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The Parliamentary Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration has released the report “Promoting Economic Prosperity Through Settlement Services”.
The Committee makes the following ten recommendations in the report:
- Recommendation 1 - The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada, as it takes measures to improve labour market data, ensure that detailed labour market information is available to prospective immigrants online and through pre-arrival services.
- Recommendation 2 - The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada conduct ongoing monitoring and evaluation of both established pre-arrival services and any new initiatives to measure results achieved and identify best practices.
- Recommendation 3 - The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada review pre-arrival services available to prospective immigrants to ensure that as many immigrants as possible are able to benefit from these services.
- Recommendation 4 - The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada continue to provide supports, including child care, to immigrant women to facilitate their uptake of settlement services.
- Recommendation 5 - The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada encourage successful mentoring programs to make a submission to the CIC hosted “Best practices in settlement services” website as a way of promoting these programs.
- Recommendation 6 - The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada continue to support Immigrant Employment Councils in their outreach to employers.
- Recommendation 7 - The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada create a new category of best practices for “collaborative initiatives” as a way of profiling partnerships between settlement agencies and employers on the website “Best practices in settlement services”.
- Recommendation 8 - The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada develop a broader employer engagement strategy, so that a common vision could be developed with clear responsibilities for each stakeholder: Immigrant Employment Councils, settlement agencies, Local Immigration Partnerships, and CIC.
- Recommendation 9 - The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada continue to support Local Immigration Partnerships.
- Recommendation 10 - The Committee recommends that the Government of Canada fund research on promising practices to support innovative settlement services.
The report was adopted by the Committee on June 9, 2015 and presented to the House on June 16, 2015.
OCASI Executive Director Debbie Douglas appeared as a witness before the Committee to provide evidence for the study that resulted in this report. Click here for the OCASI presentation.