Mr. Speaker, the recent release of the Bureau of Stats numbers would give most people an opportunity to celebrate. What they do say is the fact that unemployment rates have reached a new one-year low. This is normally a good thing. But normally this doesn’t always tell you the whole story when you take a look at the bigger picture of what all the stats say. When you look closely at them, you actually see what the true figures are.
Employment figures have actually dropped, and I mean in this case they’ve gone south, literally and figuratively.
Participation in the employment sector, trying to get a job out there, is seeing a new low. What this is really telling us is Northerners are giving up looking for work. So when you aggregate that together with the unemployment rate, it looks like more people are working.
The true question is: What are the employment figures? Have employment figures changed? Actually, employment figures are dropping as well.
The numbers tell the true story, not just half a story publicized about unemployment figures looking better. Yes, they are looking better, but the point being is, as made earlier, less people are looking for work because they just can’t find it.
When I was in Fort Smith this summer I talked to a lady named Betty, and she was telling me how challenging it is to find meaningful work in Fort Smith. Meaningful work means work she can afford to take care of herself and her children. I can’t
imagine hearing more painful words when I hear that from somebody, because you know what? Every person wants to take care of their family.
When I was in Inuvik this spring, I talked to a guy named David. He told me how he has given up looking for work because he can’t find work to help pay for his rent, his gas bills, his cost of living is through the roof. What social assistance can offer him just can’t cut the mustard.
The true unemployment rates don’t tell the whole story as publicized by the NWT Bureau of Stats, because the figures, if they were actual figures, they would tell you that the actual unemployment rate in Yellowknife is about 3.4 percent, but the community rates are over 30 percent. Sure, when you average them, they look good, but the fact is, what it’s telling me here are job opportunities are few and far between in the communities, employment is tight in Yellowknife, and we’re doing very little to address this problem.
Minister Kenney has made some really serious changes to our EI program. He’s changed the Temporary Foreign Worker Program.
My question for the Minister of ECE will be: How prepared are we as a government? How ready are we as a government to pick up the slack that the federal government has downloaded on us unfairly? Are we prepared?