEI mathematicians. The numbers also don’t explain why failed applicants were screened out: were these applicants simply unqualified?

The report also finds that Black employees from 2005 to 2018 had a negative promotion rate relative to non-Black employees — another non-proof of racism, because it’s possible those employees simply didn’t merit a promotion. Federal departments, noted the report writers, have nevertheless wanted to make up for these discrepancies by focusing their efforts on hiring Black people — but were unable to, because the diversity target law targets the broader “visible minorities” group.

The task force also pointed to Canada’s “distinct history of slavery,” abolished by the comparatively progressive British Empire in 1834 before Confederation, as another reason for special status

Slavery was objectively wrong, but it is much less clear why it should factor into special hiring considerations today. There were relatively few slaves in Canada and not all of them were Black. It would be notoriously difficult to determine who in Canada is still affected by this history — and impossible to hold others living today responsible. Additionally, the majority of Canada’s Black population is made up of immigrants who are unlikely to trace family lines back to enslaved Canadian ancestors.

Source: Jamie Sarkonak: Liberals to mandate reverse discrimination with job quotas for Black, LGBT people

Link to full report: A Transformative Framework to Achieve and Sustain Employment Equity – Report of the Employment Equity Act Review Task Force (on my reading list)

Filed under Aboriginal, LGBTQ, Multiculturalism Tagged with , , , , , , ,

Temporary Foreign Worker program sees 68% jump in approvals 

2023/04/01 Leave a comment

The absence of temporary residents from the annual departmental immigration plan becomes more and more untenable given how temporary workers and students form a larger number than new Permanent Residents, particularly given the impact on housing availability and affordability, healthcare and infrastructure:

Employers in Canada were approved to fill more than 220,000 positions through the Temporary Foreign Worker program last year, taking advantage of government decisions that broadened access to migrant labour.

TFW approvals jumped 68 per cent from 2021, according to a Globe and Mail analysis of figures recently published by Employment and Social Development Canada. Over the final three months of 2022, companies were authorized to hire nearly 69,000 positions through the TFW program – the most in a quarter since at least 2017.

The numbers reflect part of the hiring process: Foreign workers still need to get the appropriate permits to fill those positions.

Even so, the ESDC figures show that employer demand for temporary foreign labour is soaring at a time of near-record-low unemployment rates and elevated job vacancies.

Companies also benefited from an overhaul of the TFW program last spring, when the federal government increased employers’ access to low-wage labour, among other changes.

As businesses rush to use the TFW program, Canada is experiencing the largest population gains in decades. The country grew by slightly more than one million people in 2022, a 2.7-per-cent increase that was the most since 1957, according to a recent Statistics Canada report.

Temporary immigration was the primary driver of growth. In 2022, the number of non-permanent residents jumped by around 600,000 on a net basis, a record increase. This group includes international students, along with those temporary workers whose permits are issued outside of the TFW program.

In its report, Statscan said the federal government is deliberately courting more immigrants to boost the supply of labour as the country ages. However, the agency also noted: “A rise in the number of permanent and temporary immigrants could also represent additional challenges for some regions of the country related to housing, infrastructure and transportation, and service delivery to the population.”

In the fourth quarter, farms and food-processing plants were the largest sources of TFW approvals, which is usually the case. Over all, nearly 25,000 roles as general farm workers were authorized to be filled. Procyk Farms Ltd., of Wilsonville, Ont., received 599 approvals in the quarter, the most of any company.

Collectively, the restaurant industry was approved to hire thousands of people, including more than 3,100 cooks. Those employers included franchisees of Tim Hortons and McDonald’s Corp.

Other high-demand roles included truck drivers, construction workers and nurse aides.

The federal government said the expansion of the TFW program was meant to address a shortage of workers, something that companies have openly complained about for years.

In one of last year’s changes, companies are now able to employ 20 per cent of their staff through the low-wage stream of the TFW program, up from a previous 10-per-cent cap for most employers. In seven sectors with “demonstrated labour shortages,” such as restaurants and construction, the limit was temporarily set to 30 per cent. Earlier this week, Ottawa extended the 30-per-cent cap until late October.

