To the editor:
Why has the federal government reduced the number of student summer jobs it sponsors when the youth job market still has not recovered from the recession?
Under the Conservative government, the number of student summer jobs has been cut by tens of thousands since 2006. Fewer students are getting help to create a summer job where they can earn their first work experience and money to pay for their education.
This cut couldn’t have come at a worse time. Youth unemployment is double the national rate and there are 231,000 fewer youth jobs in Canada since the recession. It’s a tough economy these days for our young people.
Instead of investing in our youth by creating student summer jobs, the Conservatives chose to spend millions of taxpayer dollars on trying to “snow” Canadians with their shameless self-promoting commercials.
Every time one of these brutal Harper ads interrupts your NHL playoff game, know the $95,000 cost of it could have paid for 32 student summer jobs.
In other words, for everyone second these ads are on the air, another unemployed young Canadian could have had a job, but is going without. It’s a travesty.
The government’s priorities seem to have been set in a bubble, completely walled off from the reality that Canadian families are facing. That’s not good enough. We should be doing more to help youth until their job market recovers, not less.
Rodger Cuzner, Liberal MP
Human Resources and Skills Development critic
