Canadian HR Reporter

CANADIAN HR REPORTER MARCH 2019 10 NEWS Echoing the feds e Quebec government wants to better align the needs of the labour market due to the vast amounts of employee shortages in some regions and professions in Quebec, said Nadine Landry, a partner at PwC Law in Montreal. " ey've come to the conclu- sion that the people that are cur- rently being selected under the current legislation don't have the skills to fi ll those jobs. So they want to make a switch to align basically what's needed in the la- bour market with the candidates that most likely will be able to fi ll those positions." "What we had in the past is they would open the pool for a specifi c number of applications and then (it was) fi rst arrived, fi rst served. And then they would also, out- side of the quota, allow anybody... that's here on a work permit valid for more than 12 months, or that has a validated job off er, to apply outside of the quota." With the new "Arrima" portal to submit applications, the govern- ment has the discretion to invite the people who meet the needs of the labour market, she said. Under the proposed law, it's all about the principle of expression of interest, where immigrants say they want to live in Quebec, and the government goes into a pool and invites people to apply based on criteria that could include language skills, for example, said Landry. It's similar to the federal Ex- press Entry system, but at the na- tional level, there's a point grid so applicants know as soon as they submit their profi le how many points they will be awarded, she said. "In Quebec, it's not a point system. You provide your infor- mation and then the government goes in and they can isolate one specifi c criteria, or they can cu- mulate a couple." "They have not publicly an- nounced how they will do that; they just gave themselves the fl ex- ibility and they were clear to the fact that it was not going to be a point system like the federal one," said Landry. " ey're going to intake when they need it so they can process right away, instead of intaking on set dates or intaking because it's provided for in the budget, or things like that. It would be more intake because of the needs and what (they) have the capacity to process at this time." Federally, the government in- troduced an expression-of-inter- est system where it holds a draw every two weeks and selects from a pool of interested candidates, said Colin Singer, immigration lawyer and managing partner at Immigration.ca in Montreal. "Now they can control the exact number of people who are going to be in the system for permanent residence," he said. " e processing times are six to 12 months, so now they have a very effi cient system and there's no false promises and no hopes for people to be in a system thinking they'll be processed when in fact it was fi rst in, never processed." Cancelling the existing applica- tions is certainly not fair, but from a management point of view, Que- bec is following through with a solution that no previous govern- ment has tried, though it's been introduced successfully on the federal side, said Singer. "Quebec has had a real prob- lem with the management of fi ling inventory," he said. " ey also continue, until very recently, fi rst in-fi rst out, and what Que- bec has experienced is identical to what the federal authorities experienced — Quebec has this growing backlog, which cur- rently sits at more than 50,000 individuals." In addition, Quebec lacks the proper infrastructure investment and trained personnel to give ef- fect to these programs designed to bring people in quickly, said Singer. "Quebec has one of lowest un- employment rates in the country," he said. "Each month we're seeing, in some parts of Quebec, the un- employment rates are at histori- cal lows, all-time lows, so this is a problem if you're an employer — you're not seeing the fast treat- ment of skilled workers that em- ployers need urgently." The lack of manpower in Quebec is a huge issue, said omas Dorval, CEO of the Con- seil du Patronat du Québec in Montreal. "We have a need for 1.5 million workers for the next 10 years in Quebec, and we know that only 56 per cent of that new manpower will come from the students that are right now at the universities," he said. "We need people coming from foreign countries that are able to take a job rapidly because they have already the skills or the com- petencies and so forth to meet the need from the labour market." Part of the issue is many im- migrants don't want to move to sub-regions that need workers, said Dorval. Language is also a major issue. "We need also to bring aboard people that will be able to speak right now or to speak later in learning French, in order to stay here and integrate into the com- munity," he said. "All of that together means that we need to have some improve- ment, some change in the way we process all the immigration levels, including temporary workers and including refugees and including the selected people based on their grades and so forth." However, the Quebec govern- ment already made changes to the point system when it came to French language skills, as seen in 2012 when applicants lost points — which resulted