However, many economists have criticized those moves, saying it helps companies avoid paying higher wages, and that it could lead to the exploitation of migrant workers, whose immigration status is tied to their employer.

“Unfortunately, we increasingly have a system where our temporary and permanent immigration systems are focused on the same objective – satisfying employers’ current labour needs,” economists Parisa Mahboubi and Mikal Skuterud wrote in a recent memo for the C.D. Howe Institute. “The risk is that the overall immigration system fails to do anything well.”

To hire a TFW, a company must submit a Labour Market Impact Assessment to the federal government, showing that they can’t find local workers to fill their open jobs. The ESDC figures refer to the number of roles that received positive assessments.

Most temporary foreign workers in Canada are not employed through the TFW program. At the end of 2022, there were more than one million active work permits in the International Mobility Program. This group includes a range of workers, such as company transfers from abroad. IMP permits have jumped by 193 per cent over the previous decade.

International students, who mostly don’t need work permits to secure employment in Canada, are a rapidly growing part of the labour force. At the end of last year, there were slightly more than 800,000 active study permits – nearly triple the volume from 10 years earlier.

Source: Temporary Foreign Worker program sees 68% jump in approvals

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Rejection letter ESDC sent to Black organizations ‘completely unacceptable’: Hussen

2021/01/18 Leave a comment

Oops!

Several Black organizations were denied federal funding through a program designed to help such groups build capacity — after Employment and Social Development Canada told them their leadership was not sufficiently Black.

Velma Morgan, the chair of Operation Black Vote, said her group received an email from the department on Tuesday saying their application did not show “the organization is led and governed by people who self-identify as Black.”

The department sent a second email the next day, saying their applications were not approved because it did not receive “the information required to move forward,” she said.

“As if we’re incompetent or foolish and we’re going to believe the second email over the original email,” Morgan said in an interview with The Canadian Press.

She said Operation Black Vote, a not-for-profit, multi-partisan organization that aims to get more Black people elected at all levels of government, is one of at least five Black organizations that were not approved for funding.

The program, called the Supporting Black Canadian Communities Initiative, provides funding to Canadian Black-led non-profit and charitable organizations to help them build capacity. The applications guidelines say at least two-thirds of the leadership and the governance structure must be people who self-identify as Black. The mandate of the organization must also be focused on serving Black communities.

Morgan said everyone on her team is Black. She also said the other organizations she knows about should also not have been rejected for the reason outlined in the first letter.

“If you’re from the Black community, you know that they’re Black-run and Black-focused,” she said.

Social Development Minister Ahmed Hussen said the initial letter his department sent to unsuccessful applicants was “completely unacceptable” and that he demanded a retraction as soon as he saw it.

In a thread on Twitter Thursday night, Hussen said he discussed with his department’s officials how such a mistake could have happened and implemented measures to make sure it does not happen again.

“I will continue to work with Black Canadian organizations to improve our systems,” said Hussen, who also mentioned the systemic barriers he has faced as Black person.

The department has not yet responded to a request for comment.

Morgan said the Liberal government should hire more Black people to sit at every decision-making table.

“This is an example of what happens when we don’t have representation,” Morgan said.

The Ontario Black History Society, a registered charity dedicated to study, preservation and promotion of Black history and heritage, is one of the groups that received both letters and had its application rejected. In an emailed statement, the organization said ESDC did not provide any reasons for why they were declined outside the two letters.

Former MP Celina Caesar-Chavannes, who left the Liberal caucus several months before the 2019 election to sit as an Independent, said many of the organizations she knows did not receive funding do not want to say anything publicly. She said they are worried speaking out will lead to the government denying them other funding chances.

“Why should these organizations be afraid of trying to speak up when something goes wrong?” said Caesar-Chavannes, who posted copies of the ESDC letters to Twitter after receiving them from the organizations that had received them.

“That’s the problem with how the government operates.”

Morgan said the letter also came after months of waiting, as her organization applied to get support to purchase equipment and retrofit its facilities in June. She said organizations were told they would get an answer in September but did not hear back until this week when they received the first letter.

