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HALIFAX, TUESDAY, APRIL 10, 2007
SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE WHOLE HOUSE ON SUPPLY
4:04 P.M.
CHAIRMAN
MR. CHAIRMAN: Order please. We will begin with the closing remarks by the Minister of Energy.
The honourable Minister of Energy.
HON. WILLIAM DOOKS: Mr. Chairman, I thank the committee for the opportunity to speak for the last five hours on estimates.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Shall Resolution E6 stand?
Resolution E6 stands.
We will recess until we get the next department up which will be Immigration.
[4:05 p.m. The subcommittee recessed.]
[4:16 p.m. The subcommittee reconvened.]
MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. We'll call the meeting to order.
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Resolution E17 - Resolved, that a sum not exceeding $28,012,000 be granted to the Lieutenant Governor to defray expenses in respect of the Executive Council, pursuant to the Estimate, the Public Service Commission and the Office of Immigration.
MR. CHAIRMAN: We welcome the Minister of Immigration and ask for her opening comments.
HON. CAROLYN BOLIVAR-GETSON: Mr. Chairman, it is my honour to be here today to address the Subcommittee of the Whole House on Supply as it considers estimates for 2007-2008. Today I will be providing opening remarks and responding to committee questions about the six government portfolios for which I am responsible. These include the Nova Scotia Office of Immigration, Human Resources and the Public Service Commission, Emergency Management Office, the Advisory Council on the Status of Women, Senior Citizens' Secretariat and the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation.
With me today are a number of staff members whom I would like to introduce. Rosalind Penfound, Deputy Minister for the Office of Immigration, the Advisory Council on the Status of Women, and Commissioner for the Public Service Commission. Some others who will be joining us later, Elizabeth Mills, Executive Director of Office of Immigration; Craig MacLaughlan, CEO of Emergency Management Office; Maureen O'Connell, who will be joining us from the Advisory Council on the Status of Women; Heather Praught, Coordinator for the Senior Citizens' Secretariat; and Greg Beaulieu from NSLC, as well as several other support staff who are with us today.
Mr. Chairman, with all due respect to you, the committee, to the staff who have joined me today and to those who are following these proceedings I ask that following my opening remarks, questions be focused on one department at a time. Firstly, the Nova Scotia Office of Immigration.
Mr. Chairman, let me start with the Nova Scotia Office of Immigration. The importance of immigration as a means of growing Nova Scotia's economy is becoming increasingly more apparent. As statistics released recently by the federal government indicated, population gains across the country by 2030 will likely be based solely on immigration.
Our government's immigration strategy, designed to attract and retain immigrants who can contribute to Nova Scotia's economy and thereby securing Nova Scotia's future, is more important than ever before. As outlined in the strategy, our aim is to increase the number of newcomers to our province from 1,474 in 2003 to 3,600 arrivals by 2010.
Mr. Chairman, I am pleased to report that we are well on target with meeting this objective. Since 2003, we have seen a 66 per cent increase in the number of new immigrants
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arriving in Nova Scotia. The Nova Scotia Nominee Program we introduced in that same year is credited by the federal government with contributing significantly to this increase. In 2006, we issued the maximum number of nomination certificates we were allowed under our federal agreement. This year, we aim to remove the numeric limit as we negotiate a new nominee agreement with the Government of Canada.
We still have a long way to go, yet we have made significant strides. As important as attracting newcomers to our province is, so too is getting individuals to stay in Nova Scotia once they have landed. Lack of access to meaningful employment is a primary reason behind an immigrant's decision to leave Nova Scotia. That is why we have focused much energy this year promoting the benefits of immigration to Nova Scotia businesses. I hosted a number of forums across the province with CEOs and other senior business leaders to promote immigration as a means of addressing labour market issues and to identify potential barriers to hiring immigrants. The information is being compiled now and an action plan will be distributed to participants in the next few months. The experiences and insights these seasoned professionals shared with us will help to shape the province's future programs and policies.
It takes courage to leave your birthplace behind and start over in a new land where the culture and language are not always familiar. Promoting a welcoming community for newcomers is a key part of our immigration strategy and a significant component of our work as we work with businesses and communities.
A few months ago, we began a series of information sessions with regional development authorities and local business and development organizations to discuss the benefits of immigration and the importance of promoting welcoming communities. These sessions will continue in the months ahead. We also hosted round tables with women immigrants, including one with Her Excellency, the Governor General, in February to identify the unique issues immigrant women face in integrating comfortably in their new homeland.
On July 1st, the Nova Scotia Office of Immigration assumed full operational responsibility for the Nominee Program and Mr. Chairman, I will take this opportunity to thank the Immigration staff whose commitment to our immigration goals and their long hours made this transition a very successful one. It was during this time that we also introduced a family business worker category to the Nominee Program. The new stream requires both a guaranteed job offer and a close family relationship, thereby directly supporting our efforts as a province to help newcomers succeed here and remain here.
As I indicated earlier, retention is a priority for us. In the next few weeks, we will officially introduce yet another stream, this one for international graduates. In 2004-05 alone, there were almost 3,600 international students attending Nova Scotia universities and the
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community colleges. Some of these students want to stay and work in the province after they graduate and we want to help make that happen.
The introduction of both streams is a direct response to what we heard from Nova Scotians during consultations on the immigration strategy. This Fall, we will unveil a redesigned economic category with entrepreneurial focus. Our aim is to eliminate application fees in this category, similar to what we were able to do last year for new applicants under our skilled worker and community identified streams. Because the economic category is under review, we are not accepting applications for it. However, we are still accepting applications from business owners and operators who want to serve as mentors to nominees.
The business mentor component holds many opportunities for owners and managers who want to address their company's labour market needs, who want to build their markets internationally and who want to capitalize on the ideas and business thinking that individuals from other cultures may provide. This year, we will see the Office of Immigration aggressively promote this aspect of the program and work with local businesses to secure these opportunities.
The 2007-08 budget for the Office of Immigration, if approved, will be $3.7 million; representing a $438,000 increase over last year's budget. As in previous years, the bulk of our budget will go toward settlement and integration funding to help new immigrants integrate successfully into their new homeland We will also continue to partner with employers experiencing skill shortages, thereby maximizing our attraction and retention efforts. The additional dollars will enable the office to recruit two program development officers and a financial manager to assist us with these efforts and respond to the growing number of immigrants who want to live and work in our province.
Mr. Chairman, it is my honour now to turn to Human Resources and the Public Service Commission budget, its programs and services and progress with the government's Corporate Human Resource Plan. This government has introduced a $6.9 billion budget. We continue to invest in high quality health care, education, social services and many other programs in Nova Scotia's communities. These programs, services and new initiatives could not be possible without the people who plan for them and deliver them. A strong Public Service is essential if we are to establish Nova Scotia as a globally competitive marketplace where innovation abounds and where individuals, families and communities thrive.
A strong Public Service is what we have today and what we must maintain in the future. It is the role of the Public Service Commission to establish human resource programs, policies and strategies to ensure that people are treated fairly and respectfully and are encouraged to pursue successful and challenging careers in the Public Service.
Mr. Chairman, as you can appreciate, the Public Service Commission does its work within a dynamic and challenging human resource environment and I am proud to say that
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we are addressing these challenges head on under the direction of the five-year Corporate Human Resource Plan launched in the Spring of 2005.
The Corporate Human Resource Plan lays out five key roles: to make a difference through a skilled, committed and accountable Public Service; to be a preferred employer; to be a safe and supportive workplace; to be a diverse workforce; and to be a learning organization. With this plan we have a clear path to 2010.
Year after year we are making progress and so far, two years in, we have a list of accomplishments that I would be pleased to talk about at any time. At last count, 21 of the 28 planned activities are either in progress or completed. Last year the commission made significant gains in healthy workplace, diversity management, recruitment marketing, human resource planning, recognition, succession management, training and development, human resource policy development and information technology that supports human resource management.
In fact, I would like to mention one key business plan goal that was achieved last week. The Government of Nova Scotia has received first level national certification for healthy workplace. Nova Scotia is the first Canadian jurisdiction to receive this certification and we are extremely proud of our Public Service leaders and employees who help make this happen. As you can tell, we have a great deal of momentum going into the 2007-08 budget year.
The Public Service Commission, along with line departments and human resource partners, will continue to advance the five goals of the Corporate Human Resource Plan. This year our priorities include: to strengthen human resource service delivery; to provide leadership in the implementation of additional SAP HR system functionality; to support government's human resource management practices; to develop an integrated approach to talent management; to implement attraction and retention strategies; to assure the availability of objective, consistent and reliable compensation and classification systems and practices; to implement elements of the Healthy Workplace Program; and to promote a strong focus on our diversity initiatives.
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The Public Service Commission will also continue to fulfill its role with regard to collective bargaining. This coming year will include bargaining with the NSGEU for government's unionized civil servants as well as a continuation of negotiations for correctional workers employed by the Department of Justice. Mr. Chairman, we are pleased to be part of a government that recognizes public servants and we will continue to recognize their contributions. This ends my remarks for Human Resources and the Public Service Commission.
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I'll now turn to the Advisory Council on the Status of Women. The Advisory Council on the Status of Women is coming into its 30th Anniversary year. As the government's agency that promotes equality, fairness and dignity for women in this province, they will focus on work to ensure that women have an equal voice in society, fair play and pensions, freedom from violence and good health and well-being. Key projects for the coming year reflect the issues faced by women in Nova Scotia and government's own priorities.
This year, 30 women will gain the skills and knowledge they need for electoral success at the non-partisan Campaign School for Women. The increased inclusion of women in political roles improves the abilities of all levels of government to better reflect the communities they serve. The advisory council and partners held round table discussions last year with women with disabilities in three communities across this province. The council will share the insights and suggestions gained with appropriate government departments and the public. The needs of women with disabilities can be forgotten or overlooked and working with them to better include them strengthens their self-sufficiency.
Making Changes, a handbook for women in abusive relationships, has been updated again, this time with the addition of information to support those closest to the woman - her family and friends. Women who are abused will often first talk to their families and friends before they report it to the police. The new chapter of Making Changes better equips families and friends to help their loved one protect herself and possibly her children. The council will also continue to work with First Nations partners to develop culturally appropriate responses to abuse in aboriginal communities.
Council's work on caregiving also continues as the Healthy Balance Research Program spends a year communicating about the impact of caregiving on Nova Scotians and the implications for governments, employers and families. Achieving economic equality for women continues to be a driving force for the council. Council has initiatives to enhance and expand employment opportunities for women in Nova Scotia. Advancing the inclusion of women in trades and technology is a long-term goal of the council which supports a globally competitive business climate and reflects government's desire to create those conditions here at home.
The Nova Scotia Advisory Council on the Status of Women is meeting the needs of women through the many and varied projects it delivers. Communities and community organizations across the province demonstrate support for the advisory council's work every year. The advisory council and staff are gratified to bring forward the aspirations and concerns of women to government and other partners.
Mr. Chairman, the Emergency Management Office is one of Nova Scotia's great success stories. In fact, I was only two days into the portfolio when I met with my federal counterpart and my other counterparts from across Canada and I realized pretty quickly that we have an excellent reputation across the country when it comes to emergency management:
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a first of its kind 911 program; top-notch emergency management training programs; the only fully integrated joint emergency operations centre in Canada, with municipal, provincial and federal officials working together to plan and conduct exercises; an operations centre that truly brings emergency management into the 21st Century, the digital era, with software common to the leading agencies across North America; and the only province to have a full-time military liaison officer on the EMO management team and working full-time in the operations centre.
I can tell you it is a great feeling to hear other Canadians say, how do you make it work in Nova Scotia? What's the secret? If there is a secret, it is that we have the right people in place with a clear vision for excellence in emergency management, people who have learned that the expertise and passion for public safety isn't found in someone else's backyard, it is right here in Nova Scotia.
I'll give you two quick examples. The overall of our 911 technology - a $2.5 million project that supports digital mapping to make sure first responders get to the scene as quickly as humanly possible, and we must continue to keep pace with the rapid changes in cellphone and voice-over Internet protocol services. The second example was the expertise that went into our Nova Scotia bid for technology funding for all of our volunteer ground search and rescue teams. Not only was the National Search and Rescue Secretariat impressed with how thorough our proposal was, but they approved it and will invest $348,000 over three years - funding that will link our volunteer search teams by satellite to EMO at the joint emergency operations centre. It will mean more effective search management and better coordination with other jurisdictions that work on joint operations, just two examples among many of the initiative and professionalism that we have right here.
The EMO budget will increase this year as we offer new and expanded training programs, including one for persons with disabilities. We are also investing in satellite technology and training to bring live audio and video feeds from disaster sites back to the operations centre. This is real time information that will give decision makers the absolute best information at hand. We're also just on the verge of training departmental emergency preparedness officers in the new E Team software, the same software used by New York during the 911 tragedy and which many countries have used during hurricanes and other major events.
EMO will develop a made-in-Nova Scotia public alerting strategy. There is no national public alerting system so we'll do it ourselves and explore every possible avenue to enhance public alerting capabilities. I was pleased to see a few weeks ago that the CRTC is more open to a process known as reverse 911. Though the details need to be worked out, our vision is that reverse 911 would allow emergency agencies to make simultaneous phone calls to thousands of households and businesses. For example, if we found out a tsunami was going to hit the South Shore at 3:00 a.m., a phone call would be the quickest way to notify
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the public. We will also engage Nova Scotia broadcasters to seek their input and co-operation.
Before leaving EMO, I'll mention just a few other areas that are priorities this year. First, developing standards for emergency management in Nova Scotia, developing standards for ground search and rescue teams and also further assistance to provincial departments, agencies, boards and commissions with their business continuity planning. CEO Craig MacLaughan will co-host the deputies' meeting in Ottawa in June, then the national meeting of federal-provincial-territorial ministers in January 2008. As if that's not enough, Nova Scotia, as Canadian co-chair of the International Emergency Management Group, has been asked to host the group's 2008 annual meeting. This senior planning group is made up of the Atlantic Provinces, Quebec and the six states along the Northeastern Seaboard.
We now offer bilingual service to Nova Scotians and will also produce more public awareness materials for francophone Nova Scotians. EMO will introduce a new self-assessment tool to help municipalities measure the effectiveness of their response and recovery plans. Our regional staff in Kentville, Truro, Lunenburg and Sydney will continue to work closely with their municipal emergency measures coordinators and we will play a prominent role in the promotion of the national 72-hours promotional campaign to mark Emergency Preparedness Week in Canada, from May 6th to 12th. I know the management team is focused on clear goals that support our mutual interest in safe communities.
So, Mr. Chairman, that's a quick overview. I want to thank all the staff at the Emergency Management Office for their assistance and their dedication. I also want to acknowledge the continued collaboration between EMO and its many advisory committees. It's that kind of relationship-building that pays huge dividends when emergencies strike, and we're certainly doing it right.
Mr. Chairman, the next department I will talk about is the seniors. As Minister of Seniors and Chair of the Seniors' Secretariat, it gives me great pleasure to now speak on the Seniors' Secretariat and our plans for the new Department of Seniors. First, let me say that the committee of seven Cabinet Ministers that make up the Seniors' Secretariat will remain a vital part of the new department. With its 27-year history and across-department approach that remains the envy of many provinces, our government recognizes the benefits of the secretariat structure but we also believe much more can be achieved and we have not only acknowledged the important role that seniors play in our province, we have elevated it.
The new department will continue to uphold the core operations of the Seniors' Secretariat, which seniors and their families have come to rely on, but by creating a department, our government is furthering the implementation of our Strategy for Positive Aging in Nova Scotia, for serving the needs of seniors today, as well as planning for Nova Scotia's aging population. We are raising the profile of this important work and we are strengthening the voice of seniors in Nova Scotia - today's seniors and tomorrow's seniors.
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Our government has made a strong commitment to implementing the Strategy for Positive Aging, a commitment that will enable the new department to carry out initiatives that will make the biggest impact on the quality of life for aging Nova Scotians and the future of our communities, a commitment that is solidly backed by $150,000 in funding dedicated to the work and an investment of $800,000 dedicated to the creation of the new Department of Seniors.
