BRAMPTON – Ontario urgently needs to catch up with the rest of the country when it comes to producing skilled tradespeople to help kick-start the province’s faltering economy, Ontario PC Leader Tim Hudak said today.
Hudak issued the warning while touring Solutions Electrical in Brampton as part of his “200,000 Skilled Trades Jobs Tour” aimed at detailing his plan to reform Ontario’s 70’s-era apprenticeship system.
“Key to our plan is changing Ontario’s antiquated scheme that requires businesses to employ three, four or even five journeymen to train a single apprentice,” Hudak said.
Hudak noted that most provinces are well ahead of Ontario when it comes to lowering their apprenticeship ratios: Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, PEI, New Brunswick, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta all have lower ratios of apprentices to journeymen.
“My plan would lower that ratio to one-to-one, while delegating more responsibility to Ontario colleges for matching apprentices up with employers. The result would be 200,000 new skilled trades jobs – from sheet metal workers to plumbers to electricians,” Hudak said.
"We agree with Tim Hudak's push to change the apprenticeship system,” said Frank Cozzolino, owner of Solutions Electrical. “There are lots of good people out there who want to enter the skilled trades. Why is this government getting in their way?"
Hudak said his apprenticeship reform plan is just one of several ideas from the Ontario PC Caucus designed to address worsening economic problems under a do-nothing Liberal government.
Other elements of the PC plan to tackle Ontario’s jobs, spending and debt crisis include:
a mandatory public sector wage freeze, so government employees share in the sacrifices their private sector counterparts are making every day
a top-to-bottom review of all spending areas to find efficiencies
a full examination of what services government should, and should not provide, and what better delivery mechanisms are available
fixing a broken public sector salary arbitration system, and
a package of job creation measures, including lowered businesses taxes and a rollback of needless regulation
“It’s plain that Dalton McGuinty and the Liberals are out of ideas,” Hudak said. “As that is the case, he is welcome to mine.”