“We hardly get any money from the government at all,” she said, while adding the rejection will not affect her group’s ability to operate.

“There are organizations that work with the most vulnerable in our community in terms of mental health or poverty, and those are the kinds of organizations that need the capacity funding.”

Caesar-Chavannes said that the number of organizations that contacted her has grown since she posted about the issue on Twitter.

“It’s dehumanizing that we have to keep proving (our Blackness.) How many different hurdles that we have to jump through?” she said.

Source: Rejection letter ESDC sent to Black organizations ‘completely unacceptable’: Hussen

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Growing number of newcomers, refugees ending up homeless in Canada: studies

2019/08/12 Leave a comment

Given the tight housing market and prices in larger cities, not surprising:

A growing number of newcomers to Canada are ending up in shelters or are finding themselves homeless, newly released government figures show.

Two new reports released this week by Employment and Social Development Canada offer a glimpse into the extent of the homelessness problem across the country and reveal the populations that are most vulnerable.

The national shelter study, which looked at federal data on shelter users between 2005 and 2016, found an “observable increase” in refugees using shelters.

In 2016, there were 2,000 refugees sleeping in shelters, not counting those facilities designated specifically for refugees — an increase from 1,000 just two years earlier when the figures first began to be tracked.

Tim Richter, president of the Canadian Alliance to End Homelessness, said he believes refugees are being forced to turn to homeless shelters because of a lack of housing capacity in areas where refugees are settling.

“Many of them are coming to Toronto in Ontario, and to Quebec, and in those communities, the rental market is just really tight and we just don’t have the capacity to house them,” Richter said.

“Homelessness is a function of housing affordability, availability and income. When you’re new to Canada, you generally won’t have the income to be able to buy a house, and there’s just not enough affordable housing options.”

Canada has been experiencing an influx of asylum seekers crossing into Canada “irregularly,” avoiding official checkpoints between the Canada-U.S. border in order to file for refugee protection without being turned away under Canada’s Safe Third Country Agreement with the U.S. Over 46,000 irregular border-crossers have been intercepted by RCMP since early 2017.

Many of them have been staying in Toronto and Montreal to await the outcome of their refugee claims, which has put pressure on temporary housing capacity in those cities.

The city of Toronto estimated in late 2018 that about 40 per cent of people using its shelters identified as refugees or asylum claimants. Other Ontario cities have been asked to help relocate refugees in order to ease the burden on Toronto’s shelter system.

Meanwhile, a second study released this week by Ottawa that offers a “point-in-time” snapshot of homelessness in 61 communities also noted a trend of homelessness among newcomers.

It found 14 per cent of people who identified as homeless in 2018 were newcomers to Canada. Of that total, eight per cent indicated they were immigrants, three per cent identified as refugees and four per cent as refugee claimants.

The point-in-time study captures not only those using shelters, but also people sleeping on the streets, in transitional houses or staying with others. The 2018 study expanded its counts from 32 communities in 2016 to 61 in 2018.

Both studies also found Canada’s Indigenous Peoples remain vastly over-represented among the country’s homeless population. Almost one-third of shelter users and those counted in the point-in-time report identified as Indigenous, despite making up only about five per cent of the national population.

It’s a consequence of multi-generational trauma endured by Indigenous populations in Canada, as outlined in the findings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the recently concluded inquiry into missing and murdered Indigenous women, Richter said.

“This will require specific focus and specific investment if we’re going to help these folks.”

For those who do find themselves without a home, either for short periods or for those who are chronically homeless, their realities are stark and can be deadly.

A memorial dedicated to homeless individuals who have died on the streets of Toronto currently lists close to 1,000 names. Many are identified only as “John Doe” with the date they died.

But Richter said he is hopeful that things will improvements for Canada’s homeless.

He pointed to figures in the national shelter study showing an decrease of nearly 20 per cent in the overall number of people who accessed shelters between 2005 and 2016. Occupancy rates have increased over that period of time, however, due to a rise in the length of time people were staying in homeless shelters.