The Seniors' Secretariat has established an interdepartmental working group that has been tasked with creating the government's action plan for positive aging but this doesn't mean that taking action on these important initiatives will be put on hold until the plan is completed later this year. In fact, our government has already made significant progress in key priority areas, including, among others, expanding continuing care, palliative care and seniors' mental health services, creating safer communities, preventing elder abuse, improving access to French language services and supporting volunteerism.
I will take this opportunity to highlight the priorities of the Department of Seniors for the 2007-08 fiscal year and discuss how they plan to advance the goals. The work of the department this year will focus on creating winning conditions by promoting the contributions that increased numbers of older workers can make to the global competitiveness of Nova Scotia's business climate and workforce. Because our government strongly believes in the values of both paid and unpaid work, I also want to emphasize that retiring baby boomers represent a very large pool of highly skilled, capable and active volunteers. The department will therefore work with a wide range of partners to increase awareness about the benefits of recruiting and retaining older workers and it will develop tools to assist not-for-profit organizations in creating volunteer opportunities that are attractive to the interests of baby boomers.
Building for individuals, families and communities in the new Nova Scotia has focused our government's priorities on ensuring Nova Scotians are healthy and active, have access to services and live in vibrant communities. By planning and preparing now for the near doubling of Nova Scotia's senior population over the next two decades, our Strategy for Positive Aging recognizes that we have an extraordinary opportunity to empower citizens to arrive at their senior years in better health and more engaged in community life.
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In 2007-08, the department will work with its many partners to promote the importance of healthy, active living and life-long learning for seniors. Specifically, it will participate in initiatives to increase physical activity levels among seniors, prevent falls, improve health literacy and promote positive attitudes about aging in Nova Scotia. By adopting an age-friendly communities approach to community development, the work of the Department of Seniors will also emphasize the importance of providing a wide range of programs, services and housing options that ensure seniors are able to maintain dignity and
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functional independence for as long as possible. Age-friendly communities engage seniors in activities that contribute to their quality of life, promote self-sufficiency and encourage connections.
This year, the department will continue to collaborate in age-friendly initiatives and research already underway with the support of the World Health Organization, the Public Health Agency of Canada and the Federal-Provincial-Territorial Ministers Responsible for Seniors Forum. In 2007-08, as the department carries out the actions within the strategy for positive aging, it will engage partners in developing a unique volunteer program that connects human needs with the human resources currently sitting idle in communities across Nova Scotia. We are very excited about the potential for the innovative approach because it strengthens a sense of community by valuing people for their contributions.
As well, our government also recognizes the importance of addressing the needs of frail and isolated seniors and providing the range of supports that are needed to accommodate changes in mobility and care requirements. Implementing actions that pertain to housing will also lead to greater promotion of existing incentive programs which have a huge potential for growing local investment in supportive housing projects while strengthening our communities.
With respect to enhancing the safety of our communities, seniors - like all age groups - need assurance that they can age without fear in an environment that is free from danger and exploitation. For this reason, the issue of elder abuse will remain a priority in the coming year. The Department of Seniors will continue implementing the Elder Abuse Awareness and Prevention Strategy by launching an education and awareness campaign focused on awareness and education of financial abuse of older adults. As well, we will continue to liaise with community and policing agencies to promote initiatives such as telephone reassurance programs and emergency preparedness plans.
So as you can see, the new Department of Seniors has a very busy year ahead. The Strategy for Positive Aging reflects the direct input of more than 1,000 citizens of the province, most of them seniors. Because of their insights and experiences, we are now able to clearly define and respond to the priorities of aging Nova Scotians. Because of their insights and experiences, we are able to focus on initiatives that are critical building blocks for the future and we are able to identify the linkages across government that allow us to develop creative ways to bring together programs, departments and partners to work on innovative, cost-effective solutions. Because of their insights and experiences and the importance of this work, our government has invested more. We have created the new Department of Seniors.
I look forward to the department making a great deal of progress in 2007-08 and I am confident that we will move many steps closer to achieving the strategy's vision of Nova
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Scotia as an inclusive society of caring communities that supports the well-being of seniors and values their contributions.
Mr. Chairman, I will move on to my last portfolio, that being the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation. In 2001, when our current Premier was responsible for the NSLC, the government made a significant change to the mandate and structure of the NSLC. The NSLC was changed from a commission to a Crown Corporation with major amendments to the Liquor Control Act. I think it is important for us, in the context of this year's budget, to reflect on the incredible success of this change. Going from commission to Crown Corporation was not just a name change, it was a fundamental restructuring of the NSLC designed to make it more responsive to customers, more profitable, and more effective as a business. We changed the NSLC's mandate to give it a commercial mandate requiring it to operate as a modern retail business, and we put in place a board of directors to ensure that the business was being run and governed to the highest standards, as required by many private-sector companies.
In order to understand how this year's business plan for the corporation fits into the long-term strategy for the organization, let's look at the results to date. In the 10 years before we made these changes, the NSLC sales increased from 14 per cent or $47 million. Since becoming a Crown Corporation with a commercial mandate, in only six years NSLC has increased by $135 million or 36 per cent.
For the first time in the NSLC history, at the end of this March the NSLC will have sold $0.5 billion worth of product, but that's not all. Since becoming a commercial business, the NSLC has returned to the government 31 per cent more profit than it did in the year before it became a Crown Corporation. From an accumulative perspective, that means over the last six years the NSLC has contributed $1 billion towards the government's efforts to improve education, health care, and other crucial government services. By comparison, in the six years prior to these changes being made, the NSLC's contribution was $750 million, more than $250 million less than they have contributed under this government.
Given this record performance financially, how has the NSLC improved service to Nova Scotians? In the last three years they have renovated over half of the stores in this province, with innovative partnerships with Sobeys and Superstore. More than $50 million in capital expenditure came at no cost to the taxpayer while increasing the return to the shareholder - this is a public policy at its best.
Now if you think that this has been done at the expense of a social responsibility mandate, you would be wrong. Today the NSLC is spending ten times what it did before becoming a Crown Corporation on the promotion of social responsibility, and they are doing it effectively. Last year the Retail Council of Canada, which represents all retailers in Canada, including the private sector, recognized the NSLC with the Best Social Responsibility Program in Canada Award for their Christmas 2005 anti-drinking and driving
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campaign. Just last week, the NSLC's 2006 Christmas campaign of unique ways to get home safely was awarded a silver for public service television ads and the award for the best casting of all TV commercials in Canada last year at the National Marketing Awards.
So this year's business plan as part of the budget sees the NSLC forecasting an additional $21 million in sales and an additional $9 million in profit. This means the NSLC is expecting to sell $527 million of product and return $197 million in profit to the government. The 2007-2008 fiscal year for the NSLC represents the third year of their five-year strategic plan. This plan calls for the customer experience at the NSLC to change from a place to buy a product into a place to shop and browse. They are well on their way to achieving this goal - the NSLC's customer research shows that more than eight out of every ten NSLC customers rates the service at 8, 9, or 10, on a scale of 10. In fact, last year when rated against all retailers in the province, from grocery stores to electronic stores and from clothing stores to home improvement stores, the NSLC was rated by Nova Scotians as ranking fifth as a top shopping experience.
This same five-year strategy plan sets the NSLC's profit target for 2010 at $215 million - this is a $45 million improvement over the year before the plan was put in place. This year's business plan puts them at $197 million in the third year of that five-year plan, so they are well on their way to meeting their financial commitments to the province. This year's plan outlines many initiatives that they will employ to get them there and improve customer service. These include an expansion of the product offerings in the wine category; improved service to restaurants and other licensed businesses; continued improvement to their store designs through renovation and innovation; increased staff training and product knowledge to provide greater customer assistance; and new technologies and business processes to increase the efficiency of the business.
Mr. Chairman, for anyone who has been in an NSLC store over the past two years, they will no doubt see that this is not your grandfather's liquor commission. The NSLC, as a corporation, as a commercial business, is now a leading retail business in Canada, one which Nova Scotians not only can enjoy but can be proud of.
Mr. Chairman, that brings my opening comments to conclusion. I thank you and the committee for your attention, and I am now pleased to respond to any questions. I would like to start with the Department of Immigration.
MR. CHAIRMAN: The honourable member for Halifax Citadel.
MR. LEONARD PREYRA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I thank the minister for her very thorough opening remarks. I found it to be a very helpful overview, particularly in my critic area of Immigration.
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Before I begin, I want to say that it's been a real pleasure working with Elizabeth Mills, who is just moving up to the chair now, and also Carmelle d'Entremont, whom I have also been working with. I have been very impressed with their professionalism and particularly in dealing with the many cases that we have had to bring forward. I should acknowledge our principal researcher, Lorraine Glendenning is here as well - she has prepared me for this session and any weaknesses in this are all mine.
Let me start with just a few general comments about immigration. We had an Economic Development Committee meeting this morning and Community Counts were being released and just by coincidence there was a lot of data released about immigration itself. I was surprised. I hadn't looked at it that carefully, but we looked in particular at the 2006 census data for Canada, preliminary data that was just released last month, and the Nova Scotia population is pretty well stagnant.
Where the rest of the country has seen growth of about 5.4 per cent in its population, we really haven't grown that much; 14 of the province's 18 counties have lost population and our overall share of the national population has dropped from 3.03 per cent in 2001 to 2.89 per cent. As the minister knows, this has a pretty significant impact on a whole range of things, not to mention transfer payments and taxation and access to skilled workers - and I want to talk a little bit about that before asking specific questions about the immigration policy itself.
In that data is even more worrying data about rural out-migration - places like Guysborough County, which have been depopulated. The demographics have shifted as well - the population in Guysborough County has aged quite significantly, at least in terms of what the data shows; the number of people migrating to the West, Alberta in particular, and Ontario, the proportion in that group of the numbers who are skilled workers and young workers; and also the problem of retaining immigrants, that data shows that we haven't been terribly successful in keeping those immigrants who we brought here, even though we have been relatively successful in bringing people here.
So I just present that as general information. It shows that this is a very important department and demographics is probably the most important component to public policy that we are dealing with these days. I look at the resources devoted to the department and the challenges that it faces and I'm surprised at that gap, and in particular I'm surprised that such an important department, despite the competence of the minister and the people she has working with her, that you would have six different government agencies, boards, and now a Crown Corporation under your wing. I think that, too, is something to be noted.
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I want to start by focusing on the question of settlement, integration and retention. I was at an event last night at a seniors' home and I met a woman from Afghanistan, Farsi-
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speaking. She was in this large group of seniors and she had absolutely no way of communicating. She was sitting there smiling and it occurred to me that's a problem that we are encountering everywhere, particularly in rural Nova Scotia, our seeming inability to accommodate people who speak different languages. I'm wondering what plans you have in place for English as a second language in rural areas. There was an earlier report about the lack of English as a second language training in high schools, for example . . .
MR. CHAIRMAN: Excuse me. Could you pull the mic a little closer to you or speak into it a little - pull it a little closer.
MR. PREYRA: Is that better?
MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you very much.
MR. PREYRA: All right. Here we go. So my question really is, what is happening with English as a second language? It seems to be a real problem and I think it may well lie at the core of our inability to retain immigrants, particularly retaining immigrants in rural areas. Do you have a plan in place? I know you mentioned that there was more money for it, but do you have more than a money plan?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: English as a second language is handled by the Department of Education, in the school systems. You're talking more specifically with the senior population, I believe, when you address that question. Now, having said that, there are a variety of settlement organizations that do offer English as a second language support to various individuals or groups of individuals, and MISA provides a lot of these opportunities to individuals and they do go outside of the metropolitan area.
MR. PREYRA: That's part of my question. I looked at the estimates, the actual figures, and it seems to me that the department just transfers money to the Department of Education but there isn't any feedback loop there as to what happens with the money, what are the outcomes, how well are we doing, who gets these resources and things like that. All I see in the estimates is a transfer of money, just as I see a transfer of money to MISA. But I'm wondering if there's a policy to see whether that money is effectively spent and whether or not it is having a problem in retention. Particularly with this woman I met last night, it seems to me that women and girls in particular, in some immigrant groups, have a real challenge of adjusting because of their lack of exposure to these resources.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The transfer of funds to the Department of Education, again, is for students who are in our school systems and that is based on the percentage of students who are in a certain area, and the school boards are given the appropriate funding based on the amount of students who are there. I know that my own school board home receives some of these dollars and it's divided up to assist these students in settling into their new communities. As I said before, there is approximately $1.8 million in total that goes to
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settlement funding from the Department of Immigration to a variety of stakeholders in the province. Every proposal that's brought forward to the department is evaluated, and we do receive more proposals than we're able to meet the needs, but I will say that we do a lot of unique proposals and opportunities throughout the province, and geographically we do try to spread those out as well.
MR. PREYRA: I must say the Metropolitan Immigrant Settlement Association does a wonderful job, not just in language training but also in adjusting people to the work world here. It's not meant as a criticism of them, it's more a question of what types of review mechanisms are built into the system itself.
I had a similar question about child care, which also seems to be a problem for working families, access to child care. I know that's principally, again, the responsibility of another department, but is there any kind of oversight? You know, it seems to me that we bring a lot of immigrants here and we just dump them into this large pool and say some other department is now responsible for you. I think when we have a retention rate of only 40 per cent, we've got to be doing better than that and I'm wondering if there is anything in place that you have for that.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Yes, Citizenship and Immigration Canada takes the lead on that and they do fund language training through MISA. They provide child care at that point in time, so Citizenship and Immigration Canada does provide child care services for the programs that are offered through MISA.
MR. PREYRA: But we seem to have a number of discrete silos in this area. There isn't that much integration in terms of policy-making for these groups that are coming. A lot of people, like this Afghani woman who speaks only Farsi, are really falling between the cracks, so they're sitting in isolation somewhere and, at least from the Community Counts data I saw this morning, they're leaving after a brief period of time.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Well, I will say that the province committed an additional $500,000 last year in the budget for settlement funding and we continue to support that. Our goal is to reach a 70 per cent retention rate and we will do whatever it takes to get to that 70 per cent retention rate. We do recognize that we have to look at all the programs that we are sponsoring through our organizations across the province but, again, on a note about MISA, MISA is definitely one of the leading organizations in this province and they offer a wide range of services. I had the opportunity to go to their facility and tour some of the classes while they were in session and they really do a remarkable job, and at the same time they provided daycare services for the parents of these individuals who were enrolled in English as a second language at that time.
MR. PREYRA: Another question related to settlement - and this is something we've talked about before - and that's the question of recognizing credentials. It continues to be a
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huge problem here in Nova Scotia that we attract people here because of their skills. We tell them that they're highly desirable, that we need their expertise, and then when they get here we don't recognize their credentials. I'm wondering why it is that we're so far behind the other provinces in recognizing credentials and giving immigrants who come here the opportunity to earn a livelihood based at least in part on their credentials - you know, at least give them a halfway place where they can work. I know it's a stereotype, but it seems to me that there are so many immigrants here who are driving taxis who are engineers, are doctors, and senior people in the countries that they've come from.
It's false advertising in a way to say to these people, you know, you have great skills, now drive this cab because we have no way we can assess your credentials, or we need you to take this training program, earn a place in this residency program, but we have no spaces for you. I'm wondering if the department has any plans - now, again, I know this is something where you have to go to the other professional societies and the Department of Education and there are international accreditation bodies, but it seems to me it's a waste of our human resource to have these people doing menial jobs when we need skilled workers.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Well, I will say that having met with my federal and provincial colleagues last year, we had the opportunity to discuss some of the major issues and one of these major issues - I'm going to disagree that it's only a problem in Nova Scotia because it's probably the number-one concern that Immigration Ministers have across this country - and I guess being able to work with professional organizations to make sure that individuals know what the criteria are before they come to this country, making them aware of the level of credentials that they do need, and assisting them in getting these is key in this being successful. Now, it definitely is a very complicated system and not one that there's one solution out there, one fix for the issue.
We are currently working with NSBI and other agencies on the accounting professions, on the initiative to help skilled workers for the financial services sector, and we will continue to work to make sure that individuals who come into this country do know what the qualifications are. We have a very successful partnership currently with our engineering profession and we will continue to build on the success of that program so that, again, people who come into this country and want to make it their home can be successful in the jobs in their chosen profession.
