Some provincial leaders of trades governing bodies are calling a recent report, that says restricting the rate of apprentice entry acts as a barrier to entry into the trades, "food for thought."
Some provincial leaders of trades governing bodies are calling a recent report, that says restricting the rate of apprentice entry acts as a barrier to entry into the trades, "food for thought."
Access Denied: The Effect of Apprenticeship Restrictions in Skilled Trades by the C.D. Howe Institute says instead of regulating the rate of apprentice entry, governing bodies should focus on the quality of work and safety standards.
Safety has generally been one of the main reasons supporting higher journeyperson to apprentice ratios.
The report points out that there is very little data on safety.
Ontario College of Trades (OCOT) chief executive officer and registrar Bob Guthrie said that apprenticeships are work-based training in high stakes environments and different from front end-loaded employment training systems, like in universities.
“It’s actually on the job so it’s important that there be good supervision to address the issues with respect to safety and that there be a good training experience,” he said.
“There’s a case to be made that there should be a ratio. What that ratio should be depends… I think it depends on the trade and on the circumstances.”
WorkSafeBC records indicate injury rates have decreased for trades and transport occupations since compulsory trades and journeyperson ratios were eliminated in the province in 2003, pointed out B.C. Industry Training Authority chief executive officer Kevin Evans.
Although B.C. doesn’t have compulsory trades, it has 20 regulated trades, where safety is a top priority.
“We’ve set up a safety regulatory reform, which really enables us as the apprenticeship authority to focus on training and not be mixing with training and enforcement. It’s sometimes difficult to be getting buy-in from employers and workplaces when the trainer is also the policeman,” explained Evans.
Though Evans cannot definitively say that high journeyperson to apprentice ratios deter people from entering the trades, he said that the elimination of compulsory trades hasn’t caused a decrease in the number of people entering the trades.
“Since 2004, the number of apprentices continues to increase and the number of certificates of qualification that we grant each year has continued to increase,” he said.
Last year’s enrollment of 8,750 apprentices was an all-time high for the province.
The report said provincial regulation of skilled trades reduces the incentive for low-quality workers to enter a trade in the first place.
On the flip side, “more restrictive entry requirements might reduce incumbents’ incentive to innovate or offer higher-quality services, and cause the reduction in quality to be greater than that of the original problem of low-quality entrants,” it states.
Evans said the Red Seal pass rates in B.C. are higher than the national average.
“The quality of the instruction, both in the classroom and presumably on the job, if it’s been impacted by the elimination of ratios, it’s certainly not showing up in terms of the results of the output,” he said.
Both Evans and Guthrie noted a trend throughout Canada where jurisdictions are adjusting and lowering ratios.
“I think it’s more driven by wanting to ensure that there aren’t barriers to access to entry,” said Evans.
He also pointed to the 210,000 construction workers expected to retire by 2021, according to the latest forecast by BuildForce Canada, formerly the Construction Sector Council.
“Some of these ratios are going to be very difficult to maintain when you simply do not have the journeypersons there,” said Evans.
Guthrie recognized that high ratios can have an impact on employers, especially smaller firms that want to grow, but are restrained by high ratios.
“Particularly for small employers, there can be a constraint there. We’re hoping that our review process will address that,” he said.
Guthrie believes that other jurisdictions will move towards the OCOT model, which lets industry decide its own fate when it comes to ratios.
“Whatever the process is in other provinces and territories, we know it’s a government process, it’s essentially inscrutable and it responds to wherever it can get the attention and the action by influence of people in government,” he said.
“I think this is a better process. I think it’s having the effect we want, which is to get industry engaged in the discussion and to make those decisions on what the ratios should be on the basis of evidence and compelling arguments and now we have the ability to do that in Ontario.”
Evans is satisfied with the results of no compulsory trades in B.C.
“We looked at (this report) as a confirmation that we think we’re on the right track in British Columbia,” he said.
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