But many jurisdictions have been taking the issue seriously and making significant improvements, Richter said, pointing to a decrease in chronic homeless numbers in places like the southern Ontario communities of Chatham-Kent, Guelph, Kawartha and Haliburton.

“We’re seeing that it is possible, and we know how to do it, it’s just a matter of getting on with it,” he said. “I’m hopeful that we are going to see, now, consistent and focused trends going in the opposite direction.”

Source: Growing number of newcomers, refugees ending up homeless in Canada: studies

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‘Barbaric cultural practices’ tip line dead, but other snitch lines have continued

2016/07/21 Leave a comment

Interesting. More smoke than fire in terms of the number of leads followed up and acted upon:

A small team in a secretive government office in the nation’s capital stands ready, 24/7, to hear from Canadians who want to squeal on their neighbours.

Working in 12-hour shifts, between two and four Canada Border Service Agency employees are assigned every day to monitor the agency’s Border Watch Tip Line, a creation of the Paul Martin Liberal government that gives Canadians a chance to report “suspicious immigration activity” to the government around the clock, in either official language.

“No information, however trivial it may seem, is too small,” according to the CBSA webpage for the tip line.

Most of those tips end up being deleted or filed away in government archives, as do those made to two of the government’s other immigration-related tip lines, according to statistics provided to The Hill Times by the federal government.

Many of the communications via the tip lines have actually been questions about how to file paperwork for visas or other routine and unrelated matters. Some are reports of illegal activity that falls outside of the CBSA’s jurisdiction—for example, financial fraud. Others simply don’t include enough information, or do include information “not substantiated” by database searches of CBSA officials, the agency says.

Many of the tips come from members of the public who suspect a business is employing illegal workers, a neighbour may be in Canada with an expired visa, or someone they know might be perpetrating marriage fraud, according to records from earlier this year obtained by The Hill Times.

Others read like the plot from an immigration-themed soap opera.

“Tipster called to report that her friends [sic] husband has sponsored another woman,” reads the summary of one tip received by the Border Watch Tip Line in January.

“Subject is legally divorced in Canada…but she believes that she is still married to her husband [censored] and would like to know if that is legal and if divorce in Canada also means divorce in the original country of marriage.”

That tipster was “advised that [the Border Watch Line] does not offer advice or information” on such matters and told to contact the federal Immigration Department.

Round-the-clock monitoring

Calls to the Border Watch Tip Line—1-888-502-9060—are fielded by officials at the CBSA’s Warrant Response Centre, a “24/7 operation” of 34 full-time CBSA employees who help officers from the CBSA’s regional offices and other law enforcement partners “throughout North America” to execute immigration warrants or look for previously deported persons, according to CBSA spokesperson Line Guibert-Wolff.

The Warrant Response Centre is located on the first floor of a CBSA building in the southeastern corner of Ottawa, but is not open to the public and does not receive tips in-person. The CBSA only confirmed the location of the centre, which it originally declined to disclose and which draws a $2.6-million annual budget, when it was identified by The Hill Times.

The Border Watch Tip Line yielded about 12,000 tips in 2015, though the CBSA took no action in response to about 65 per cent of those tips, according to information obtained through an access-to-information request.

When asked why the agency did not take action on those tips, Ms. Guibert-Wolff wrote that the tip line receives calls “that do not contain sufficient information, calls which are not substantiated by database queries, calls that contain duplicate information that were already referred to the appropriate section, and calls not pertaining to legislation enforced by the CBSA.”

Useful tips are forwarded to regional Immigration Department or CBSA offices for further action, and the CBSA does not track the results, wrote Ms. Guibert-Wolff.

Those regional offices determine the best course of action, which can include further checks of government databases, or referral to other authorities for investigation, in which case “it may be several years” before any results are achieved, wrote Ms. Guibert-Wolff.

Different lines, same tips

Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship Canada and Employment and Social Development Canada each operate their own online tip-reporting systems; one is intended for suspected citizenship fraud and the other for misuse of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program.

