Congress Of Aboriginal Peoples: Native Leaders

Canada Dept: According to the report, various native leaders have recently expressed concern over the impact that Canada's high immigration levels around a quarter of a million people a year and recently expanded temporary foreign workers program about 300,000 are now in the country are having on potential native employment. This summer, for example, Betty Ann Lavallee, the national chief of the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples - which represents urban natives - said Canada needs to train and employ aboriginal youth, not bring in foreign help, according to Vancouver Sun. It should come as no surprise that aboriginal leaders are questioning the need for large-scale immigration when so many of their own people are unemployed. While finding ways of bringing more native people into the workforce will require imagination and persistence, the fact is that most of Canada's expected labour short-ages can be met through our existing human resources and, with sufficient planning and organization, aboriginals should be able to play a major role in this process and the Canadian Press reported on Sept. 20 that Rick Dykstra, the parliamentary secretary to Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, met with representatives of the Assembly of First Nations and the Congress of Aboriginal Peoples to obtain their views on immigration policy. This is the first time such a meeting has taken place with leaders of Canada's native communities and is significant in terms of ascertaining their views on the extent to which current immigration levels may affect the prospects of bringing more people from their communities into the workforce. Dykstra, in the event, described the Sept. 20 meeting as "very productive." While making the point that he was not asked to shut the door on immigration, he indicated "there definitely was a leaning toward lowering the numbers, for at least a little while, to assist them in their endeavour to help with youth unemployment." (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.