Partnership Agreements Ripped Up
[Apr 7, 2010 01:54 PM]
For immediate release:
April 7, 2010
Aboriginal Employment Strategy Shattered: Unions
REGINA—A number of unions are speaking out against what they are calling the Saskatchewan Government’s efforts to set hiring policies back by decades.
The Aboriginal Employment Development Program—the branch of the First Nations and Métis Relations (FNMR) Department which signed Partnership Agreements with unions, employers and aboriginal groups—has been terminated. In a letter to signatories of the partnership agreements, including unions, FNMR Deputy Minister Ron Crowe informed signatories to the agreements that “current Aboriginal Employment Development Partnership Agreements are no longer valid, anticipated agreements will not be entered into, and funding supports are not available.”
The unions are calling the scrapping of in-force partnership agreements regressive and short-sighted.
“These agreements promised a better future for our workforce and for aboriginal people,” said Larry Hubich, president of the Saskatchewan Federation of Labour. “The agreements take a holistic approach to achieving a more representative workforce by bringing employers, aboriginal groups, unions and others to the table to negotiate the best ways to foster participation. If this government wants to go back to a quota hiring system, they do so to the detriment of our provincial workforce as a whole.”
Saskatchewan has the largest gap of employment rates between aboriginal and non-aboriginal adults. In 2007, 88.3 per cent of non-aboriginal adults were employed, compared to only 66.4 per cent of employment-age aboriginal people.
The Partnership Agreements have resulted in thousands of aboriginal people getting appropriate education and training and entering into the workforce. As of March 31, 2009 there were 98 active Partnership Agreements resulting in 4,465 aboriginal people entering the workforce. In addition, 36,676 employees received Aboriginal Awareness Training in addition to 1,996 aboriginal employees who received work-based skills training.
With baby-boomers about to retire and the working-age aboriginal population about to boom, union leaders are concerned that the cancellation of the Partnership Agreements will result in a dramatic labour force shortage in the coming years.
“This program was making major gains toward solving a problem,” said Tom Graham, president of the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Saskatchewan, which has signed 12 Partnership Agreements in the health care, municipal and education sectors. “Without investment now into training, education and employment programs, this province is staring into a future more troubled than our past in terms of aboriginal participation and the development of our communities.”
A problem, Graham notes, which is more expensive than the solution. While the Program has cost $780,000 per year, the Saskatchewan Institute of Public Policy calculates the cost of aboriginal unemployment to be $2 billion, annually.
The Partnership Agreement Program
Partnership Agreements are negotiated between multiple parties, each potentially including employers, aboriginal councils, unions and government. All parties approach the negotiations with an agreement to build an agenda together.
The documents outline opportunities and responsibilities for each party which have included ways to prepare potential employees by identifying employment opportunities and training and education requirements; and prepare workplaces by delivering Aboriginal Awareness and Misconception Training.
Partnership Agreements have resulted in contract language being added to collective bargaining agreements.
Aboriginal leaders have identified major regressive trends in former hiring policies, such as designated quotas in which aboriginal people are hired through affirmative action. Not only does an unprepared workplace and unprepared employee often result in that employee leaving the employment—but quotas restrict aboriginal employment to only those jobs which employers choose.
In contrast, the Partnership Agreements help set the conditions for aboriginal people to become qualified to bid on any job, and provides a healthy and accepting workplace in which employees can access training to gain additional skills and qualifications. Recruitment and long-term retention flourishes under the Partnership Agreement Program.
Demographics Changing
According to the 2006 census, 55 per cent of the aboriginal population in Saskatchewan was under the age of 25. The median age of aboriginal people in Saskatchewan was only 22 years.
Over the next two decades, 171,500 working baby boomers will retire. With Saskatchewan’s low population growth, the workforce is projected to require an additional 120,000 working people by 2020.
“We don’t want token employment,” said Graham. “What we are asking for is forward-thinking solutions to address shortages and solve rampant unemployment and poverty issues in aboriginal communities.”
Hubich added that problems with multiple causes require multiple solutions. “The holistic approach has been successful in providing equal access to opportunity, and preventing discrimination from getting in the way of employment,” he said. “We haven’t seen another approach that works to achieve a representative workforce—so why scrap this one which has been working so well?”
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For more information, contact:
Saskatchewan Federation of Labour: (306) 525-0197
CUPE Saskatchewan: (306) 757-1009