Shocking
numbers posted in an article on Beacon
News by NDP MP Laurin Liu, revealed that only 22 out of the 961 students who interned
with a government department were subsequently offered a job.
House of
Commons MPs were exempt from answering questions about students brought on
under the Post-Secondary Co-operative Education and Internship Program.
According to
Liu, the department that hosted most unpaid internships was Veterans Affairs,
having employed 146 interns since 2008. The amount of time each student put
into this program was somewhere from a few weeks to several months with more
than 30 hours of work every week.
The numbers
prompted MP Liu to propose bill C-636 to limit the use of non-educational
internships in departments affiliated with the federal government.
After last
year’s government crack down on unpaid internships forcing big guns such as
Rogers Media and the Walrus to close
down their programs, this proposal will emphasize the benefits of the
internship for the employee not the employer.
It goes further
to offer all workplace standard safety and provisions to interns just as they are given to full-time paid employees.
Comments from
Bank of Canada Governor Stephen Poloz encouraging unemployed youth to take up
free work and “beef up” their resumes while living in their parents’ basement, highlight
a disturbing attitude towards the struggles faced by unemployed youth.
The proposed
legislation is currently under consideration by Labour Minister Kellie Leitch.
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