Recent Labour Market Comments

Nov. 24 Construction Sector Presentation:

A Discussion ensued on the following topics:
· Incentives being used in the “oil patch” such as signing bonuses and job completion bonuses;
· Recruiting outside the country, in the past Canadian labour has been sought after around the world and now the market is such that Canada is seeking labour. This was identified as a normal trend in the world economy.
· Need to promote trades in the high schools by educators and employers;
· Employers are currently recruiting labour out of the high school;
· Need to have local trades training so that students are not distracted by out of town socializing while attending technical institutes. Comment that the educators providing trades training are not providing long enough class times during the day to keep students focused on the training and to keep the time needed to complete training to a minimum. Experienced trades people are saying that current trades courses offer 5.5 hours of class time per day and in years past students were offered 8 hours of class room instruction.

We would like some comment from those who have recently attended trades training to find out if student work load is appropriate or if training time could be reduced by having more instruction each day.

Do those attending trades training programs have lots of opportunity to socialize because trades training workloads are too light?