October 11, 2024

By Chinweizu Okeke

Canada is competing for skilled tradespeople from around the world who have the knowledge and skills needed to support our emerging green economy. To future-proof its prosperity, Canada must rethink its approach to attracting them.

The Smart Prosperity Institute (SPI) projected labour shortages for clean growth sectors in our Ready for Green Jobs report. Our conclusion? Canada must add to its skilled labour supply to avoid worsening a skilled labour shortage. This is particularly important in decarbonizing sectors with higher ratios of retiring workers, such as manufacturing, agriculture and forestry. To address these labour needs, stakeholders will need to attract new and more diverse domestic entrants and set up targeted immigration programs; this blog focuses on the latter. 

Despite the strong push for skilled trade immigration, the path for workers into Canada’s labour market is not straightforward. The most prominent skilled trade-focused immigration program, the Federal Skilled Trades Program (FSTP), has suffered from low uptake. An assessment by the OECD noted that between 2013 and 2019, the FSTP never reached its annual maximum capacity for applicants. Addressing this shortfall will help spur clean economic growth, improve Canadians’ wellbeing, and help Canada achieve its zero-emissions targets.

Applicants to the FSTP must have either a year-long, full-time offer from a Canadian employer or a Canadian-issued certificate of qualification (an official document that proves that a person is qualified to work in a particular skilled trade). Drawing from year-long research and engagement with employers and employment and settlement service providers, SPI identified that a major challenge for foreign-trained skilled tradespeople is not knowing how much time and money it takes to apply for and receive a certificate of qualification.

The challenge: uncertainty and high costs

International applicants must pay for travel and significant exam fees without the certainty of having paid work. This is because Canadian employers hesitate to hire people without Canadian training, certification and/or experience, and provinces require applicants to sit for trade certification exams in-person.^[1]

In Canada’s federated system, the federal government manages immigration, but it’s usually provincial and territorial certification bodies that recognize foreign credentials. This division of power means the cost and process for attaining a certificate of qualification varies greatly across Canada and information on both is often hard to get.

To be certified, applicants must first apply for approval to take the exams. SPI’s team of researchers could only confirm how long it would take to get approval to sit for the licensing exam in some provinces. In the Yukon, it takes one to six weeks, twenty working days in Nova Scotia, eight to ten weeks in British Columbia, up to a year in Saskatchewan and up to eighteen months in Alberta.

If approved, applicants pay varying amounts to sit for exams in Canada. In Saskatchewan, it’s a $125-fee for the trade exam. In PEI, some trade exams cost $50 and in Ontario, exam fees vary depending on the testing centre. The exams must also be written in Canada, and if they fail, applicants often pay an additional fee to reapply.

These fees are in addition to the cost of travelling to Canada, accommodation and a temporary visa application. These costs can discourage immigrating skilled tradespeople, thereby costing Canada much-needed, qualified labour.

Solutions: clarity and coordination

Canada can address these issues by streamlining procedures to ease workers’ entry into the country and the workforce. At a minimum, greater coordination is needed between the federal government and provincial certification bodies to ensure that up-to-date information on the process and costs of obtaining relevant certification are available. Additional investments in standardizing and reducing fees and approval times across provinces and territories would help immigrants align their job prospects with other factors such as family, language or cultural ties.

The murky details of multiple financial costs involved in obtaining a Canadian certification could be replaced with a more transparent process that informs the applicants upfront about all the costs of getting certified. While Nova Scotia’s exam fee is among the highest at $750, it includes both the cost of applying to take the exam and writing the exam, easing the administrative burden on applicants.

SPI believes a balance can be struck between maintaining the integrity of provincial certification standards and addressing a significant barrier faced by prospective immigrants from whose skills and knowledge Canada and the climate could benefit. A first step could be for federal and provincial governments and agencies to pilot offering certification exams virtually so that applicants do not need to travel to Canada to take them.

Immigrating often requires people to start over, but it should not require them to restart their career when there is an immediate need for their skills and labour. Canadian provincial and federal governments must make it easier and cheaper to navigate the immigration programs designed for skilled tradespeople. Doing so will help Canada be a competitive and attractive destination for foreign-trained skilled tradespeople who have the skills to support Canada’s clean economic growth.