MR. PREYRA: Well, I'm glad to hear that, but it seems to me that requiring these immigrants to be aware of the Canadian political, economic, or social structure is a bit unrealistic. Many of the people that we have seen in terms of cases - I must say, I myself am often confused about whether you go to the federal government or the provincial government, or you fill out this form for a work permit or get a student visa, it's a confusing mess of bureaucracy that they're faced with. I'm not surprised that they just fall between the cracks because the burden of navigating through our system is just so confusing as it is. I'm wondering if the department should take more responsibility for settling these people in their
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professional areas and get them up to working in their areas of expertise as quickly as possible, but I will pass on that because I would like to move on to some policy issues as well.
A number of questions relating to the Nominee Program in particular. It's a program that has been fraught with difficulty. I want to start by just asking a general question. We effectively ask these people to provide about $130,000 to come to Nova Scotia and we offer to partner with them. I'm wondering, given this huge population problem that we're having, there are problems with skilled workers, is it fair to treat this area as a sellers' market when in fact what we really want is to lower the barriers - $130,000 is a real barrier, it's a real barrier to the kinds of people who would settle here. I'm wondering if the department is going to reconsider that. I mean it's like a price of admission into Nova Scotia.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I will say that the economic category that we do have for the Nominee Program is under review. We're not accepting any new nominees in this category. Our intention is to redesign the economic category and to remove all fees associated with the economic stream. Now the economic stream is only one stream of our Nominee Program. We have the skilled workers stream, the family business stream, the international graduate stream, which is something that will be launched later - it's on our Web site now, but there will be an official launch for this stream - and also the community identified stream which we work closely with the RDAs throughout the province so that they identify individuals and we work with them to meet their needs in their communities.
MR. PREYRA: Thank you. I'm glad to hear that, because I think it is important for us to lower those barriers and I know that it continues a policy that started earlier last year in the reduction of fees. I do have a quick question - I know it's beyond your jurisdiction here, but I'll ask you anyway. There was a protest here in Halifax last week about the fees that are being charged for refugees, the $550 application that they need. The upshot of it really is that those refugees are paying $2,000-plus just to renew their right to stay in Canada. I'm wondering if that's a humane policy, given that many of these refugees have spent time in camps, they really don't have a right to work, they have no way to pay that fee. If they don't pay it they end up dropping to the back of the line or they have to leave the country in some cases.
Is there any way that the Nova Scotia Office of Immigration can pick up that slack? These people are willing to stay here and we need people in Nova Scotia. I would say, as someone who came here in the same way, that these refugees are very much more likely to stay here in Nova Scotia if we provide some money to those families.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I'm sure that this is the case across Canada and it's definitely something that I can raise with my federal counterpart. Having said that, you were right in your opening remark that it definitely is outside of my jurisdiction and this would be federal jurisdiction. Again it's something that I can raise with the federal minister. I wouldn't
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want to step in and start paying fees that they are charging without having that conversation. I think it's something that if it needs to be removed, we definitely should speak to our federal counterpart to have that done.
[5:15 p.m.]
MR. PREYRA: Well, it certainly does because they're here in Nova Scotia and we want to keep them here. If they're not going to be able to pay $2,000 they're not going to stay here, they're going to go somewhere where they can earn that money. I think it's just inhumane really to be expecting those people to be paying $2,000-plus, some of them with large families, given their economic circumstances. I want to ask something about the Nominee Program, I know you said that it is effectively frozen as it is and I'm sure it will be renewed in a different form, but has there been any consideration given to allowing NGOs and allowing not-for-profits to serve as partners in the Nominee Program?
I know I've mentioned a particular case to people in your department. I think they sent you a letter earlier this week but the question is here you have a thriving company that's doing very well, raises millions of dollars in revenue, has a large staff, can offer all kinds of mentorship and support to a potential entrepreneur, and yet we've cut them off. We know that we've had a problem matching people in this entrepreneur stream anyway, so why not create an additional pool that we can draw on in the NGO community and not-for-profits so that they can be mentored there?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: There are a number of benefits to companies that become business mentors and an opportunity to address their labour market needs to gain exposures to other cultures and to learn other ways of doing business and business thinking, as well as being able to access a more global market through the nominee. Now, when you look at the business-mentor component of our Nominee Program, it also helps newcomers establish their business networks here in Nova Scotia. It's intended for entrepreneurs who want to start their own business and it's to give them first-hand experience into what it takes to run a business and to give them that mentorship to do that, whereas NGOs, as not-for-profit organizations, wouldn't see the profitability side of that and that's key if the nominee is to be successful in running a business in our province.
MR. PREYRA: I understand that but I had understood that the main objective of our policy was not so much to make profit but to provide people who are coming here with expertise so they can adjust to the Canadian marketplace. If they can get that expertise through these organizations - and, in fact, these organizations can also benefit from that expertise - I'm not sure why the profit motive narrowly defined should drive that policy.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I guess the number one reason why our new Canadians or new Nova Scotians leave the province is because they're not able to find meaningful work. If we want these individuals to stay in Nova Scotia we have to make sure that they're able
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to support their families, and profitability of a company that they're running will be key and instrumental in that reason for them to stay here. So we have to make sure that they have the tools in place so that they are successful in running a business on their own. The profitability issue is for the nominee, they need to be able to make money in order to stay in this province to support their family.
MR. PREYRA: Yes, but they're providing the money to employ themselves, are they not? They're giving the company that's going to hire them $120,000 of which they get $50,000 or $60,000 back. Is that not how the process works here?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: They do provide the $130,000, which is divvied up accordingly, but a portion of that does come back in a wage to the nominee and, in return, they are supposed to gain business experience from a Nova Scotia firm or company here in the province so that they are able to go out and start their own business or go into whatever venture they so choose at that point in time. But it's to give them the business experience here in the Province of Nova Scotia.
MR. PREYRA: I'll pass on that question but I do understand that they're paying themselves the wage, there's no new money coming out of the company that's sponsoring them. In fact, it's quite likely that the company sponsoring them gains quite a significant financial advantage from having them there?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: No, it gives them the experience that they need to start that business and that's how the economic stream was set up originally. It is something, as I said, that is under redesign at the moment and our goal is to remove all fees associated with the economic category. We will continue to work with the business community to make sure that all of our nominees who have landed will have a business match and we will aggressively seek to do that.
MR. PREYRA: Now, I have some questions about the overall quota that Nova Scotia has. I'm looking at the Manitoba figures and I see here in a press release that the Manitoba Government says that in 2006 Manitoba received 50 per cent of all provincial nominees who came to Canada. How is it that Manitoba has been so successful? I see here also that Manitoba received almost 10,000 immigrants in 2006, an increase of 23.4 per cent. Manitoba's provincial nominee levels increased 43.8 per cent. It seems to me that Manitoba, which is a similarly situated province, is just incredibly successful. What's going on there and why are they so much more successful than Nova Scotia?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Well, I will say that Manitoba definitely looked at immigration earlier than what the Province of Nova Scotia did in an immigration strategy and they started back in 1995. They went through their nominee program. They were able to prove that they could be successful with this and currently they have very large numbers. Now, our goal is to have the numeric limit removed this year and as we move to negotiate
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a new contract with the federal government, that will be our aim so that we are not capped at the current number of 400 that we were at last year.
MR. PREYRA: We were not meeting our old limits though, were we?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The numbers that we have for Nova Scotia's total landings, when we started the strategy in 2003, it was 1,447. We're currently at 2,580. Last year we met the 400 cap that we had. Initially, yes, we had to kick off, we had to get the strategy going and in the first year, by the time you rolled out your streams, you set up the office, you had everything in place, no, we didn't have the 200. Originally the intent was to have 200 nominees a year and we were able to have that doubled because we didn't meet those initial figures in the earlier years and, again, our intent is to definitely have those numeric numbers removed so that there isn't that cap on the amount of nominees coming into this province.
MR. PREYRA: I also had a question about source countries. Looking at the Manitoba figures, their top source countries are the Phillippines, Germany, India, China and Korea. Yet looking at our Community Counts figures earlier today, we seem to be getting fewer immigrants from countries - Southeast Asia, for example, our numbers have dropped. I'm wondering, do we have a larger vision of which countries are going to be our source countries and how we're going to go after potential immigrants from those countries?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I guess our source countries that we have right now, most of the individuals are coming from the U.S., the U.K., European countries. We are definitely going to be partnering with NSBI, as I mentioned earlier, and the financial sector to look at bringing individuals in to meet the needs of the new hedge fund companies that will be setting up business here. In Nova Scotia we'll be looking at working with our graduates from our local universities, we'll be looking at bringing individuals' repatriation back, and we'll also be looking at the immigration as a need to fill the remainder of those jobs.
MR. PREYRA: I guess that was part of my question, that we do seem to get an awful lot of immigrants from the U.S., U.K. and Europe - very traditional source countries. The other provinces have gone beyond that and it seems to me that's a natural pool for us if we want to look for potential immigrants, and skilled workers for the Nominee Program as well.
I think I have about a minute left here before I hand it over to my colleague, the member for Queens. The MOU that's being negotiated with the universities for new students - you mentioned it in passing - where is that right now in terms of the negotiation stage and what is the objective?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Are you referring to the international program where students are allowed to work off campus?
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MR. PREYRA: Yes.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: That has been set up and is currently ongoing. I just wanted to go back to one of the comments that you did make because the primary country our nominees are coming from, or area that our nominees are coming from, is the Middle East, where the majority of our nominees are currently coming from.
MR. PREYRA: Thank you, there are lots of other questions, but I'll pass it on to the member for Queens.
MR. CHAIRMAN: The honourable member for Queens.
MS. VICKI CONRAD: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to ask some questions. This is just such an important department, it really is.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Are we still on immigration?
MS. CONRAD: Yes, apologies for that, yes, we are. In the interest of time, I just have a couple of quick questions. I do want to say that I met with your deputy minister some time back to have an understanding of immigration in rural Nova Scotia, and I'm most impressed by the deputy minister's commitment and passion for this department. I know that under some of her direction as well, and working with yourself, that the department will be successful as time goes on. I'm very much convinced of that.
As we know, we have serious problems in rural Nova Scotia with population decline, aging population, out-migration of youth, and immigration to rural Nova Scotia is going to be so important in the future to not only increase our population base, but also in terms of our economics, in terms of making our rural communities more sustainable. My two quick questions are, how are we packaging rural Nova Scotia to interested immigrants who are looking at Nova Scotia as a possible place to land in and call home?
On the flip side of that, how are we preparing our rural communities to accept immigrants into our - sometimes - communities that are not as connected to our urban areas? I moved to Queens about 20 years ago and I just grew up down the shore and I'm still sometimes considered, in some of the communities, as a come from away. So it is a challenge for the Department of Immigration to really reach out, raise the awareness. So I'd like an update on what that's looking like and how we will make our rural communities more attractive to immigrants.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Thank you for those questions. Having grown up in rural Nova Scotia all my life and lived in Lunenburg County, a neighbouring county to Queens, I fully appreciate the comments that you are making and recognize that we really do need to move to be more welcoming in how we approach newcomers in our rural communities.
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One of the programs that I spoke of earlier was working with the RDAs and the Community Identified Stream, the partnership that we have there with the RDAs, is instrumental in that if a community identifies an individual to become a nominee, they've usually already accepted those individuals into their community and it makes the process that much easier for them.
Also, we hosted a series of CEO forums across the province and in doing so we met with a variety of different companies and one of the main issues that was put forward was the need to be able to meet the out-migration that is happening in rural Nova Scotia. Ten years ago you wouldn't have been sitting in those rooms with those same business partners and them raising the issue at the table - the table has definitely shifted.
[5:30 p.m.]
Communities are becoming more welcoming and recognize the need, for their own sustainability, to have immigrants in their communities. The value that immigrants give to our community is insurmountable in the amount they give back. MISA offers a variety of outreach programs to the communities and communities can partner with them. MISA can come out and do different things. The settlement funding of the $1.8 million is definitely key in the success, but we need the communities onside. We need all of the people in the community onside; we need to have welcoming communities.
It starts by opening our own doors to these individuals and allowing them into our homes so that they do feel part of a community. Again, our retention numbers are not what we would like to see here in the province, and it's something that by 2010 we would like to see at 70 per cent, and we're going to continue to work until we maintain those numbers.
MS. CONRAD: Thank you, and I'm going to pass the questioning over to my colleague, the member for Dartmouth North.
MR. CHAIRMAN: The honourable member for Dartmouth North.
MR. TREVOR ZINCK: Madam Minister, thank you for entertaining our questions today. It is a very interesting topic for me - with my previous background I had quite a bit of contact with immigrants coming into the country and entering the grocery field. I've also had the opportunity to work with MISA as well, and appreciate the extensive work that they have.
I have a few quick questions in and around the Nominee Program. I've recently spoken with a Korean immigrant who came to our country approximately six years ago - actually the first Nominee Program person entering was Korean - and I'm being told now by the Korean community that they no longer look towards coming to Nova Scotia because of the fee that is charged. I've recently been told they are seeking out residence in New
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Brunswick because there's no nominee fee. Is that a similar sort of model that we're going to be looking forward to with the new program?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: What I can tell you is the current Nominee Program that we are implementing here in the province does not have any fees associated with it; we eliminated all fees. As I said, the economic category is under redesign at the current time and we're not accepting any new nominees in that stream. The other four streams that we do have in this province, there are no fees associated with them, and that's the direction this government will be taking - to eliminate any fee or all fees associated with all the streams that we currently have.
MR. ZINCK: Also, to stay on the topic of the Nominee Program, my colleague, the member for Halifax Citadel, suggested what type of opportunities to bring people from other countries were we looking at. What I would be interested in knowing is, what is your department doing to promote Nova Scotia to potential nominees from other countries, what sort of programs or marketing is Nova Scotia taking, is our government taking?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Throughout the year we take part in a variety of immigration fairs that go on across the globe, and we also will be partnering with Economic Development in a lot of the trade missions that they take part in. We will also be setting up immigration booths at these and looking to promote Nova Scotia in a definitely welcoming way, and we will continue to do that.
I did say we were partnering with NSBI on another initiative earlier, and throughout when there are other government departments out there trying to sell Nova Scotia, we will be there, as well, with them.
MR. ZINCK: One of your mandates you stated earlier was to allow for a welcoming community throughout our province. I'm wondering, Canada is a multinational country - a melting pot of sorts - if Nova Scotia is going to become that, if Nova Scotians are going to accept immigrants and the value that immigrants bring to our province, I'm wondering if there's any kind of marketing or advertising to promote the benefits of having immigrants in our province that's going to take place in the near future?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Throughout the CEO forums that we held across the province, one of the issues that was raised is that everything we told our CEOs at this forum was really welcoming to them, but they didn't know about it. We need to promote our own success stories; we need to get out and let the communities and the business community know some of the things that are going on. There are different initiatives there. They were wondering how to attract immigrants to their area and what type of supports would be there - they had no idea that we were putting $1.8 million into settlement funding currently and that MISA and a variety of different organizations, and the local RDAs and so on, are able to bid
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on these dollars or come in with a proposal and we will evaluate the proposal and from there the funds are divvied up.
Looking at some of the comments that were made at these forums, definitely we need to promote ourselves and make sure that people are aware of the current programs that we have, the availability of funds through the province, for settlement and retention right now.
MR. ZINCK: I'll just finish up with one comment. Actually it's not even a question, it's just in relation to the point my colleague, the member for Halifax Citadel, was trying to make in regard to what the actual mandate of the department is or possibly should be or could be.
When we look at immigration, we look at families coming in. The member had mentioned education, ESL programs, and I look at the large immigration population that we have now, particularly the youth who are in our education system, P to 12, and some of the difficulties that they have as far as culture in our schools and how the Education Department encompasses and makes them feel welcome. And I know it's not the mandate of the Immigration Department, but along with Economic Development, Education, health care, I believe my colleague's point was that upon entry into our country, upon entry into our province, the immigrant looks toward the Department of Immigration as their lead, and I think that I would have to finish by encouraging you to work with those other departments in regard to this, because it goes beyond bringing someone to our country and then leaving them to navigate through the system themselves.
There are mentor programs for certain individuals, for some there aren't. So I would like to encourage the department to take that lead, to work with the other departments, Community Services, Education, especially Economic Development, and really guide individuals who come into our country, because if they understand that we are going to be there throughout the whole process they're more likely to stay. If we leave them on their own throughout any part of the process, I believe that's when we lose them, they fall off. So I'll end my comments and thank you.
