This is so much bullshit, with all the people taking college foundation courses in the thousands why not support them and apprentice into the trade???? Province spends millions on these programs and the people taking them end up at Wal-Mart or another low end job. And here is IPG off on another holiday at our expense in the end. Someone needs a wakeup call,

Check and see how the unions feel about apprenticeships – therein lies the problem.

This is just another symptom of an organization that has completely lost its way. IPG was set up to attract new business and help grease the wheels to make the process as easy as possible.

In the last year or two(since Tim left) their main focus seems to be is to try to fill vacant positions in existing businesses. If Stinger needs trained and experienced people there are any number of headhunting firms, many that specialize in trades, that can assist them for a fee- the taxpayers of the city should not be bearing these costs.

Further to steph99’s point, how many apprentices are on Stinger’s payroll? Are they are maxed out on the tradesman to apprentice ratio? If not give some locals a chance before looking offshore.

I share the views of steph99 and lonesome sparrow … employers are looking for easy quick fixes and not willing to make long term investment in training and development

regarding ob1’s post about alleged union objections to apprenticeships … last time I checked, a Collective Agreement was a negotiated contract between management and the unionized workers … if management wants a different deal, then it is up management to negotiate a different deal … it is a two way process

There was a time when it was up to business to advertise, find, and fill their own employment vacancies. Now it is up to us (and our tax dollars) to do this for them.

I am getting sick and tired of everyone complaining about trips to China, trips to Ireland, using our hard earned tax dollars all for the benefit of business.

Hey everyone, I have an idea; vote for more business minded people in the next civic and provincial elections and repeat your bellyaching!

Ob1 please enlighten or is that all you got?

A desperate decade calls for desperate measures… seen this before…

blog/view/24953/66/initiatives+prince+george+launches+promotion+in+vancouver

Guess Vancouver hasn’t worked, time to try Ireland? By the way… love mitch2’s comment!

Wow, paid holidays for the green party in china. Paid holidays for initiative PG bunch.
Am i wrong about all this? All I see anymore is an abuse of taxpayer money.

I am so old that I remember when business did the training in house. Two examples are you could graduate from high school and start working in a bank and you were trained and able to work yourself up to bank manager and higher. Same with nursing, start in a hospital and you were train to be a RN. The Dutch still use that system and to them an employee is an asset, after all they have spent time and money training them.

onemanstoughts; no you are not wrong about all of this, you have a say in changing this at the next civic and provincial elections.

@graymare; yes there was a time when business and employers “invested” in their workers. Now they just abuse them… which is why the Temporary Foreign Workers Program is so popular with them; a cheap source of slave labour!

I’m not sure what IPG ‘should’ be doing, but this isn’t it. They went last year. What were the results from that? Did anyone from Ireland actually move here, or is this one of those things where they feel they need to go back several times?

And like others have noted, businesses should be doing their own recruiting, not IPG.

Come to think of it, if a family from Ireland actually moved here due to their last trip, IPG would be trumpeting that news from the hilltops.

A busy booth at a job fair means little.

Thanks steph99, I to fully agree with you!
Reduce training school costs and let the average students into training for these positions,
that are fair city is looking else where to find.

Anyone can access (via the www) information on just what business and career opportunities are available just about anywhere in the world….no need to travel abroad on the taxpayer’s dime with a PPP. Hard to tell from the above article if IPG’s objective is to simply increase the population of PG or to attract skilled workers to this region, neither of these objectives falls under the operational, functional or governance requirements of the municipality of Prince George.

We have a trades skill shortage because the province’s Industry Training Authority (ITA) is a complete joke!

“As the CEO of the ITA, Evans was expected to increase the number of apprentices that complete trades training programs and implement flexible training initiatives that reduce the amount of time apprentices must spend away from the workplace.

However, the ITA reported that apprenticeship completion rates in B.C. have fell to 37 per cent in 2011/12 from 43 per cent in 2009/2010.

The BC government expected the ITA to increase completion rates and take these specific actions, while funding to the organization remained stagnant or declined.”

