• 25% of Canada’s 4 million tradespeople will need to upgrade their skills within five years amid significant digital disruption.¹
• Canada will face a shortage of at least 10,000 workers in nationally recognized Red Seal trades over that period—a deficit that swells tenfold when 250 provincially regulated trades are included.²
• The most severe shortages will be among trades critical to the coming infrastructure boom, including industrial mechanics, welders and boilermakers.
• Demand for digital and “soft” skills like creativity and problem solving is expected to rise significantly in these critical trades.
• Over 700,000 skilled tradespeople are expected to retire by 2028. Meanwhile, an outdated perception of the trades has hobbled recruitment efforts.
• Women made up just 11% of new registrants for apprenticeship programs in 2019 and continue to represent less than 4% of workers in the most in-demand trades.³
• Immigrants comprised 8.7% of apprentices despite accounting for more than 20% of the population.⁴
• Canada is falling short of its goal to bring in 3,000 skilled tradespeople annually through immigration, admitting 2,365 such newcomers in 2019 through the Federal Skilled Trades Program.⁵
• Educators, employers and policymakers will need to address chronic problems in the trades pipeline, tap into underused pools of talent, and address a widening digital skills gap amid rapid technological advances in the workplace.

Recruiting the workforce of the future

Closing the gap between the supply of skilled tradespeople and growing demand will mean addressing core challenges, including recruiting from underrepresented groups and battling outdated biases. And that’s on top of preparing the next generation of tradespeople for a more digital future.

Sharpening the tools for the post-pandemic era

Canada’s potential to thrive in a greener, more innovative and technologically advanced post-pandemic economy depends on its skilled tradespeople. Recruiting and equipping them to succeed in this new landscape will depend on the cooperation of industry, educators and policymakers.

Some ideas:

• Federal and provincial governments should increase funding to promote the trades in primary and secondary schools as well-paying, valued, and intellectually challenging careers. Exposure to trades should be incorporated into school curricula. For instance, trades problem solving could be integrated into primary and secondary level science, technology, engineering, arts and math courses (STEAM).
• Industry, academia, and government must work more closely together to ensure curricula keep pace with technological change in the workplace. Industry, in particular, must play a larger role in informing standard-setters and ensuring they are responsive to change.
• Policymakers can support women in the trades by offering expanded childcare options. Governments should examine the use of gender quotas to ensure greater representation of women in publicly funded infrastructure projects.
• The federal government and Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada should close the gap between the target and actual intake of immigrants in the skilled trades by more aggressively promoting Canadian trades in source countries. They must counter the stigma of trades as “lesser-than” in these countries and among newcomers, and ensure immigration caps on individual trades are responsive to the market.
• Employers should explore the use of “payback clauses,” so they can invest in apprenticeships and upskill without fear of employees immediately leaving once the training is complete.
• Provincial regulatory authorities should develop pilot programs to ease the transition of skills between trades, explore ways to apply existing skills to new technologies and industries, and facilitate transfer of know-how from retiring tradespeople to new workers.
• Interprovincial recognition of skilled trades should be expanded beyond Red Seal trades to enable greater mobility of labour.