Labour mobility across Canada in some skilled trades is guaranteed through the national Red Seal program.Marissa Tiel/The Globe and Mail
Ben Woodfinden is the former director of communications for Pierre Poilievre. Mark Lawson is the former deputy chief of staff to Doug Ford.
This week, Canada’s premiers and the Prime Minister are meeting in Muskoka, in the shadow of a trade war and under new threats from U.S. President Donald Trump. Previous First Ministers’ meetings have resulted in commitments to progress in the months ahead. But Mr. Trump’s constant tariff threats are not going away, and even if a deal is reached with the United States, the uncertainty and unpredictability of the President require us to continue to work to build one national economy.
After commitments to major nation-building projects, the next challenge facing the country is unlocking labour mobility for the workers who would build these major projects. This work should now become the primary focus of the premiers in the months ahead.
Today, labour mobility across Canada in some skilled trades is guaranteed through the national Red Seal program. More recently, a series of bilateral provincial agreements has committed to finding a path to mutual recognition. Ontario’s Bill 2 allows workers with qualifications from other provinces to work while their credential is evaluated, creating an effective “as of right” scenario.
Now, it is time for this ability and benefit to be extended to every Canadian worker. This should be the focus of the next phase of breaking down barriers between provinces.
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While the bilateral approach offers a path to progress, led especially by Nova Scotia and Ontario, it also risks creating a patchwork of credential recognition regimes, each noble in intent but potentially fragmented in execution. The federal government took some important steps recently by legislating that federal regulatory bodies recognize provincial licences and certifications for workers, but this only applies in the federal jurisdiction. Ultimately, what is needed is a coherent national strategy led by the provinces.
Nova Scotia serves as a harbinger of things to come. After tabling an ambitious bill to tackle labour mobility, challenges emerged from the province’s self-regulating industries and licensing bodies, with the province’s engineering licensing body warning that labour mobility could open up a “big fuzzy grey zone that creates a risk to the public.” Others warned of diluted standards in areas such as social work.
Prairie pragmatism provides a path forward. Of all provinces, Saskatchewan has demonstrated a long-term approach to labour mobility that could underpin total labour mobility across the country.
In 2022, Saskatchewan brought in the Labour Mobility and Fair Registration Practices Act, giving its provincial regulators 20 days to certify and recognize any qualification obtained in another province. Regulators have 50 days to assess an internationally trained applicant’s qualification, recognizing that it could prove more complex. If any application is declined, a regulator must issue a detailed decision and a pathway to certification for a rejected applicant.
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If identical legislation were adopted and passed by every province, Saskatchewan’s system could support bilateral mutual recognition agreements. It would also accelerate adoption and create a system of precedents, allowing provinces to move quickly and methodically to adapt to labour market demand, support “as of right” systems and thereby protect provinces from an inevitable call that the federal government should simply take over the system if it moves too slowly.
The premiers could also take ideas from unexpected places. The Conservative Party of Canada has long promised to bring in a “Blue Seal” that would create a national standard for health care professionals, allowing them to work in any province or territory.
Measures like these would create a single national labour market and open up a world of possibility. Workers could choose more freely from the provinces that offered the most opportunity or the best environment for raising a family, creating conditions for internal competition and migration. Making our provinces and cities compete with each other for workers and talent will drive innovation and dynamism. Co-operation and recognition of credentials could rightly lead to greater efforts at retention and recruitment. The best and brightest would finally have access to opportunities across Canada.
In this moment for our country, we should not tolerate small ambition. Major projects such as pipelines to tidewater and generational opportunities on critical minerals are examples of the scale of the national projects we should be undertaking. The ability for a qualification to be recognized anywhere in the country allows a family to move where opportunities exist, to recognize and discover more of the country, and to knit the country together in ways that will ultimately contribute to the fabric of our nation.
Having made demonstrable progress on interprovincial trade, Canada’s premiers should now embrace even greater ambitions. It’s time to create a country without borders, for all Canadian workers.