Movement for Canadian Literacy

Basic Skills and the Bottom Line:

4. What Impact Will Bill C-12 Have on Adult Literacy in Canada?

As a result of changes in the structure of Canada's labour market and associated increased demands for higher levels of skills, people with low literacy levels are at greater risk of being unemployed in today's economy. Their employment prospects in the future are likely to be even worse. Any reductions to wage replacement benefits or any criteria that make it more difficult for unemployed workers to qualify for benefits will have negative impacts on large numbers of Canadians with low literacy levels.

Given the clear correlation between low levels of literacy and low incomes, people with low literacy levels and low incomes will suffer greater than average hardship as a result of any cuts in wage replacement benefits or changes that make it more difficult to be eligible for benefits.

These points notwithstanding, MCL will not address any of the specific proposals contained in Bill C-12 related to wage replacement benefits. We believe that other national groups are in a better position than we are to research and articulate the impacts that changes in wage replacement benefits and eligibility requirements will have on the poor and unemployed. We do, however, want to add our voices to those groups that are urging both federal and provincial governments not to pursue deficit reduction strategies that penalize poor or disadvantaged Canadians.

Dollars Available for Active Supports

We applaud the decision to increase the level of active supports to the unemployed. Unquestionably, we see the need for increased government spending to help people get back to work. However, given our comments regarding benefit levels, it should be clear that MCL is opposed to funding increased active supports by reducing wage benefits to unemployed workers.

Overlooking the source of the $2.7 billion, for the purpose of this discussion, it must be noted that the figure being proposed for active supports is still grossly inadequate to address the training needs of Canadian adults with low literacy levels. In order to be more precise about how inadequate the $2.7 billion figure is we would need data that are currently unavailable; for example, the average annual number of unemployed adults with low literacy skills, and the portion of active support dollars that would be invested in training grants or loans for these adults.

We do know, however, that roughly 3 million adult Canadians lack the very basic literacy skills needed to adequately meet the demands of the workplace, and another 4 million have some difficulty with everyday reading tasks (LSUDA, 1989; IALS, 1995). If every penny of the $2.7 billion were directed exclusively to literacy training, the amount would not be adequate to enable 7 million Canadians to develop the level of literacy skills they need to remain employed and employable in an increasingly high skilled labour market.

Skills Loans and Grants

Bill C-12 will eliminate the federal government's role in directing the purchase of training from training providers. Instead, a system of skills loans and grants for eligible claimants, developed with the consent of provincial governments, is proposed. We have several major concerns about this proposal as it relates to Canada's adult literacy problem.

Recognition of Literacy Education

Our first concern relates to the question of whether literacy education will be recognized as legitimate training under the proposed skills loans and grants. Under the proposed legislation, will the federal government require provinces to recognize basic literacy education as legitimate training for the purposes of skills grants and loans? If not, then Bill C-12 will do nothing to ensure greater access to basic skills training for Canadians.

Costs of Training

Bill C-12 proposes to pass an undetermined portion of the costs of training to the individual, essentially asking them to incur debts at a time when they are out of a job. This proposal might be reasonable if it were realistic to assume that the individual will find work upon completion of the training program

Literacy training, however, must be recognized as a first step towards employment readiness. In most cases an individual may be expected to require more job-specific training, once she or he has gained sufficient literacy skills. Thus we do not believe that the government should encourage adults to incur debt for literacy education programs.

Responsibility for Choosing Training

Assuming that literacy education is recognized as legitimate training, our next concern relates to the unmanageable burden that may be placed on adults with low literacy skills to locate and make choices about literacy training programs.

Subsection 57(1)(e)(ii) Bill C-12 indicates that people receiving benefits will be expected to take "primary responsibility for identifying their employment needs and locating services necessary to allow them to meet those needs."

Adults with low level literacy skills need considerable assistance when it comes to accessing information and making their way through the maze of training opportunities that exist. The special access issues and needs of adults with low literacy skills were clearly overlooked when decisions were made to reduce the number of CEC employment counsellors and centres and replace some of these with automated CEC information kiosks.

Print-outs of the introductory screens displayed by CEC's automated information system have been included in an appendix to this submission. To put it as simply as possible, if a person can't read and use a computer-based system, these automated systems, as they are presently configured, are useless. This isn't a small problem. Based on the figures in IALS (1995) and LSUDA (1989) we estimate that at least 3 million adult Canadians lack the literacy skills needed to use these machines.

The issue of access goes beyond the technical domain into the more personal realm. Years of living with a "literacy problem" impacts profoundly on an adult's independence and self-confidence. Information and referral (1 & R) services that are effective with this group are human and humane. In addition to providing information, effective I & R services for adults with literacy issues provide empathy, encouragement, respect and client-centered assistance.

Program Quality Control and Accountability

Assuming that an adult with low literacy skills has managed to find his or her way to an appropriate training program, MCL's next concern with Bill C-12 focuses on what could be a lack of quality control over and accountability of training providers. As far as we know there are no provisions in Bill C-12 guaranteeing that public dollars will go only to high quality training programs.

While this concern applies to all training, the issue is all the more acute with respect to adult literacy education. As already noted, those who have struggled for years with literacy often have low self-confidence, particularly with respect to their sense of themselves as potential learners. An insensitive or inappropriate approach to a new adult learner with these particular vulnerabilities could do irreversible damage to that individual's willingness to participate in training.

The issue of outcomes from training programs is tied closely to the issue of program quality control. We understand that some are calling for national training exit standards to provide some measure of program quality control, standardization and accountability. We support this direction, with one caveat.

The issues of assessing training outcomes for basic literacy education are many and complex. They have recently been documented in a paper developed by the Ontario Literacy Coalition. Before outcome measures can be used to control the quality of literacy education programs, a great deal of related development work will need to be done.

Some promising initiatives in this regard are beginning to emerge in some provinces (for example, the Recognition for Adult Learning Systems in Ontario), but these systems are in a very early stage of development and implementation.

Portability of Training Credentials

One final concern regarding the move away from direct purchasing of training seats to a less controlled training marketplace is related to issues around portability of learning credentials.

In "Agenda: Jobs and Growth" the government recognizes the need to "make learning more portable".

If the EI system under Bill C-12 loosens government control over training providers, and requires no standardization in training programs or approaches from province to province, how will Bill C-12 contribute to the goal of making learning more portable?