MR. CHAIRMAN: The honourable member for Cape Breton Nova.
MR. GORDON GOSSE: I'm glad to see you have such a large following of staff with you today - I haven't seen this much staff here in a long time - that just goes to show the importance of your office. I'll start on the subject that's dear to me, and I know you were absent the other day when I brought this question up for the acting minister, so I'll start off with that, being as you weren't here, and I'll ask about whistle-blower protection.
In a survey a few years ago, over 25 per cent of the Nova Scotia Government employees reported they had witnessed wrongdoing on the job. Last year, the Ombudsman told your department that they had received expressed concerns that the regulations made
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employees fear disciplinary action if they reported something that was not an immediate threat to life or limb. Instead of making the changes, however, you maintained the regulations with the results that not one single person came forward in 2005 and 2006. So I would like to know, what possible explanation do you have for no one coming forward in the last reporting year?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: There definitely has been a lot of information, there have been inquiries, but there has been no actual follow-up through the process. People do notify, ask questions and sometimes are able to resolve this within the process themselves. Having said that, we have definitely promoted - we have put up numerous brochures throughout all of our departments, and we have recently created a brochure for employees explaining the process so that they know how to go through the process and what the steps are to report any wrongdoing. We encourage employees, and I publicly will say that, we encourage employees to bring these things forward.
MR. GOSSE: When not one person came forward to report wrongdoing within the government, how can you say that these regulations are working?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: We put together a process so that individuals could bring any wrongdoing forward. I cannot force individuals to bring things forward but it definitely gave them a process to bring things, if they so wished, to the table.
MR. GOSSE: So you feel that rather than having legislation, that the regulations are working within the department?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I guess in a recent report that we just received back from the Ombudsman there were 18 inquiries, and there were three being followed up on currently, so there is activity going on within the current policy that we do have in place.
MR. GOSSE: Do you feel that this process is making less people come forward?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: No, I think that this process is something that definitely is working. It gives people the opportunity to bring their concerns forward. It puts together specific mechanisms so that they can report it to the variety of different levels, and if they feel uncomfortable with going to one level they can go to the next level and so on. It definitely does put in place a thorough system for people to bring forward issues of wrongdoing.
MR. GOSSE: Last week Manitoba proclaimed their legislation to protect whistle- blowers who come forward within government. One thing their legislation allows for is the civil servant to go public. They say, "A public disclosure could also be made if the matter is of an urgent nature and constitutes imminent risk of substantial and specific danger to life, health, or safety . . ."
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Nova Scotia's regulations do not allow for public disclosure, and in fact punishment of an employee does not follow the process. As I mentioned, the Ombudsman has received expressed concerns like you had mentioned, so I'm just wondering, is the department worrying about someone going public with allegations or incidents of wrongdoing where necessary?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: You stated that the Manitoba piece of legislation was in an emergency situation or that they could take it forward to the appropriate authority. We definitely do have that; this piece of policy definitely does not supercede anyone from going to the RCMP if they feel that's where they need to go. If it's criminal in nature, whatever, it definitely does need to go through the RCMP; otherwise, I believe the process that we have in place is a very good process and I encourage all public servants who know of wrongdoing to use the process.
MR. GOSSE: That's where I differ, I guess, in the sense that I feel that we need legislation to protect whistle-blowers for government employees, and we've seen that in the federal department with the Gomery inquiry. So that's just my different opinion on that.
I would like to turn to post-secondary internships. We know that there's a pressing need to recruit more young people into the Public Service, and one of the ways to do this that I have been talking to you about over a few years now, and you know this, is through the post-secondary internship program. I know I have asked you questions over the last three years on this issue.
I will read you something from the department's business plan for this year:
"If one looks at the age distribution in public sector organizations, few people are under 40, meaning there are few to take the places of those retiring. If the various levels of government wish to compete with the private sector for talent, they will have to do a better job in recruiting students and young professionals into the public service and mentoring them as they prepare to fill these leadership positions."
[5:45 p.m.]
Since I don't see any specifics in the business plan and haven't so far heard any announcement, could you tell me why you aren't going to be expanding this program to meet the clear needs that exist?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The issue that you raised is one of age diversity and one of the programs that we have put in place is our Career Starts program that offers students and recent graduates real life, real work experiences. These programs can offer individuals a great start to their careers, while government gains exposure to youth. Recognizing the
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demographics that we have across government, it's definitely nothing that every major corporation and government across Canada is not faced with as our baby boomers are exiting their careers.
When we look at this, it definitely will open up the doors for a younger workplace to come in, and the numbers are starting to change now - not in large percentages because, again, as people retire, we will be using our Career Starts, we will be using our diversity pool. In our diversity pool there's a cross-section of all ages in that we're able to tap into and bring these people into casual positions and bring them then into the full Public Service.
MR. GOSSE: With the age we discussed in the Public Service, have you thought about offering a debt assistance program as recruitment incentive to help young people with student debts to stay in the Province of Nova Scotia?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: That's something that we've been researching other jurisdictions on. There are a few provinces that have recently implemented one and New Brunswick would be one of those provinces that recently did that. We will be looking across the country to see what programs are there, what incentives they are using. We definitely do know that we have to maintain a very good Public Service in this province and be able to keep the reputation that we do have currently.
MR. GOSSE: I did do my research on the debt assistance programs across the country and there are some very good programs out there that maybe we should look at modelling after to keep some of our bright young people here in the Province of Nova Scotia. So are there any other plans that you have to entice young people not to leave Nova Scotia and consider a career in the Public Service?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: One of the programs that we do have in place and that has been put in place in the last few years is a program called Career Connect. This puts members of the Public Service out into the high schools during their fairs that they have, job fairs, in looking at what trades or professions these individuals choose to go in. Again, we have to sell the Public Service to these individuals. In the past, our numbers didn't allow us to have to do that but in the future, everyone will be out competing for this talent pool that is graduating from our high schools and our universities. So we need to steer them in a direction that tells these individuals that the Public Service is a career, it's a good career, and one that has ample room for movement within the sector.
MR. GOSSE: I guess it's time to go to one of our favourite topics which would be bonuses, I guess. Now, I know that you said your government has eliminated them for senior civil servants this year, but there are other people on the government's payroll who get these lump-sum bonuses. So I have a few questions in that area. Why was a report on these bonuses, done by Robertson Surrette, submitted to the Treasury and Policy Board in February 2006 and yet your department said they did not see it until October of last year?
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MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: That is something that you really need to address to the Treasury and Policy Board. That does not fall under the jurisdiction of the Public Service Commission.
MR. GOSSE: I thank you for clearing that up. Okay would this one be appropriate? Is the total cost this year, 2007, I guess the salary increases for deputy ministers and assistant deputy ministers, as the result of a new scale being implemented in lieu of bonuses, that wouldn't fall in your . . .
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: That does not fall under my jurisdiction as well.
MR. GOSSE: Okay, I had one here that I had written down and I wanted to look at, too. How many requests for leave of absence for training does the Public Service Commission receive from reservists each year? Do you have any idea, from reserve soldiers?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Could you repeat that?
MR. GOSSE: How many requests for a leave for training does the Public Service Commission receive from reservists each year?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: That is something that is dealt with through individual departments. It is not brought back to the Public Service Commission so I cannot tell you. You would have to contact or ask each department, individually, what those numbers would be.
MR. GOSSE: Would you be able to do that for me in the sense that I would like to have that information sometime to find out, or even how many of those requests were granted in the last year?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: We will make the request to the departments to see what we get back from them on that.
MR. GOSSE: Also in that I would like to know how many of those were granted within the requests that were asked if that's possible. I'll just ask, last Fall we raised in the House the issue of adoptive parents not getting the same parental leave benefits as natural or birth parents. The government responded in a sense that you were pleased to see the expansion of benefits for birth or natural fathers. This didn't address the limitation of benefits for adoptive mothers. So I just want to ask, how many members of the Public Service would have been impacted as adoptive parents last year?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: We do not keep track of those statistics in the department.
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MR. GOSSE: Okay, I thank you and the little bit of time left I'll leave over to my colleague who has been waiting patiently.
MR. CHAIRMAN: You have four minutes.
The honourable member for Hants East.
MR. JOHN MACDONELL: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, minister, I'll try to make this a memorable four minutes for you. (Interruption)
I guess one of the issues, I know you addressed it in Question Period one day, but it was addressed in a Question Period kind of answer, so it has kind of left me wanting a bit but it's around the issue of casual workers. Most of the ones whom I would come in contact with would be with DNR but I'm sure it's across the board. I'm curious as to whether this practice is going to end. When my colleague was talking about bringing new people into the Public Service program, to do that, well, certainly there are people in the Public Service who are not really treated the same as other people in the Public Service. So I'm just wondering, are these people going to become full-time employees with benefits the same as others?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: You raise the issue of seasonal workers within DNR and there definitely is a difference between seasonal workers and casual workers. We did meet with the union about their concerns back when they were here; I met with DNR officials and with the union at that time. We did commit to looking at the situation that was before us. We're compiling all that information. We were going out across the province to see how many seasonal workers we do have, to see what the implementations would be of reducing that six months downward, and I'm currently awaiting that report to come back.
MR. MACDONELL: What's the difference between seasonal and casual?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: According to the definitions that we use, seasonal employees are employees who work six months or more consecutively and casual workers can be hired for a brief period of time to fill in for vacancies and so on throughout government departments.
MR. MACDONELL: It wouldn't be six months or more? It'd be less than six months?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: No, it still could be more than six months, but it could be up to a year with a casual employee.
MR. MACDONELL: Okay, so six months or more for seasonal, but up to a year for casual, but no more than a year for casual.
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MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: That is correct. It's consecutively. When we're talking seasonal workers, we're talking workers who work consecutive years for six months or more to categorize them in that for the benefit reasoning. We do have seasonal workers out there and that was the issue that was raised by DNR individuals when they were here, that some of them have worked numerous years, but for a lesser period of time than the six months.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Time has elapsed for the member for Hants East.
The honourable member for Digby-Annapolis.
MR. HAROLD THERIAULT: Thank you, Madam Minister, for entertaining a few questions.
I'd like to touch on immigration. Where I'm from, in the western end of the province, it's quite a thing, immigration is. All I hear are nightmare stories about immigration. There's never, ever a good story. I have people come to my office and I've tried to call Nova Scotia Immigration and tried to get some help at times and they say, that's not anything to do with us, that's a federal issue. I've heard that two or three times from whoever that was in the office.
They would ask, what is that office for in Halifax? What's this nomination program all about? I said, well, I really can't tell you, I don't know what the nomination program is about. Anybody can nominate someone as long as they're a Canadian. But, the nightmare stories I hear is there are people down there who have tried to come to western Nova Scotia for the past six or seven years, a lot of them keep being sent back home. Their paperwork will run out and they have to redo that again, spending hundreds and thousands of dollars - there are just no good stories in immigration, I never hear any.
But, one question I want to ask you publicly is, I want you to explain to me what the Nova Scotia Office of Immigration is all about and what is your goal there to try to help immigrants in this province?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The goal of the Nova Scotia Office of Immigration is to have 3,600 landed immigrants here by 2010 and also to have a 70 per cent retention rate so that out of those 3,600 individuals, we would like to retain at least 70 per cent of these individuals.
Our current rates of retention are not there. I'm very disappointed with the comment that you made in that there's no success stories in Immigration, because there are numerous success stories in Immigration and . . .
MR. THERIAULT: In western Nova Scotia, where I'm from.
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MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: In western Nova Scotia, in southwestern Nova Scotia, in the Valley region - I've just recently travelled across this whole province and met with a variety of CEOs throughout this province. Yes, they did raise issues that needed to be addressed, but in every forum, there were also success stories. A lot of the individuals, the CEOs, who were sitting around those tables, were immigrants themselves and have come to Nova Scotia, have made a very good life for themselves and have definitely given back to Nova Scotia and to this country as a whole - and there are a lot of success stories out there.
We need to be, and I'm going to say it again, a more welcoming community. We need to work with our local RDAs, the different streams that we have in our Nominee Program - the one that works well is the Community Identified Stream, where the community identifies an individual who wants to make that area their home. A lot of times it may be somebody who has a summer home and is looking to move here to set up a business in the area, and this works very well for them because they have already been accepted or been culturally moved into the Nova Scotia society here.
[6:00 p.m.]
Again, we need to make sure the communities are very welcoming for them, and one
of the best ways to be welcome them is making sure that they are able to find meaningful work once they come here. Credentialing is important there and, as I said before, we are partnering with a variety of associations, the APENS, with the medical professions - we have a doctor mentoring program in the Yarmouth hospital going on right now, which is a very successful program. I recently attended a citizenship ceremony down at Pier 21 last week, and this doctor from Yarmouth and his five children and wife became Canadian citizens, and it was all through the programs that we have put in place here. These are success stories, but we need to tell people about them, we need to get out in the community and, as communities face more of the out-migration that is going on, we will become more of a welcoming community to our immigrants.
It's unfortunate that we have to look at it that way, but in the past - and I said it earlier here today - 10 years ago immigration was not something that was even talked about in rural Nova Scotia, but today it definitely is and businesses and communities are looking at immigration as a way to keep their communities more vibrant and sustainable.
MR. THERIAULT: You are right, Madam Minister, the good stories need to be put out there, because they are not getting out there. I guess all you do is hear the bad and we are not hearing enough of the good, because that is all I hear in my office, the bad part of it, the problems there are.
You say you are working with the medical community to bring doctors here - oh, first of all, you never really said, and I asked the question of just how does the nomination program work and I don't believe you really answered that. Can you answer that, how it
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works? Say somebody in another country wants to come here, with nobody to back him up or support him - is it just a matter of going to this Nova Scotia Department of Immigration and you will nominate him?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: No, they definitely have to meet certain criteria and, again, there is the Community Identified Stream, there is the International Graduate Stream, there is the Family Business Stream, there is the Skilled Worker Stream, and the Economic Stream which is currently not active - we are doing a redesign of that to eliminate any of the fees that are currently in place and to look at a stream that meets the needs of the business sector better than what the Economic Stream is currently doing.
Now there are different categories. If there is an individual here - we will use the skilled worker category as an example - who has a permanent job offer in Nova Scotia, they are able to apply through the Nominee Program. They then have to have their security clearance done through the federal government, and health checks, and when those things are in place then they are able to come into the Nominee Program. There are a variety of different ways to come into the Nominee Program as I said, the skilled worker is only one - family identified could be a company that is looking to pass on or to carry on a family business and is looking for someone from their country to carry on that profession for them, or that business for them. Again, they have to meet the same security checks, but they need to have that job offer here, because the whole purpose of the Nominee Program is to promote our labour market needs here in the province.
MR. THERIAULT: So the Nova Scotia Nominee Program, can that help them through the federal red tape that they have to go through?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: If someone is accepted as a provincial nominee and we recommend or we nominate those individuals to the federal government, it cuts the process down considerably. Usually the process can take years for an individual if they choose to go outside the Nominee Program. Within the Nominee Program it is usually a nine month to a year process to get that individual cleared and here working, so it is definitely something - and they are able to work here on visas up until that point, temporary work visas.
MR. THERIAULT: So the Nominee Program will nominate those people if somebody here in Nova Scotia needs them, some company, some business?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: If they have full-time employment, not seasonal work - it has to be full-time employment. That was one of the issues that was raised by the rural communities throughout Nova Scotia when they were trying to address labour market needs in the fishing industry in direct relation to fish plants and so on. The key to this is that they have full-time employment so they are not dependent on another system that we would have here in the province - or federally over that - it is for them to come here and to be able to contribute.
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MR. THERIAULT: Fish plants in the province of P.E.I., I believe, are bringing a lot of Russian immigrants in - I don't know if they're working full-time or not, but they are bringing them in to process their fish, what fish they have left.
You said you worked with the medical community. I want to talk about doctors in Cuba - like thousands and thousands and thousands of them. Venezuela just accepted 20,000 doctors from Cuba - traded them a little oil and they got all the doctors they needed. There are thousands and thousands of them left down there - and I've been there a few times - a lot of them are tending bars, opening beer bottles for people. They're very well-trained people, highly skilled and it seems to be such a waste.
