In this heated economy many Northern employers face shortages of both skilled and semi-skilled workers. Allowing employers to fill their labour shortages through foreign employees, both on a temporary or permanent basis, is a win-win for our economy, and there is a role for the G.N.W.T. to play.
There are shortages in a variety of industries, and we lack the number of interested people to catch up. Eleven jurisdictions, including the Yukon, have a provincial nomination system that helps speed up the immigration process for skilled and semi-skilled workers who wish to become permanent residents of that jurisdiction. Of course, Citizenship and Immigration still have the final say, but these programs do cut the red tape and make it easier for these employers to help fill those labour shortages.
I believe the G.N.W.T. needs to take a look at setting up such a program. I’m also aware of the difficulty and expense the employers go through in the food and hospitality industry as they face trying to recruit staff. It is extremely difficult to find workers who are willing to work for the wages that they can provide. Some food service operators have had some success in hiring temporary foreign workers, but this process is expensive and very time consuming.
We need to help our employers meet these challenges, Mr. Speaker. The resulting tax revenue and increased grant from Canada that will result from higher immigration levels could easily help with that expense involved.
Mr. Speaker, I can best describe the situation as a Scylla or Charybolis. If we do nothing, the six-headed monster will chew those hard-working small business people down, wear them out and cause them to give up. Or equally as bad, the whirlpool of bureaucracy will swallow them up in a frustration type way in a system that was designed to always help them. If we do nothing the ambition of small business will be sunk, and it is embarrassing for this government to watch that sailing ship sink without helping it.