Read the rest on the dismal failure of this provincial organization here:

http://www.joconl.com/article/id56657

Irish unemployment rate is 13.3%, Prince George rate is 10.3%. Charity begins at home.

Is PG’s reputation so bad that domestic job fairs don’t work anymore? Or is it just that the Irish pubs on the East Coast aren’t authentic enough for IPG staff?

Charity begins at home ,give our young people a chance. As a taxpayer I think IPG is something we could get rid of its costing taxpayers to much money and seems to be out of control. I would rather spend the money helping our unemployed and young people get our JOBS, The cost of a education here is more than most can afford , but there is student loans if you qualify, if your parents both work you are out of luck. Why should our young people have to end up deep in debt to get a job?? You have to wonder who is in charge?? and why are we letting this happen??

Maybe IPG just has a thing for red-heads.

The main problem is the scam of universities (taxpayer again)and training schools. It could all be done much better on the job

I think IPG has a thing for Irish Whiskey.

joke — Two Irishmen walk out of a pub ———
well, it could happen.

The firm I worked for when I came here in 1973 recruited me from Toronto. They paid for me to come out to have a look at the region and the place of work to see if it would suit my family and then paid for the move when I accepted. I think we had about 8 people in the office at that time and it grew to over 20 before the boom ended in 1981.

All the others came from other parts of the province, other parts of Canada as well as Europe and HongKong.

Firms in those days did their own recruiting through newspapers, professional magazines and accessing the personal networks of the staff. There were no post secondary institutions in town at the time which taught the knowledge, skills sets and experience that were needed. In fact, there still aren’t.

The expenses were part of the cost of doing business.

There was no IPG or economic development department at city hall.

If we wonder how come our taxes are going up at a rate higher than inflation and a rate higher than the income of businesses as well as individuals, it is because such “new” services provided by communities, especially when the services do not know what their actual objectives are.

If there has to be an IPG in order to promote this community to the outside world as a great place to do business, then learn to understand what that means today and make sure that we present ourselves that way and we have the infrastructure in place for that. In addition, provide the one stop shopping for out of towners to make it easy to work with the bureaucrats in the city so that there are no unnecessary and unusual hurdles in place.

Finally, report the successes and failures to the citizens of this community who are paying taxes for a service which they are providing so that they know that their taxes are spent efficiently and effectively.

I do not think anything could be any simpler.

On the face of it, a trip to Ireland or any other place outside of PG simply to recruit people and show them pretty pictures just does not help unless the trip is to an economic development office that actually works to get some new knowledge!!!!

Sorry, lonesome sparrow, I said the same thing as you, just a bit longer and a bit more personalized ….. :-)

There is one more thing to my story to make it even more poignant.

We no longer have the capacity to design and even build the kind of commercial, institutional and residential developments we did then. City Hall, BC Hydro, College, Hospital additions, office buildings, etc. were mostly designed and constructed with local firms. That work is now mostly done by outside firms.

Many of our dollars are leaking outside the community to support others. The question is whether we have public and private organizations which are pulling money into the community.

Perhaps someone knows of a report which shows the change in the balance of trade over the last 5 decades or so. IPG should certainly have that. Perhaps there is someone at UNBC, such as Dr. Halseth maybe, who is researching the sustainability of interior BC communities.

More BS. I have family that has moved to Prince George from Ireland as well as from South America….on their own steam, dime, intestinal fortitude call it what you want. They are highly educated and qualified in a trade that filled a demonstrated need in Canada and Prince George and Kelowna were where the opportunities were specifically. This had balls nothing to do with IPG or any organization other than their own research and direct employer contact via other methods that did not include trade shows.

Ireland seems to have problems of their own…again more waste… IPiG

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/ireland-tallies-votes-in-referendum-on-senate-future-1.1913846?cmp=rss

Ireland seems to have problems of their own…again more waste… IPiG

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/ireland-tallies-votes-in-referendum-on-senate-future-1.1913846?cmp=rss