The community where I'm from, Digby-Annapolis, I brought this up a few times and the medical community there asks why can't we try to bring some of these doctors from Cuba, we could trade them some fish or something - whatever it may take. Oil worked for Venezuela, I'm sure we could find them some fish, some lobster, some scallops, or something. Has this Nova Scotia Nominee Program ever looked into this matter about bringing doctors here? God knows, we need doctors here, we certainly do in western Nova Scotia. I'm sure there are people down there in the medical profession who will probably accept these people - has it ever been brought to the attention of the Nominee Program?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The Department of Health does the recruiting for the doctors in the province, and once they do that they enter our process through the Nominee Program. So there are opportunities for them.
Another program that is currently out there that the Dalhousie Faculty of Medicine has announced for the first time - they've opened up 10 residency positions and they've set them aside for medical graduates who have completed their medical training outside of Canada, and eight of these new residencies are being funded by the Province of Nova Scotia and two are being funded by the Province of Nova Scotia, and two are being funded by the Province of New Brunswick. So the Dalhousie Faculty of Medicine has opened up these positions within the university and the government has funded eight of these.
MR. THERIAULT: Do you think there will be more? Do you believe there will be more? Do you believe there will be more doctors, who will be immigrant doctors, who will be nominated by the department in the near future?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Yes, I do, and we currently have several doctors in the province here who are looking to have their credentials recognized so that they can be in the medical profession, and we're working with those individuals - and the mentorship program that is currently working in Yarmouth and so on is one of these programs that has been a success story to get doctors to rural Nova Scotia and maintain them there.
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MR. THERIAULT: If a person comes to Nova Scotia and is sponsored by the province and supported by a business, does that person have to stay in this province - I mean do they become a prisoner of Nova Scotia until they are fully immigrated? If it takes six or seven years to go through the process, do they have to stay here in this province or can they move on to somewhere else in the country?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The Nominee Program that we have in place, the process takes between nine and 12 months, as I said earlier. Before they can move throughout Canada they need to have their permanent residency, but once they have their permanent resident card they are able to move wherever within Canada. We cannot confine them to Nova Scotia, but it is our goal to put the settlement funding and to put the things in place that will make them feel welcome and want to make Nova Scotia their home.
MR. THERIAULT: Are they tracked to see what the retention rate is, or do you know? Like 2,580 people in 2006, do you know the retention rate of how many stay? I guess it's out of your hands once they . . .
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The only thing that will give us those statistics is the census data, and we've currently received those and, again, our retention rates are not where I would like to see them - the goal of the Office of Immigration is to have that 70 per cent retention rate by 2010, so we definitely have our work cut out for us to make sure that we are able to retain that percentage here in the province.
MR. THERIAULT: There were two immigrants who came to Halifax and they wrote me a letter not long ago. They came to the city, I believe they are here in Bedford, and they wrote a letter saying they would like to leave the city and come to a rural area. If those two doctors were working in a hospital here, would it be possible for them to leave to go to another hospital, like in the rural areas?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I guess it depends on how they came in. If they came in as a temporary worker under a temporary work permit then they have to work for that individual hospital, or wherever they said they were coming to work. It they are permanent residents then they are able to move freely throughout the province or country. So yes, they could go to a rural area in Nova Scotia, but if they only have the temporary work permit then they are only able to work in that facility - but they are able to apply for a new work permit and then transfer to that area.
MR. THERIAULT: So it would just be the matter of a new work permit?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Yes.
MR. THERIAULT: This couple would like to move out of the city and come to a rural area. I think that was a question at the time, but . . .
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MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Do we know if they are permanent residents?
MR. THERIAULT: No, they're not. I don't believe they are. So they would have to just apply for a new work permit?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: A new work permit and they may wish to apply for their permanent residency through the Nominee Program.
MR. THERIAULT: You have an agreement with the federal government and that expires this August, 2007. Have any negotiations begun, to renew that contract and how long are those contracts for - one year periods, or longer?
[6:15 p.m.]
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I guess I started this discussion with the federal minister just about a year ago now. Definitely, at the senior official level, there have been several conversations going on and it is our goal to have this numeric number removed so we're not faced with this 400 or 200 cap that we have currently. When this expires at the end, they will evaluate the program that we did here in Nova scotia with our Nominee Program and at that point in time we're hopeful this numeric value will be removed.
MR. THERIAULT: There's little to no increase in the budget for operating costs or grants or contributions. If the numeric limits are removed, how will you pay for the increased numbers of the nominee certificates? I believe there's quite a cost to them.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: We have increased in the budget, it doesn't show up under Settlement, but there are two new positions for individuals to deal with the increased number of nomination certificates that would be going through our office. The federal dollars in settlement funding increased last year; they made that commitment, and we increased our settlement funding last year by $500,000, which brought it up to $1.8 million so there was a considerable amount of settlement funding there, increased last year.
MR. THERIAULT: So, has the budget gone up this year?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Yes, the budget for the Office of Immigration has gone up $438,000.
MR. THERIAULT: So, $438,000, where will that money go? How will that be used?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: In this year's budget, it allows for the office of the minister to be set up as well, which was not in the budget for last year. It allows for the addition of two new program and development officers - these are nominee officers that will deal with the nomination certificates - and it allows for a manager of finance also to come
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in. It's mainly in the staffing complement as well as the NSGEU, the wage settlements that will be incurred during the year for the existing staff we do have.
MR. THERIAULT: Fees are charged, aren't they? There are no fees charged for the nominees?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Not any more. The fees were eliminated last year and the fees that were associated with all the streams that we have in place are currently gone. We're currently redesigning the Economic Stream, so we're not accepting any new nominees into that program. It is our goal to have the stream redesigned and fees will not be a part of that so that there will be no fees charged to our nominees.
MR. THERIAULT: Are the federal fees increasing for immigrants?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Federal fees throughout have decreased. Their landing fees have been cut in half and the other fees have remained the same but if anything, they've decreased over the last few years.
MR. THERIAULT: Is there any chance the feds will decrease their red tape for immigrants along with the fees?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Part of my discussion with the federal minister definitely identifies the issues that we have with the timeframes around the immigration process here in this country, and in this budget alone they've reduced those fees by half for the landings and that definitely is a step in the right direction. I spoke to the federal minister and they were looking at putting more staffing in place to address the amount of people that they have currently in the mix trying to get through the system.
MR. THERIAULT: Do you believe that there will be more nominees this coming year to Nova Scotia, more immigrants who will apply for Nova Scotia?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Absolutely. I wouldn't be working with the federal government to have my numeric numbers removed if I didn't feel that I was going to meet the 400 objective. We're already well into this year and our numbers are climbing and they will continue to do that. We're currently sitting at 141 nominees this year already. So we're well underway and I'm very optimistic that we will be able to meet the 400 and exceed if those limits are removed.
MR. THERIAULT: I'm hoping and praying that I don't hear any more nightmare stories from it, you know, because the few down home that I've tried to work with, they're really going through something. They don't know whether they're going to have to leave tomorrow. They feel they're sitting on pins and needles. Their medicals have run out, they've got to redo them, and all the paperwork that they have to redo because it has taken so long,
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after three or four years it runs out and to redo that again. Some have to go back, some have gone back to England, whom I know personally, to start over again, but I'm not hearing any of the good news stories. As an MLA, you just hear the bad anyway. So I think the Department of Immigration in Nova Scotia as a nominee department should be putting out more good news there and telling these people who are having problems to hang tight, you know, that you are going to become a Canadian citizen if everything checks out and, hopefully, within two to three years, not six, seven, eight years, like some of them are going through. That seems to be the problem.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: If these individuals are individuals who are here working or who are planning to work in Nova Scotia, the Nominee Program may be something that we can definitely assist these individuals with and something that it may be beneficial to you, or to your caucus, to have a briefing on the Nominee Program to see how you can assist. Most of the issues that you are talking about are federal jurisdiction and the time frames associated with the federal process and, yes, it is a lengthy one.
The Nominee Program was put in place to cut down on those time frames while addressing the labour market needs in the different provinces. Now, most or all provinces, except for Ontario and Quebec, most of the other provinces do have their own version of a Nominee Program. They all differ in some way or another but they were put in place as a means to address the labour market needs and to eliminate a lot of the process that is there federally so that they are streamlined. If they're in the provincial nominee programs, they take precedence and they are moved more quickly through the system.
MR. THERIAULT: I believe that would be a great help if the department could come to our caucuses for an hour or two, whatever it takes, do a presentation and questions could be asked. It is a complicated thing if you don't know first-hand what you're dealing with because there are questions out there about immigration I just can't answer. I'm sure there's lots of literature and stuff on it, but an hour or two presentation from your department to our caucus, and probably all the caucuses, I believe that would be a great thing. Is that something you could look at in the near future?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: We definitely can arrange setting that up for yourselves and for the other caucus as well if they would like to have a presentation on the Nominee Program that we do have and the process involved with that. We can arrange that for you. We can contact the offices and arrange that.
Looking at the Nominee Program and again going back to the CEO forums that I recently completed across the province, we definitely recognize the need for better publicity on the good news stories, better communications between the RDAs, between local businesses, between communities, as to what programs are out there and how beneficial they can be to rural Nova Scotia because there are some real success stories out there. Once you have the opportunity to talk to some of these people and hear their stories, you really see that,
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yes, it can work and how important settlement is and how important fitting in to a rural community really is.
MR. THERIAULT: I believe that needs to be heard by a lot more people and the more positive you can get out on something like this, it certainly, you know, because you do hear a lot of negative about immigration. Anyone you seem to talk to, it's all negative in the communities because that's all they hear. You don't hear enough of the good news. So with that, I'll hand it over to my colleagues.
MR. CHAIRMAN: The honourable member for Shelburne.
MR. STERLING BELLIVEAU: Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank Madam Minister, for the opportunity to ask a few questions regarding emergency management. (Interruption) Yes, again I want to thank Madam Minister for the opportunity to address a number of concerns that I will raise representing not only residents in Shelburne County but I think right across Nova Scotia.
One of the first questions I raised in the House regarding seniors or people in rural communities, I believe it was the last session, was the need or a concern of having seniors, or people who are in need when there is a crisis situation in our communities being identified, and my understanding is that there is no such list of people who may need services to be identified - there are no such lists that have been created?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: There currently is no list out there that would identify all the seniors in this province. Specifically, I believe that the Department of Community Services does have their individuals that they can contact. One of the initiatives that I spoke of earlier was the reverse 9-1-1 and how beneficial this would be to all Nova Scotians in relation to public alerting by being able to, from one switch, dial back to all the homes in this province to alert them of a tsunami, of a hurricane, of a major storm system of whatever nature that was brewing here in the province. So it would give us that opportunity but that is something that we are currently working at to try to address here in the province.
MR. BELLIVEAU: Again you're going down that same road, I'm trying to lead you here, but I think there is a serious concern. I just want to make note that in Shelburne County last year we had a number of seniors contact our office. They were definitely concerned about the heavy snowfall and the lack of getting adequate snowplowing in there. This was just by doing a few phone calls and identifying people who are in need, and the local snowplow operators, this was done on a volunteer basis - and I can name you several, but I don't want to do it here in a public forum. But there are people willing to come together to address that, and I raise that question because, if we are in a crisis situation, I know that you can multiply this by a hundred in a number of communities and there are people who would fit into that. I raise that question because I sense that there is a need or urgency to have these people identified when there is a certain crisis.
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[6:30 p.m.]
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The municipalities throughout the province have emergency management coordinators assigned to them, and these emergency management coordinators do have some lists where people voluntarily can submit their names to them so that they are able to be contacted in the event of such an emergency in the province. One of the things that we have really tried to do over the course of the last few years is a 72-hour preparedness initiative and going out to seniors to make sure that they do have an ample water supply, medication, everything that they would need to tide them over for a 72-hour period - and this is something that the campaign is going to kick off here in May.
So it's something that again we will be looking to definitely stress and make sure that our senior population - and another thing that, as Minister of Seniors, I had a staff person attend a conference recently and it was on emergency preparedness for seniors specifically, so there are programs out there and initiatives that are ongoing throughout the country and abroad trying to put it in perspective currently.
MR. BELLIVEAU: One of my personal concerns in this job, and I was at the municipal level for nine years, I see this issue basically growing every year. I'm concerned, if not nervous, about a situation - I'm talking about an ice storm here now - we live in a rural area and if you look at the power lines as you drive to Halifax and the city, each time that I do I observe the power lines are not being pruned in a manner in which they were done 20 years ago, and I think that this is something that needs to be addressed now because we're living in a situation where our climate can fluctuate very severely and if we do have a major ice storm, which they had in Quebec a number of years ago, I would think that it would be not days, but weeks, before we could restore that power. I think that a lot of this could be prevented if we addressed that and treated that like a crisis situation and have those power lines pruned. I would just like to hear your comments on that.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Part of the advisory council that we have, Nova Scotia Power sits on that committee and these issues are raised on a regular basis with them. As MLAs across the province, I know that we all have our issues in relation to the power lines and the outages, especially in rural Nova Scotia, that we've experienced over the course of the last few years.
I will say that in my own area, since Hurricane Juan and some of the more significant storms that we have had, White Juan and so on, that there has been an increased emphasis on bush cutting and on getting a lot of this setback from the power lines done so that they are able to - preventive maintenance is what it all boils down to, and they need to make sure that these lines are kept clear, but again we do live in rural Nova Scotia and it's quite a task, I will say, for them to do that.
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MR. BELLIVEAU: On that topic of severe climate change - you see we have been victimized by, I call it torrential rains in the last few years, and I've lived a few years myself and I don't think I've seen severe flooding in our communities, in our constituency of Shelburne, that severe, that fast, that quick, that rainfall can actually fall in such a short period of time. I also know that basically this hasn't taken place in the last two decades, so when you get these severe climate changes, like heavy rainfall, and if you have development over the last 10 or 15 years - and the other observation is that we have a number of the drainage systems in our highways, the old Trunk 3, a lot of the culvert systems are 50 or 60 years old, and basically their lifetime has expired so you are having a scenario of where flooding can be created in a fast manner.
One of the problems, I guess, is that first of all there is a serious problem because there are a number of these situations - go through each village or community and identify these problem areas now because I think this is overlapping into different jurisdictions, different departments. If the Department of Transportation and Public Works does not see that as a crisis and people in their community, the local fire departments and the Emergency Management Organization identify them as priorities and yet they are not being addressed - is that something that can be addressed through your department, getting those particular situations corrected?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Again, on the advisory council that is in place, the Nova Scotia Department of Transportation and Public Works sits on that committee as well. One of the things that I guess we have all experienced over the course of the last few years - in my lifetime I, up to a few years ago, could say that I never experienced floods and hurricanes and White Juans, or any of the above, but within a three-year period, or a two-year period, in my own home constituency we had Hurricane Juan, we had White Juan, and we had the severe flooding in Lunenburg County in 2005, as well as earlier than that. Looking at some of the situations that did arise during that time, again, preventive maintenance definitely would have helped in those cases.
One of the commitments that this province has made is the commitment of 500 kilometres of paving, and with that new paving also comes new culverts and ditching and everything else that goes along with it. This is one way to address these individual concerns I would hope that you would raise with your departments in your areas, and I would hope that they would be correcting them if they see blockages that potentially could lead to washouts and whatever. Again, that's a question, really, for another department, but I know that individually that would be the route that I would take.
MR. BELLIVEAU: I'm fighting the clock here, but I'm going to ask you a question and then I will ask the second part and you can answer them both at the same time, hopefully. First of all, there were a number of people who were under an emergency situation and were looking for access to funding, and I think that took a long time. If you could just elaborate
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on what the turnaround time is of people getting an application in and that application being processed.
My final question to the minister: A number of people, especially municipal leaders, through the UNSM rural caucus, identified a problem with residents in rural Nova Scotia having access to testing of their well waters - I want to ask the minister, would they pursue having a testing program where people in rural Nova Scotia could have access to this particular testing?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The question comes back to individual claims, that is what you are talking about, not claims that would fall under the disaster financial assistance relief for the major - such as HRM here, you are talking about individual claims, are you?
MR. BELLIVEAU: Yes.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Those individual claims, once we have declared and sent out the application forms, it's usually a three-month process and within a year those claims are paid, and there are no individual claims outstanding currently in that program.