in lawsuits, said David Chalk, barrister and solicitor at Chalk Immigration in Montreal. (In late February, the Ontario Superior Court issued a tempo- rary injunction ordering the CAQ to resume processing the more than 18,000 applications after a group of immigration lawyers said the move to cancel them was illegal.) And the government awards a certain amount of points for spe- cifi c types of training, determined by the government's perception of the demand for people with that skill set, "so they already fi ne-tune their system on an annual basis to take into account labour market connections; they're already try- ing to match the point system with the demands of the labour force," he said. "So for them to say to these peo- ple 'If we give them selection cer- tifi cates, they are not going to be well-suited to the labour market' makes no sense — they rejig their system to take into consideration labour market demands on an an- nual basis already." Impact on employers e potential changes are already aff ecting employers, said Landry, because if they have employees in the province on a temporary work permit who want to pass the per- manent residency, their fi les are going to be cancelled and they have to start over. "It really affects those that are trying to recruit long-term, meaning when you try to con- vince the candidates to take a po- sition up in Quebec, some of the people will say, 'Well, do I have a future there after my work per- mit of two years or three years… is there a path to permanent resi- dency?'" she said. The uncertainty is really the main issue for employers, accord- ing to Landry. "Before this new law, we would be able to say, 'Well, you have so many points on the grid and be- cause you will have a valid work permit, you'll be able to submit your application.'" " at's no longer going to be the truth." Cancelling the backlog of more than 18,000 applicants is cer- tainly neither fair nor ethical, said Singer. " ey're now facing an outcry and a backlash from people who advocate for immigration that this is just unfair." However, it's not likely the CAQ government is concerned about its brand because there's no shortage of people willing to move there, he said. "But the Quebec government is not only dealing with individuals who are coming to the province — there's a need to serve employ- ers, that's a strong mandate, and in order to recruit and retain, you need to be able to (get) people here quickly. So I think the way they're currently heading, yes, I think they're harming Canadian employers in Quebec." Quebec employers and busi- nesses are "extremely prejudiced in this process," said Chalk, be- cause, within the province, it takes six months for an applicant to get a selection certifi cate. People then have to apply for permanent residence through the federal government, which takes about 18 months, so it adds up to a two- year process. And that's only going to get worse because there are already a lot of people who have the certifi - cate in Quebec, but the province wants the feds to put through fewer applicants, he said. "That inevitably is going to back up the system more than it's already backed up… So if I'm try- ing to sell this province as a des- tination for a foreign worker, I'm going to have to tell him 'You're going to become (a permanent resident) in Canada, if that's ulti- mately your objective, at best, 18 months later.' at's the current system." Another challenge for employ- ers is language barriers. Many employers recruit from engineer- ing faculties that only teach Eng- lish, and many international PhD students don't speak French, said Chalk. Employers don't know how they're going to keep those people in Quebec, and are "even thinking about opening branch offi ces out- side of (Quebec) so that they can hold onto their most important employees," he said. "It's going to be certainly some- thing that will give people pause before they commit to working in this province or setting up a busi- ness here," said Chalk. "Because unless all the inter- national workers they're plan- ning to bring are francophones, that's an issue they wouldn't have to deal with somewhere else in Canada." Low unemployment rate requires quicker process QUEBEC < pg. 1 Proposed changes to the immigration system in Quebec should make for a better match between candidates and employers, says Coalition Avenir Québec Immigration Minister Simon Jolin-Barrette. Credit: Jacques Boissinot (THE CANADIAN PRESS) COMPENSATION info@resourcecorporation.com | (416) 498-7800 ext. 101 | www.resourcecorporation.com Compensation Surveys Compensation Surveys Compensation Surveys Incentive Programs Incentive Programs Incentive Programs Job Descriptions Job Descriptions Job Descriptions Job Evaluation Job Evaluation Job Evaluation Pay Equity Pay Equity Pay Equity Performance Appraisal Performance Appraisal Performance Appraisal Salary Administration Salary Administration Salary Administration Sales Compensation Sales Compensation Sales Compensation CONSULTING. "We need people coming from foreign countries that are able to take a job rapidly because they have already the skills or the competencies."

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