Of 457 tips emailed to IRCC’s citizenship fraud email address during the month of January 2016, 37 were forwarded to the CBSA or Immigration Department offices for further action, while 59 that were classified as spam or duplicates were deleted, and 355 were filed away with no action taken. The six remaining were still pending review as of May, according to information obtained through an access-to-information request. An access-to-information official did not respond to a follow-up question seeking information on why no action was taken on many of the emails.

The 37 tips that were forwarded for further action were split between the 18 government offices or departments, including the CBSA, immigration case processing centres and visa offices everywhere from Lima, Peru to Islamabad, Pakistan.

Subject lines of those emails—the only portion the department disclosed—suggested that tips to the citizenship fraud email address were very similar to those made through the Border Watch Tip Line, including suspicion of people working in Canada illegally, living in Canada illegally, marriage fraud, as well as a handful of emails unrelated to the purpose of the tip line.

“Person currently harbouring an alien immigrant/illegal temporary foreign worker,” reads one; “victim of fraud after marriage,” reads another.

Employment and Social Development Canada also operates a tip line and online fraud reporting tool for people who want to report suspected abuses of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program.

A July, 2015 press release from ESDC said the department had received “thousands of complaints” at that point since the tip line and online reporting tool were launched in April and June 2014 respectively.

A sample of the TFWP tips received online during the months of October and November of 2015, acquired through an access-to-information request, shows that ESDC was acting on about 23 per cent of the tips it had received.

Source: ‘Barbaric cultural practices’ tip line dead, but other snitch lines have continued

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Public servants scramble to fill data deficit on Liberals’ priorities

2016/06/23 Leave a comment

Understandable given difficult cut choices recommended by the public service and approved at the political level (with the previous government’s anti-evidence and anti-data bias), with predictable impact on the quality of analysis:

If Prime Minister Justin Trudeau really is a data geek, he couldn’t have been encouraged by what some federal departments had on hand.

Internal documents obtained by the Star suggest years of belt tightening has led to a data deficit in Ottawa, gaps that may “create challenges” in delivering on the Liberal government’s priorities.

Early childhood learning and child care, expanding parental leave, increasing youth employment, and expanding training for apprentices and post-secondary students all figured prominently in the Liberals’ election platform.

But as of November, the department responsible for making good on those promises was worried they didn’t have enough concrete data to deliver.

“Spending on surveys has been reduced over the last several fiscal years and has been concentrated on priority areas to help manage financial pressures,” read documents prepared for the senior public servant at Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC).

The Liberals have made “evidence-based decision-making” a watchword for their early days in office, and senior staff in the Prime Minister’s Office are known for their attachment to data-driven strategy.

A spokesperson for Families, Children and Social Development Minister Jean-Yves Duclos said the issue is government-wide, not isolated in their department.

“This is an issue that all ministers are facing right now. We do know that there are gaps in the data the government owns,” Mathieu Filion told the Star in an email.

“There are many discussions on the matter with different minister’s offices as to see what will be done to acquire more data.”

According to the November documents, Statistics Canada was largely preoccupied with the restoration of the long-form census, but had identified a number priority files.

Along with ESDC, StatsCan was looking to revive “longitudinal surveys” to fill in gaps. Longitudinal surveys are more expensive and time consuming than other methods of collecting data, but the documents suggest they can give greater insight into “the dynamics of life events” and have a greater payoff when continued over a number of years.

StatsCan’s wish list includes greater labour market information (specifically aboriginal participation, unpaid internships, temporary foreign workers, and worker mobility), better information on children’s physical and mental health development, and more data on Canada’s aging population and the resulting effect on the economy and the health-care system.

The agency says the digital economy remains largely in the dark, as well.

“The use of digital technologies is an important and growing phenomenon and stakeholders are increasingly demanding statistical products to address questions on the topic,” the documents read.

“While the agency has been doing some feasibility work on Internet use by children, the incidence of cybercrime amongst Canadian businesses, and has developed some questions for the inclusion in various surveys, there remain important data gaps.”

ESDC is also interested in learning more about Canadians’ “computer literacy” and use of the Internet.

Source: Public servants scramble to fill data deficit on Liberals’ priorities | Toronto Star

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