MR. BELLIVEAU: I apologize. My final question was, the UNSM rural caucus has raised concerns about people in rural Nova Scotia having access to testing of their well waters if there is heavy flooding, and a number of barriers that are put in place are inability to have this sampling done or the cost of this chemical testing or the ability to correct faulty wells or septic systems - usually this happens, the need for this is when we have a flash flood or a crisis situation, so I'm asking if your department has any desire to have this testing put in place at no cost?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: If the affected well was in the affected area of a flood or another environmental cause that would come into play from an emergency situation, then yes they would be covered for testing, and sometimes that's a very simple process that can be carried out, to check individual wells in that area, but it would have to be in the flood area, as you referred to. There are programs through Environment and Labour for well testing and septic testing over and above that.
MR. BELLIVEAU: I just need to follow up on that point because my understanding is they may be covered if there was a flooding situation, but if there was no crisis situation there would be no funding or sampling - is that something you would be looking at doing in the future?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: No, not through this department, that would be through another department. Again, there are programs that people can apply for different testing through the Department of Environment and Labour, but again that's a question for another
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department. Through EMO it would be specific to an emergency situation or damage caused by floods or some other act of nature.
MR. BELLIVEAU: Mr. Chairman, I will turn this over to my colleague.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Thank you, and the time is 6:42 p.m.
The honourable member for Dartmouth South-Portland Valley.
MS. MARILYN MORE: I'm going to talk about the Advisory Council on the Status of Women and the Seniors Citizens' Secretariat. Now I apologize, Madam Minister, as you know I was over at the provincial volunteer ceremony and so I missed your opening remarks. It may be that there was some relevant information there that I don't have, but you perhaps could include it in your answers if I've missed something significant.
I just want to start out by reminding everyone that for many women in Nova Scotia it's not fun being a woman in this province. The reality of our experience is very different from men's experience and the advisory council itself has researched many of the challenges facing Nova Scotia women, and I congratulate them on doing that research and analysis.
I want to start from that foundation because I think people have to understand that even though women are the majority of citizens in the province, there's a significant wage gap, there's higher risk of violence, we have greater unpaid household work and caregiving responsibilities, there's a shortage of affordable child care, a significant number of single mums and women seniors are living in poverty in our province, and we have the widest low- income gender gap in Canada.
We've seen recent reports reminding us about the criminalization of women with mental disorders - especially after physical and sexual abuse. We've recently had significant federal cuts. We've lost our Halifax Status of Women Canada office. We've lost federal funding for volunteerism, for literacy, for court challenges for women's advocacy and research on women's issues. So I guess, basically, I'm going to start off by asking, I think, a question I've asked the last couple of years that the Advisory Council on the Status of Women seems to be doing, as I said earlier, a good job of researching challenges and doing the analysis, but that information is not leading to action, and decision making; that's addressing access, equity and adequacy for women in Nova Scotia. So I ask the minister, what is the advisory council, or you, as the Minister responsible for the Advisory Council on the Status of Women doing, to make Cabinet and your caucus colleagues aware of these issues and why isn't the government taking more aggressive action to improve life for Nova Scotian women?
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[6:45 p.m.]
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Thank you for the question, and it definitely involved a lot of areas throughout that. Looking at what has been happening within government, with the statistical information that is gathered, it definitely has been used in a variety of circumstances, some of those in relation to caregiving, in relation to elder abuse in this province and in relation to violence against women. There is a lot of information that we do use in our decision making and it's very valuable research information that is carried out by the advisory council, as well publications that are made available to women in this province, through the advisory council. One of those additions, making changes and so on, is a publication that has been downloaded numerous times from our Web site, and the copies last year we actually ran out of and we will be increasing the number this year, so that we're able to meet the needs. The advisory council definitely is providing to the population here, the women's population, a very valuable resource.
The Status of Women Canada cut, as you referred to it, I'm going to look to it differently. It's an additional $5 million of federal funding for women's programs; $3 million of this new $5 million will be allocated for municipalities and other levels of government to apply to things specifically for women. So that if Community Services had a program that they wanted to implement, they could apply through the federal government, through this pool of money, through Status of Women Canada. I met with the federal minister here recently on this and it really is going to be a good news story. We need to get it out to the individual groups and so on, so that they are able to apply for funding. I'm not sure if any groups have applied and have been turned down, currently, for funding. The federal minister didn't know of any. I did ask that question. I know that they have changed their opening statement, their mandate statement for Status of Women Canada, and what they are able to apply those funds for. But there is more money; it's $15.4 million, in total, which is more money than has ever been there before. Again, when I met with the federal minister, this was a good news story.
Having the office closed here in Halifax, no, it's never good to see a regional office closed, and this was a provincial office, and now we're going to a regional office out of Moncton. Having lost those services, yes, they'll have implications to the local population, but again, it's something that we definitely need to emphasize the increased dollars that are there, and it's hard to say what effect that will have on the actual programming to women's organizations and women's groups, before having seen it through for a year, to know what that effect is.
MS. MORE: Mr. Chairman, I'm not going to spend my time debating with the minister about the reason for the federal cuts but we have seen similar trends in other areas of action. When a significant amount of money is taken out of a budget - whether it is provincial or federal - and then reinvested in project money, this a way of control over the activity that happens with that money.
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What happens then is what we've seen in the voluntary sector right across Canada, a lot of the project-based money - it allows government to control the agenda. It puts it in short-term projects that don't affect the environment and don't get to the root causes of the problems that are facing many Canadians, so I disagree that its a good-news story but I do appreciate that as a provincial minister, you don't have any control over what happens there. The reason I mentioned it is because it impacts so directly on women in Nova Scotia because women make up the majority of volunteers and women have the largest gap to make up in order to have equality of opportunity in this province.
Let me just take an example where I think your provincial government actually has full control over. This has been raised in many forms before, I'm bringing it up now because I think it is something that can be done to show good faith. I know that one of the goals of the advisory council is inclusion and I know the minister herself has taken quite an interest in trying to encourage more women to run for all levels of political activity. I've been told previously in budget debates that the Advisory Council on the Status of Women does not track the number of women, or the gender breakdown, on appointments to agencies, boards and commissions in this province. I think we all recognize that that is a tremendous learning experience. I think a lot of women who would have the advantage of learning the background of many of those ABCs, as they're called, might be encouraged to run for political office or get involved in political Parties or in community leadership but they're missing out on that opportunity.
So I'm asking the minister again, would you commit the advisory council to tracking the gender breakdown of the appointments to the ABCs, so that we have some way of encouraging women to get involved at that level? That's something that could be done, could be mandated by Cabinet, that there be gender equality on the ABCs in this province.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I believe there is some tracking in place now - not by the Advisory Council because they're not really the individuals who are responsible for ABCs but there is tracking that currently does take place. One of the biggest issues that we have in appointments to ABCs is that women are not applying, there are not the names coming forward from women in this province to fill.
I know that I sat on a committee that looked at and one of the questions that was always asked was, how many women applied, or there's not a woman's name in the list. A lot of times there are no women who are applying. Now there are certain boards in government that are all women. The advisory council is one, there is a definite gender mix in the secretariat - there are different things that there definitely is a gender balance there but there are a lot that there is not. Again, it is because individuals are not putting their names forward in this respect. So we need to encourage women to step up to the plate and to put their names forward.
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Other areas that you spoke of - yes, we are 52 per cent of the population. But one gain that we have made within government that I am very proud of, as a government, when you look at our senior officials across government and the shift that has happened there within the last five to seven years, and there is a significant shift in the gender balance in our senior officials. Again, it depends on the agency, board and commission that they are applying to and what their field of interest is. So there are a lot of reasons why people don't apply or do apply. There are some other things that we have looked at and tried from an advisory council perspective. Is it child care, is it transportation to and from? Are there different things that definitely need to be addressed in order or more women to be able to apply to agencies, boards and commissions?
So, again, there are individuals and health boards are another prime example. I know my own - there is a considerable amount of women who sit on my health board and different boards in my area. Again, it needs to be an area that the individual feels that they have something to give and a lot of times they are just not putting their names forward.
MS. MORE: But I think, as you have touched on, minister, that is a symptom, not the cause. I think the process, perhaps, for advertising, and I have to give credit, I have seen several times in the advisory council's own newsletter, an explanation of the ABCs and encouraging women to apply but I think just as encouraging women to run politically, you have to use a different approach and I think that information has to be spread more widely. Women often need to be asked. They don't put themselves forward. So I think we need a different approach in how we encourage and advertise and promote those vacancies.
I feel the advisory council has a role to play here. We track the percentage of women parliamentarians and the advisory council doesn't have responsibility for that either. So this is just a small example, though, of an area where the provincial government has complete control over the makeup of those agencies, boards and commissions. I'm suggesting that if we raise the bar to say that there had to be gender equity it could happen, but without having that expectation in place it is not going to happen.
I want to get back to another area. I started off by suggesting various examples of women's welfare in Nova Scotia and how it is much more difficult to be a woman than it is to be a man. I'm interested to know if there has been any consideration by Cabinet or consideration by the advisory council of having a gender lens on legislation and public policy that comes forward. We know public policy is not neutral. It impacts differently on women than it does on men and I would be somewhat encouraged if at least legislation that is coming before our assembly, if we know upfront the impact that is going to have. You just have to look at policy like early discharge from hospital and day surgery. The impact on women across this province has been tremendous because they are the ones who are taking time away from volunteer responsibilities, from their jobs, to stay home and look after the person who has had that operation that afternoon. So it has an impact. So do we wait and see the
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unintended consequences of legislation and public policy or do we understand upfront what it is going to be.
So has the advisory council, or Cabinet, considered putting a gender lens on the impact of legislation and public policy in this province?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: There are several pieces of legislation that I can use for an example that definitely the advisory council has been asked to put that gender lens on and they are involved in a lot of the policy development and so on throughout government. A few of those are the minimum wage that the advisory council definitely does look at, as well as the insurance programs that are in place are two examples that recently they have been asked to have a look at to see what to put the gender lens on. There are other program out there. I know that there is different work being done now with caregiving and so on, that the results of a lot of these studies definitely have an impact on the programs and policies that are put in place across government.
MS. MORE: Can you give me any example of either legislation or regulations or policy that's actually been modified, once it was realized the impact it's going to have on women?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The elder abuse policy would be one of these and also the framework for the HIV/AIDS policy that was carried out, would be another that had the gender lens put on.
[7:00 p.m.]
MS. MORE: And it was actually changed in process?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: . . and the immigration strategy that was put in place. A lot of times the Advisory Council on the Status of Women is asked to put representation on these task force so that the input is there, so that, yes, the gender lens is put on policy-decision making.
MS. MORE: I'm just wondering when that legislation and public policy is brought forward, if there's any way that it can be identified that it has had the gender lens put on it? I think that would be very useful and it would actually win support from women's groups and I'm sure from other politicians.
I'd like to move over, if I may, to the Senior's Secretariat - oh, I'm sorry, there was one last question. I think probably a number of members of the Legislature have received letters in the last month or so from Women's Centres Connect, from transition houses, sexual abuse centres, and second-stage housing. I'm just wondering, has the advisory council
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taken any stand in this year's budget, on the underfunding of community-based organizations and programs that serve women?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: There is no change in the operating budget, currently, this year for women's centres. That funding also is done through the Department of Community Services and is not directly done by this department whatsoever. Having said that, I do meet with Women's Centre Connect on a regular basis and they have the opportunity to bring their concerns forward. I do speak with my counterpart regularly on this and I know that over the course of the last few years, we were able to increase that funding to women centres and at that point in time, they were quite pleased with the amount of funding that they did have.
Now there are some centres that are operating, I believe, in a deficit but there are some centres, I believe, operating with a surplus. So there is a mix across the province, depending on the services that they are offering to their communities.
MS. MORE: Well the two priority funding issues that have been identified to me by women centres are these: one, they have to catch up somehow in terms of the wages paid to the staff; and secondly, every women's centre in Nova Scotia has identified the need for at least one more staff person. Their workload has increased substantially and the complexity of problems and issues that each woman faces who comes in as a client has increased dramatically. So, any increases in the past aren't making up for the increased workload and, also, the increased expectations by government and other community groups. Some of the women's centres have service organizations also providing money for the individual needs of some of their clients so the ripple effect is really quite unbelievable. I remember hearing during the Forum on Poverty in February from representatives from the Antigonish Women's Centre and they were saying - I believe it's the Lions Club in Antigonish supplies $25,000 that they give to the women's centre, to actually provide for some basic needs for the women who come. It's not for the operation of the women's centre, it's to provide some of the basic needs of the women who are there as clients.
The needs are really, really increasing. So I'm just wondering, what can be done so that your advisory council can actually get involved in assessing the level of need of women's programs and services throughout the province? If the funding comes from a different department, there must be some way for the advisory council to have input and prioritize some of those areas of severest need.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Again, the funding for women's centres is the responsibility of the Department of Community Services. Having said that, I do meet with Women's Centres Connect and they do bring forward their concerns. I don't believe that I have received the letter that you're talking about. Not individually or as a minister, I don't recall this letter at all.
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Having said that, if I do, it's something that normally I would meet with Women's Centres Connect - which represents all the women's organizations across the province - and I would sit down with my counterpart, within the fiscal capabilities of the province.
MS. MORE: I guess perhaps I would suggest that the advisory council needs to have at least an annual forum where they invite representatives from the groups who provide the basic programs and services for women throughout communities across this province. If the advisory council is not aware of the funding gap, that's an area they need to get more involved in and hopefully they can make some recommendations to Community Services, Department of Health and these other funding departments. The advisory council needs to know the inadequacy of service for women, so I would suggest having a forum or something where they can hear directly from them.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I do know that on a regular basis the Department of Community Services works very closely with them on their funding needs. Again, I do meet with them and they have the opportunity to bring forward their concerns. In the past, the Department of Community Services was able to increase their funding to women's centres - and every women's centre does not operate in the same capacity. So every centre really needs to be looked at individually rather than as a whole because all the women's centres out there offer different programs in their areas, and depending on the level they're providing depends on whether or not they're operating - a lot of times people are operating with a surplus, and there are women's centres in this province that currently are operating with a surplus.
MS. MORE: The Department of Community Services insisted that the women's centres do an analysis of their budgets, programs, and services a couple of years ago. That department is well aware of the core activities those women's centres have in common, but also their unique differences because they need to respond to the priorities and problems in their area. I guess what I'm suggesting, Madam Minister, is that if you have one department that is doing the funding and another advisory council who is measuring the results, somehow you have to combine those two so that the government is making the right choices in terms of where the money is invested. So, I'll just leave that suggestion with you.
I only have five minutes for the Seniors' Secretariat, so two points - I'd like to know what a Department of Seniors is going to do differently than a Seniors' Secretariat?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: As I did say in my opening remarks - and I'm sorry you were unable to be here for those remarks - the Department of Seniors will definitely recognize what we have that is working very well. The Senior Citizens' Secretariat is working very well and so is the level - it's actually a model across Canada that is looked at with envy by most provinces. To have a Secretariat that can directly report to a senior group of ministers and there is a senior group of ministers, or six different departments, that the
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secretariat meets with on a semi-annual or more, depending on if they request it more often, so that it is a model that works very well.
Having said that, within the Department of Seniors, there is an additional $800,000 this year. I see that money going into programming, I see it not going into administration - it's not my goal to have an additional $800,000 and to see it used up in administration. I would like to see it to the benefit of seniors in this province, so we'll be looking at putting programs in place that directly will help seniors.
MS. MORE: I didn't see that increase, so I'm pleased to hear that. So will there be additional staff? Will it be led by a deputy minister?
MS. BOLIVAR- GETSON: I do not foresee a stand-alone deputy for seniors at this point in time, but there will be a deputy minister assigned. That's not my prerogative to decide or to do, but it will be the model that would normally be carried out - when you do have a department there's a deputy responsible or a deputy for that department. So again, my goal is not to see it used up in administration, but to definitely have a fully functioning department that benefits seniors.
MS. MORE: Will there be an expanded mandate from the current Seniors' Secretariat?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Again, this is new with the additional funds that have been allocated for the Department of Seniors and something that will be worked out in the next few months. I recently had the opportunity to visit Alberta and saw some of the programs that they offer, seeing what programs that they had in their department, how they had it set up, what worked and what didn't work. Currently, I believe they have the only Department of Seniors in the country, besides ourselves, that will be moving forward with a specific department for seniors. Again, they came back to us - don't disband the Seniors' Secretariat and the model that you have in Nova Scotia, because it's the best in Canada. So it definitely is something that we will build on and not disband.
MS. MORE: I'm confused - are we going to have a secretariat or a ministry?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: We're going to have a ministry, but the secretariat will be part of that.
MS. MORE: So it's not an expanded secretariat, the secretariat will be part of the new ministry?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Yes, it will.
MS. MORE: So, what else will be there then?
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MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Again, these dollars allocated here, we will be looking at the overall structure of the department and all those things have not been worked out currently, but there will be a variety of different programs and so on set up for seniors.
MS. MORE: Just two quick questions - the government's action plan for positive aging strategy was released in December of 2005 and I'm just wondering, when will information be available regarding priorities, and will there be annual updates on that? How do people, especially seniors, stay in touch with any progress made on the action plan?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Again, one of government's key objectives is to make sure that the Strategy for Positive Aging is carried out - and there is an interdepartmental committee that will be meeting to prioritize some of these things that are in here, as well as for individual seniors throughout the province. The group of nine that meets regularly is a very, very good organization that provides a lot of information back to the community organizations that they do represent. As well we will be using, hopefully, information directly back to seniors in the near future to show them the progress and some of the initiatives and good news things happening in Nova Scotia and the Strategy for Positive Aging - a lot of those initiatives we are undergoing right now.
MS. MORE: I guess that is what I'm asking. I'm very interested in seniors' issues, I'm very interested in the strategy - where do I go to find the progress that has been made and decisions that have been made in the last year and a half?
[7:15 p.m.]
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The strategy was released in December of 2005. Over the year we put together action plans on how we were going to meet a lot of the goals that were in this action plan and this year we'll be putting together a process to evaluate where we are and to monitor our progress as we move forward, and I will keep you apprised of that formula as we move into that.
MS. MORE: I appreciate that, but I'm thinking the general public would like to stay apprised of it as well, so perhaps there needs to be either an annual or a semi-annual report. Just one last quick question: With the Pharmacare increase, was any impact analysis done of what those increases would lead to? We certainly had experience, and my own Leader has raised this in the Legislature of what has happened - they did an analysis of an increase in Pharmacare for seniors in Quebec and it led to more seniors not taking their medication, not getting their medication from drug stores and, quite frankly, seniors died because of those increases. Was that information available to Cabinet before they raised the fees?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: There was nothing done in advance from the Seniors' Secretariat at that point in time - I'm not sure what the Department of Health would have
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carried out and I think that would be something that you would have to ask the Minister of Health.
MS. MORE: Thank you. I would like to turn the rest of my time over to the member for Pictou East.
MR. CHAIRMAN: The time is 7:16 p.m., and you have until 7:25 p.m.
The honourable member for Pictou East.
MR. CLARRIE MACKINNON: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I'm not going to waste much time with preamble, considering the time that is left.
I want to ask some questions on the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation. We constantly talk about the growth of agency stores and sort of stagnation in corporate stores. Are there plans to open more corporate stores in growth areas and in underserviced areas?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: That would depend on the business case for that area, but absolutely, if there's an area - I will use HRM, for example, and look at what happened out in Bayers Lake. There definitely was a business case to put a new store in that area.
MR. MACKINNON: So we have thirty-two agency stores - are we expecting more agency stores?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: We currently have thirty-six agency stores and there will be, in the very near future, additional ones added to that.
MR. MACKINNON: I have two pieces of correspondence here - one talks about a move to reduce inventory and therefore inventory costs, and another talks about downgraded liquor stores in small rural centres. Is there a fundamental change in policy in relationship to inventories?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: With the new IT systems that we currently have in place and the new warehousing system that we have, we're able to monitor the product that is sold from a specific location. So if you have a product that is not moving on a shelf and it has been sitting there, you would be more likely to put something in that would be selling, so they definitely will look at the products and the rotation of those products to see what's moving in a specific area. And they will vary from area to area because if one area carries a particular brand, it does not mean that another area will carry that brand - it will depend on the sales volume in those areas for a particular product.
MR. MACKINNON: One piece of correspondence talks about fifty brands being removed from Pugwash; another talks about empty shelves and less Port of Wine selections,
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and unhappiness among wine producers - they're not able to get product on the shelf. Any comment?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The reduction of fifty products in the individual store that you mentioned would be a direct relation to the change that I said was happening. If they a had a large assortment of product - and in the past we stocked our stores with every product that was sold in the province and every store carried just about every product - again, with the current system that we have in place we're able to monitor what products are sold in particular areas and be more effective that way.
In relation to the issue of empty shelves - that was a supply issue, management issue that we did have and we have addressed, and hopefully that will not be a problem in the near future at all.
MR. MACKINNON: Thank you, Madam Minister. We have moved away from politics in hiring over the years, but what assurances do we have that politics is not filtering into the system? I have an example of a 19-year veteran being overlooked for promotion, even with the recommendation of management and certainly support from other staff members.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Well I will say that all staffing is based on a merit-based system and politics has absolutely no play into those positions whatsoever. I know that you have raised that with me before, and I definitely do know that individuals are hired based on merit and based on their qualifications to obtain the given level that they are applying for.
MR. MACKINNON: One other quick one - Wine Kitz in Halifax, in Clayton Park, is requesting U-vins be allowed to legally operate in Nova Scotia. Why are U-vins or ferment-on-premise facilities not allowed to operate in this province?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: In my opening remarks, I did say that we were noted in this province for one of the highest levels of social responsibility and this is one of the areas that I feel that we do need to maintain that with. Currently, under the regulations that we have in place, it does not allow U-vins to exist in Nova Scotia. There are control issues; there are things that we definitely need to look at. Having said that, down the road is it something that we may consider? It may be, but currently the regulations do not permit it and, from a social responsibility perspective, I definitely would like to maintain that status that we have across the country.
MR. MACKINNON: Is it true, Madam Minister, that most provinces allow U-vins to exist?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: According to our statistics, it's less than 50 per cent that allow U-vins currently in Canada so it's not something that's only in Nova Scotia that it's
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not being allowed to happen. Again, our regulations currently do not permit it and it may be something that down the road we do look at changing but it's not something that's in the immediate future that we are looking at.
MR. MACKINNON: Thank you, Madam Minister. One last one - what action is NSLC taking to promote Nova Scotia products?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I'll be quick on this. We definitely allow them a considerable amount of shelf space in our stores to promote local product. We allow them to sell at their vineyards . . .
MR. CHAIRMAN: Order, please. The time has expired, and the time is 7:25 p.m.
The honourable member for Kings West.
MR. LEO GLAVINE: Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I think I'll start off with Immigration questions. Thank you very much, Madam Minister, and staff, for the opportunity to ask some questions around this very important and timely topic of immigration.
It's interesting that in an area that should be expanding and should have all kinds of positive dimensions around it, we start out with the goal of retaining 70 per cent - why wouldn't we at least aspire to the goal of 100 per cent? I mean, I don't understand that for a department, and I wonder if the minister could comment on that please.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I'll thank you for the question and I definitely would like to say that I like to be realistic in the goals that are set, and the 70 per cent retention rate is a realistic goal that I'm optimistic we will be able to meet in 2010. I'd love to see 100 per cent. Is it realistic? No, it's not a realistic target. The national average across the country is 80 per cent and when you look at some of the main urban centres that we do have, in Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto, they're probably significantly higher in their retention rates.
MR. GLAVINE: So basically then, you work from a premise that we're not going to do much screening work that would do matching and take a look at what may be appropriate, for example. I see areas of Nova Scotia, especially in the Valley now, where we certainly cannot meet the requirements at harvest time. Are we appealing to the very average citizen of other countries who could come here and make a contribution to Nova Scotia?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: We are being very aggressive in our retention rate. It's more than doubling where we stand currently with the 70 per cent goal. This is something that we're going to have to work very hard to be able to meet, but it's something that I really think that we'll be able to do, if we do everything that we have been doing in relation to settlement funding and with getting communities involved and becoming more welcoming communities out there. Rural Nova Scotia really has a part to play here - a lot of these people
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want to settle in rural Nova Scotia, so we have to make sure that they do feel welcome when they arrive.
MR. GLAVINE: What was the retention rate of those who came, let's say, 2005 or 2006 - do we have kind of a baseline that we do want make an improvement upon? I mean, I think all Parties have the goal of working toward greater recruitment of immigrants to the country, have our numbers grow and our retention rate correspondingly increase as well.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The last census is how we would determine the amount of the retention rate for our immigrant population. It was at 37 per cent in 2001 - that is what the retention rate was at that point in time, so to move that to be 70 per cent in 2010, again, is a very aggressive move.
[7:30 p.m.]
MR. GLAVINE: I'm certainly pleased to hear you say that rural Nova Scotia should be playing a stronger role and be able to attract more immigrants, especially since certainly the highest percentage seem to be attracted to the urban communities and particularly the HRM. I know that one of the programs that was very, very successful was when the Vietnamese immigrants came here and were adopted by church communities and so on. That model in rural Nova Scotia worked very, very well and certainly, when we take a look at the fact that some of these families came twenty-five and thirty years ago and are still in some of our communities, I think it speaks very strongly that perhaps we do need some adjusting of the model and the shifting, and even if they don't have the desired job at first in their rural communities, that perhaps it's again something they can transition and grow into and find suitable employment, or a couple of members of the family with part employment and so on.
Michelin in Waterville, I know, is going to have a rough time keeping their workforce at the numbers they would like, and yet we don't seem to be appealing to the average worker in getting immigrants here - so I'm wondering about the model and the suitability and so on of the immigrant.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Thank you for the question. One thing that we have to remember is that employment is key to retention, and one of the primary reasons that an individual leaves here is because of not being able to find work. Having said that, we have carried out a number of CEO forums across this province and we have met with all the major industries in the areas, including Michelin, and they definitely have expressed a very eager interest to look at the nominee program to see how it definitely would fit into their skill shortage that they are going to be faced with in the near future - and all businesses across Nova Scotia, this is not a phenomenon that is only happening in Nova Scotia. These are our baby boomers who are exiting the workforce and we definitely do not have the individuals coming behind to meet those needs, so immigration will be the fuel that will drive our economy in the coming years.
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MR. GLAVINE: So does that mean then that you will add a category or two to the nominee program in order to make certain that certain skill sets are targeted in terms of attracting immigrants to Nova Scotia?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: We currently have a Skilled Worker Stream which would meet the needs of these industries across the province; we have a Family Business Worker Stream; we have recently introduced the International Graduate Stream which will be launched later this month, but it is up and active on our Web site; and we have the Community Identified Stream. The other stream is our Economic Stream which, as I mentioned several times, is currently under review and we are working to eliminate all the fees associated with that stream and put in place a stream that will definitely come back to meet the needs of the business community.
MR. GLAVINE: In terms of the recognition of international credentials which, as we know, is a real stumbling block and I think all of us would like to see progress made there, I'm wondering where government is now in this process of having quicker availability of those who come who could get in the workforce but their credentials aren't recognized?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Again, one of the things that we have to make certain when we're dealing with newcomers coming into this province is that they understand what the credentials are for their specific trade that they're coming into and, having said that, the Department of Education and the Department of Immigration are currently working together on the issue of credentialing. It's something we will continue to do to make sure we definitely streamline the process as much as possible.
Now we also have to work with the professional organizations within this province, and some of the success stories have been with APENS, with the engineers and being able to work with them. Also, within the health care sector, there is a variety of programs that are working very well throughout the province in relation to credentialing in the health care sector.
MR. GLAVINE: Ontario introduced a job mentoring type of program for immigrants - I'm wondering if there is any consideration of a program like that, that would find and help to retain foreign workers? It seems to be making very, very good success in Ontario and I wonder if that's a model or part of a model that we would look at in Nova Scotia?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: It's interesting that you bring that up because the program that Ontario is currently using is a made in Nova Scotia model and it's a model that is used by MISA, the Metropolitan Immigrant Settlement Association. They've actually taken that form they have here and are using it in Ontario so it's something that we are currently doing - we have an entrepreneur forum as well here - and where the mentorship program does work very well.
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MR. GLAVINE: Just to move along in terms of the target for the current year of immigrants - what would that be, Madam Minister?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The current numeric limit that we have in place is 400. I said that my goal is to have that removed as we negotiate a new federal agreement, a new nominee program with the federal government. It was at 200 a year and we were able to have it upped to 400, because in the initial stages of the nominee program we weren't able to meet that number the first year so they allowed us to carry those numbers forward to be 400. But we currently sit at 141 nominees so far this year.
MR. GLAVINE: I need to reference the book here - this is something that transpired a while ago - the contract to provide the agency's services on behalf of the province was not renewed with Cornwallis Financial, who later sued the government. What is the current status of this litigation?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Whereas that is before the courts, I cannot comment on that.
MR. GLAVINE: But has the province replaced that service - where exactly is that right now?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: We currently are not accepting any new economic nominees to the program. We are looking at revamping that because we would like to see the fees associated with the Economic Stream eliminated. We have eliminated all the fees associated with all of the other streams within our nominee program and that is the goal of the department to do that, and we will continue with that.
We are doing all the existing individuals who are waiting for business matches, it's all being done in-house. We will continue to do that and there is currently an additional two staff people in the budget who will assist us in doing this more quickly.
MR. GLAVINE: So is this likely to be the plan going forward - that inside the government agency this economic stream of immigrants will be looked after - or would another agency that has greater global scope or do you feel the current practice is what you'll fine-tune?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The current practice that we are doing, I feel, will work. We will streamline and, again, if we want to eliminate all fees associated with these streams, we're better off to do that in-house. So we will continue but, again, the Economic Stream is under review. I don't see it coming back in the same format that it's currently in at all. I see a revamped model of this stream and again, when that is carried out, then we will be launching a new stream there.
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MR. GLAVINE: I think my next questions are with seniors. Housing, of course, remains one of the big challenging areas in regard to seniors. I'm wondering how many new units have been built for seniors during the last fiscal year?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: That would be a question that you should ask the Department of Community Services. We are not the funding partners whatsoever for housing.
MR. GLAVINE: Okay, I guess we're passed that one since we have dealt with the Minister of Community Services. So we'll have to do that one off the record then I guess. The Elder Abuse Strategy, this strategy was released last year in November, and what is the status of the implementation of that?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Well, I would like to start by saying elder abuse in any form is unacceptable and after saying that, the Seniors' Secretariat is allowing $165,000 this year for work in the 2007-08 year; the advisory council remains intact that we had put in place to look at this. There have been different awareness campaigns carried on and we will continue to do those campaigns and more aggressively - we have looked at TV ads and different things to get the message out to seniors that elder abuse is unacceptable. There have been some very good projects and programs carried out across the country that seem to really hit home with a lot of individuals, so it's good news to do that. We will be looking at piloting two campaigns in the province this year on elder abuse, one in the Cape Breton area and one in the Valley, so these two programs will be carried out in those areas.
MR. GLAVINE: In terms of monitoring this strategy, I think, again, we have to set benchmarks for improvement. So, I'm just wondering how you plan to monitor this strategy. Will there be ministerial reports and updates as to how this is progressing?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Every year in our accountability report that is submitted, we definitely mark our progress on all the policies and objectives that we have set in our business plan for the year. Using a benchmark, elder abuse is something that really has gone unreported and something that we really need to make the general public and everyone aware is unacceptable. Elder abuse can take many forms from physical to mental, to financial. There are a lot of different forms of elder abuse, and raising awareness will be our greatest success out there - to create in the minds of all Nova Scotians that it definitely is unacceptable and that there is somewhere to turn and to put together the mechanisms so seniors do know how to deal with elder abuse.
MR. GLAVINE: So basically existing agencies and groups that are working with seniors, whether it is VON with home visiting, are these going to be the front-line group that will be asked to be part of the reporting process in terms of identification? Is that how you're going to try and reach out to greater recognition of elder abuse, or is it going to be more self-reporting or family reporting that you will rely on?
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[7:45 p.m.]
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Looking at the reporting system, any case of elder abuse in this province that anyone would come across in the course of their work definitely should be reported. Having said that, again, we need to raise awareness in this province that it exists.
I look back a few years - and not a lot of years - where violence against women was something that you didn't speak about, but it is something that definitely is in the forefront and definitely something that has been addressed, needs to continue to be addressed, and we need to continue to do this from the elder abuse perspective as well, to make people aware. I'm going back to a forum that I attended in British Columbia last year on elder abuse and the awareness issue was one of the key things, to get it on the agenda, to get it forefront in people's minds that it is unacceptable, and the FPT meeting for seniors has definitely raised the issue of elder abuse, and it is something that is on the top of our agenda for our next meeting.
MR. GLAVINE: Thank you. Another strategy released last year was the Positive Aging Strategy - has this been implemented or what percentage or part has been implemented to date?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: There have been a number of initiatives carried out to date with the strategy for positive aging - out of the nine goals there are several that have been implemented, ones that we are currently undergoing and that we will continue to do. I did say earlier that we will be putting together a process to monitor where we are, and another member mentioned that we need to make sure that this progress is monitored and that this information gets out to the senior population in the province, and that was duly noted - that is something we will need to do.
Now the group of nine that we meet with on a regular basis represents a variety of seniors' groups in this province and they definitely do monitor and track where we are, what we've done - and we've set a very aggressive agenda for ourself to make sure that we are able to carry out and implement all the goals that are in the strategy for positive aging.
MR. GLAVINE: So in terms of a percentage to date, what target do you have? I was here for the launch of that and certainly applaud that initiative, but I'm just wondering if there are some targets, what percentage of the strategy do you feel is at least in progress - not necessarily complete but is underway in the districts?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I don't have that percentage here, it is something that really would be hard to put to a percentage. There have been a number of initiatives carried out through government departments, through organizations throughout that have set forth a lot of the goals and the implementation of a lot of the goals that we have recognized in the strategy - and keeping in mind this strategy was completed by the task force, but the main
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participants in the strategy for positive aging were seniors, and definitely recognize that the attainability of these goals is something that we do want to see happen across this province and something that government has placed as a high priority - as to the increase that was placed in the budget to make sure that these initiatives or these goals are carried out.
MR. GLAVINE: I was wondering if the Senior Home Medication Review Act, will that come under - just moving into another area here - is that going to come under the Seniors' Department, the Senior Home Medication Review Act?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: That is something that is carried out by the Department of Health and there is no move afoot to move that into the Seniors' Department.
MR. GLAVINE: Maybe at this juncture, because I was quite fascinated when my colleague opposite asked the question about the Seniors' Secretariat, which we certainly know in the province - you know, it has been again a wonderful development and lots of positive things have emanated from that - but we're now creating a Department of Seniors. So, do we have a Seniors' Department or do we have a Seniors' Secretariat?
I don't quite understand that structure yet and if you could also comment, in terms of an umbrella fashion, on what the Department of Seniors will encompass because my understanding of the rationale and the thrust for the Department of Seniors was, in fact, to make it a very connected department with areas like housing, like medications, all of these areas that would allow for seniors to more easily facilitate programs, get information, and have less red tape and arduous processes to work through. So I'm wondering, at this stage, could you give a little bit more definition, rationale, some of the mission, if you wish, for that?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I'm very pleased that the government has decided to place the emphasis on creating a new Department of Seniors - and I say "new" because that's exactly what it is. It's something that there is additional funding to set up a new department or within the department to organize different programs and so on - I do not see taking every aspect related to seniors currently housed in other departments and bringing them into a Department of Seniors. I recently had the opportunity to visit with the Alberta ministry and find out what's working, what isn't working, and one of the comments that the minister made to me, and senior officials made to me, was don't get rid of your secretariat, don't get rid of the organizational structure that you currently have in Nova Scotia because it's one of the best across the country. So within the current system we will be creating a Department of Seniors, but the secretariat will remain intact.
MR. GLAVINE: I guess we'll have to work through that one because, I mean, what you're really telling me is that we will have a Seniors' Secretariat and we'll have a Department of Seniors.
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MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I'm saying that the Department of Seniors will include the Seniors' Secretariat in the model that will be designed.
MR. GLAVINE: Okay. So this is an evolving area?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Yes, it is.
MR. GLAVINE: Yes. Well, I know that the thrust of developing a department was to have this department that would be very encompassing, and in fact, you know, I wouldn't be going to Alberta to look for a model, we need a made-in-Nova Scotia solution. We have the second highest percentage of seniors in the country and we have to develop Nova Scotia solutions. So, in other words, if the secretariat was working so well, why would you create a Department of Seniors? I am for a Department of Seniors, but I would have a very definite and definitive structure as to how it would unfold.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: And, again, when I visited Alberta to look at their system, they were the only other province in Canada that had a Ministry of Seniors. I wanted to look at the programs, what their seniors' department was offering, what they were doing, and I came back with a lot of very good information - again, things that work, things that don't work, things they're in the process of changing.
And a lot of times, yes, you don't need to reinvent the wheel. Yes, it needs to be made-in-Nova Scotia but we don't need to do things that we know don't work from other jurisdictions that they have recently found out. Again, it definitely was a worthwhile visit and I definitely appreciated their comments on how valuable they felt the Seniors' Secretariat is in Nova Scotia and what role they do play and being probably the oldest secretariat in the country, so something that is well viewed by the rest of Canada.
MR. GLAVINE: In terms of the budget for the Secretariat/Department of Seniors, were you happy with that amount this year and do you feel you can carry out what really a department should be doing and unfolding in terms of program development?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Yes, I feel that it's definitely a step in the right direction. An increase of $800,000 is a significant amount of money in this department, and we will be working within that to set up the structure and move forward with that in this current year.
MR. GLAVINE: I missed that, but I'll have to read Hansard - it was my negligence in not hearing your answer.
I was just going to finish off with a few questions on the Status of Women, so could we move to that area, please? Maybe my colleague will have a question or two on the liquor commission to finish up. Sorry for all the shuffling, but you do have a lot of areas.
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In terms of the Status of Women, certainly the business plan outlines a number of pretty lofty goals there. I'm wondering, how is the plan going to match up, and the money availability, with these goals?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Could you repeat that for me?
MR. GLAVINE: There are a number of lofty goals that the Status of Women would like to achieve so I'm wondering, how do you plan on paying for these strategies within the budgeted amount?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: This is the business plan that you're talking about and every item that is in the business plan is definitely funded through the budget that is currently there, or through initiatives that would be carried out through partnerships with other organizations and other levels of government.
MR. GLAVINE: Are there any further policy discussions that are ongoing that could impact on what is in the budget for this year or is everything absolutely targeted?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Within the department, there is a business plan that is put together every year and then there is funding allocated to meet those needs. Is there a reserve pool - no, there isn't a pot of money at the end of the rainbow. However I did say earlier that with the new federal funding that is being made available, there's an additional $5 million that has been set up and $3 million of this will be made available to other levels of government - municipal and provincial - and departments not only within the Status of Women. It could be the Department of Community Services, or Department of Health, who would like to apply for these dollars to do a particular project.
These are things that there may be dollars coming our way through other programs that may not be identified in the budget this year that we see as we go along through the year and may apply for.
MR. GLAVINE: In terms of inclusion and participation, we still have pretty dismal statistics in our province. We only have nine female legislators in the province here in the House of Assembly, 21 per cent of municipal council seats, and 7.3 per cent of mayors and wardens. I am wondering what the government's plan is to change this trend and bring the number of women and public officials in line with the hoped-for numbers and what is certainly seen to be developing in other jurisdictions at a stronger level?
[8:00 p.m.]
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Thank you for that question. We definitely are under-represented in the House of Assembly; I will definitely say that. We are currently 52 per cent of the population and I believe we sit at 17 per cent in the House currently. We definitely
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need to encourage more people to put their name on that ballot, to identify how to become elected. In saying that, this will be the third year for the Nova Scotia Campaign School for Women, a non-partisan campaign school where we partner with Mount Saint Vincent University, accept 30 individuals - and I'm doing this from memory here - who are able to apply to the campaign school and we run them through different things that they would need to know from the day they are thinking about it to going through the nomination process. We do a door-knocking campaign, we do mock interviews, scrums, budgeting - just about every aspect of political life.
One of the biggest issues that has been raised for women is the ability to be able to raise funds for their nomination, and this is something that constituencies and that level will have to definitely look at, but individuals really are challenged with raising the funds to run the original nomination to win that seat to start with. So other than that, we definitely need to encourage more women to come out; we need to encourage more women to sign up for agencies, boards and commissions. That is something that was raised earlier here - we don't have the representation there either and we need to see that.
Municipally, we are doing better but we are not there, again. The goal is 30 per cent for women in local government and that is a project that has been ongoing - there have been different forums held across the province and municipal representatives have been a part of that, along with the federal counterparts.
Something that has been an interesting publication that women have used is our Votes For Women publication, and last year alone that was downloaded 2,000 times. So there is an interest out there; there are women inquiring.
I often go back to something that my daughter asked me when I was going to speak at the first campaign school that we held in this province - I was rehearsing my speech and she was listening to me, being my audience. At the end of it, I was saying how we needed more women to do this and we needed to increase the numbers and so on and she looked at me said, well why wouldn't they? Hopefully that will be the mindset of the next generation that is coming along and those numbers will continue to change, as they are changing in our House now - there was significant gain the last election when we look at it and I hope to continue to see that change.
MR. GLAVINE: Within that whole area, you also then have race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and disability intersecting and impacting as well. I am wondering, are there any special initiatives to try to draw and embrace that almost subgroup, if you wish, within women?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: The Campaign School for Women definitely looks at attracting women from all minorities across this province and we try to get representation spread out. We hold seats for the rural individuals as well, so that we do have a cross section.
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It's not meant to be an urban campaign school, it's meant to be province wide. We have held a variety of forums as well, throughout the province. We've held them in Yarmouth, Cape Breton, and a variety of one-day forums for individuals who are interested in running for political office.
MR. GLAVINE: One of the latest statistics, 2004, showed that women here in the province, in the workforce, earned about 70 per cent of what men were earning, and almost one half of all sole support mothers are living below the poverty line, and we've been talking a lot about a poverty reduction strategy, and I'm wondering, is there something specific, an initiative to try to reduce this discriminatory gap that does exist?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: One of the initiatives that currently has been ongoing is the Advisory Council on the Status of Women hosts a Round Table on Women's Economic Security, with representation from the federal and provincial departments, labour, community and women's organizations, and a working group is looking at how employment affects women in this province so that there isn't this discrepancy, but it includes part-time seasonal work, low wages, individuals working without benefits, and keeping in mind that a large percentage - I don't have that number right before me - of entrepreneurs in this province, are women. A lot of these individuals are home-based businesses that are not eligible to have benefits and definitely contribute a lot to society but there are some voids in the system here that we need to look at.
MR. GLAVINE: One of those areas obviously is in the trades and about 4.6 per cent of women in Nova Scotia currently in the trades and only about 4 per cent of registered apprentices are women. I think less than 10 per cent of students at Nova Scotia Community College trades and technology programs are women. I'm wondering if there is any, again, targeting to get women in the trades? Just what is being done in that area to encourage women in the trade sector?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: Two of the initiatives that we have right now for women in trades and technology is the Techsploration program that is introduced in Grade 9, to female students who are interested in trades and technology. To be eligible they need to write an essay. These essays are evaluated and then so many - I believe it's 100 girls across the province but I believe there's roughly five or six from each school, and I do have one of these schools in my area and it definitely is something that is working very well. They are assigned a mentor and they have the opportunity to go out on the job with these individuals, to research and look at everything that's involved, from being a mechanic to being a computer consultant to working in the military to working in the oil fields. The mentors come back into the school, they have the opportunity for the whole school to listen to these individuals. They get to present at the end of the year to a forum at the Truro Community College, where they demonstrate what they have learned, and at the end of their mentorship, if they choose a field of trade when they graduate, there are scholarships available to them if they were a member of Techsploration.
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Another program that has been recently been introduced in the province is a program called Women Unlimited, and it currently is operating out of the Bridgewater Community College and it is operating out of the Halifax Campus as well. This allows women who are diverse, unemployed women to come in and apply to the trades and at the end of their term they are guaranteed employment in their particular field of work. So it's something that is going over very well.
On International Women's Day, I had the opportunity to go out to the campus and be part of the Women in Trades forum that was the main theme for International Women's Day this year, and listen to individuals who have done a variety of trades and have come through the courses and how successful they have been, and the mentorship that they are providing to young girls in the schools currently.
MR. GLAVINE: There is just a short time remaining, so a few final questions. The last year of full statistics on personal safety and violence against women in this province are pretty staggering. I don't need to list them all here but one in 12 women reported experiencing violence at the hands of their current or former spouse and almost 1,000 sexual assaults; yet many, as we know, go unreported.
We have talked about developing a strategy on the elimination of violence against women in our caucus and I'm wondering if government is looking at anything in terms of a strategy in this area where the negative statistics are pretty staggering?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: One of the priorities this year for the Advisory Council on the Status of Women is to promote the development of a comprehensive strategy to reduce violence against women. This is something that we definitely want to carry out, we will be monitoring the progress and making sure that we are able to meet those commitments that do come forward from that.
MR. GLAVINE: Are you doing any monitoring to say that from a baseline we have seen some improvements made or we certainly need to target more budgetary monies, or other initiatives that are working in other jurisdictions? That statistical profile of violence against women in the province is a pretty staggering one.
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: That currently is being done by the Department of Justice in the Family Violence tracking and I believe you will have your opportunity to ask those questions shortly, but that is currently being done.
MR. GLAVINE: I'm sure, being a pretty conscientious minister, when the feds cut money to the Status of Women, how quickly did you pick up a phone and ask for reconsideration?
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MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: From an Advisory Council on the Status of Women perspective, we definitely were there - I wrote several letters to the minister. Recently in the last few weeks, I came back from a ministers' meeting with the federal minister on what direction the federal government was taking with the changes to the Status of Women Canada and one of those changes was the removal of the office from this area and to set up a regional office, but to also put $5 million back into women's programming in the country. That is something that I look favourably upon, it's the greatest amount of funding that Status of Women Canada has ever had in their budget and it wasn't a matter of cutting dollars, it's an additional $5 million on top of their existing budget from last year. This isn't a reallocation of funds, these are new funds put into new programs. Yes, their mandate has changed, there have been changes to where they are going here, but there definitely is an additional $5 million more and $3 million of that is earmarked for municipalities and other levels of government and departments to apply for, if they have programs or something that they would like to do specifically for women.
MR. GLAVINE: Can you give me hope that there will be a better day when we have something in place that is working?
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I believe that we have things that are working very well. With change it is hard to monitor something that has just recently been introduced but I really think that putting $5 million in the hands of women's organizations in this province will definitely help.
MR. GLAVINE: Thank you very much.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Your time has expired for the four hours of estimates today. Are there going to be any more questions tomorrow for this minister? Well, if there are no questions tomorrow, minister, you can wrap up and read your resolutions as well.
[8:15 p.m.]
MS. BOLIVAR-GETSON: I'm going to make wrap-up very short and sweet. I want to thank everyone for their questions today and especially thank staff for being here. I know I have quite a contingent behind me and they've been doing a juggling match back and forth. I definitely win the prize for having the most staff in the room, I do know that.
E16 - Resolved, that a sum not exceeding $1,554,000 be granted to the Lieutenant Governor to defray expenses in respect of the Emergency Management Office of Nova Scotia, pursuant to the Estimate;
E22 - Resolved, that a sum not exceeding $916,000 be granted to the Lieutenant Governor to defray expenses in respect of the Nova Scotia Advisory Council on the Status of Women, pursuant to the Estimate;
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E30 - Resolved, that a sum not exceeding $1,286,000 be granted to the Lieutenant Governor to defray expenses in respect to the Senior Citizens' Secretariat, pursuant to the Estimate;
E42 - Resolved, that the business plan of the Nova Scotia Liquor Corporation be approved.
MR. CHAIRMAN: Shall Resolution E17 stand?
Resolution E17 stands.
Shall Resolutions E16, E22, E30, and E42 carry?
The resolutions are carried.
That concludes the business for today.
[The subcommittee adjourned at 8:18 p.m.]
