October 16, 2008

Apprenticeship Training

Debate continues to swirl around journeyman-to-apprentice ratios

VINCE VERSACE

staff writer

The current Ontario journeymen-to-apprentice ratio for electricians does not need to be reworked contend union officials and one electrical association.

“We have taken a serious look at this issue,” said Bob O’Donnell, executive vice-president of the Greater Toronto Electrical Contractors Association (GTECA), in a statement.

“And, once you consider the economic demand and the need to provide a proper and safe training environment, we do not believe there is any solid evidence to support lowering the ratio for the electrical trade.”

GTECA and Local Union 353 of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) recently submitted a report to the province called Electrical Apprenticeship: Building on Success. Both organizations state that more attention should be placed on completion rates of existing electrical apprentices and not the three-to-one ratio of journeymen to apprentice for electricians.

“To properly train an apprentice to become an electrician you need a safe and well supervised work environment,” said Joe Fashion, business manager of IBEW Local 353 in a statement.

An apprentice in a one-to-one environment “will be assigned repetitive menial tasks” becoming a helper, said Fashion.

“In the current three-to-one environment, mentoring and supervision is a shared responsibility so the apprentice may learn a progression of skills while the journeymen also remain productive,” said Fashion.

The Open Shop Contractors Association (OSCA) firmly believes the opposite is true.

“A one-to-one environment provides the fastest learning and safest environment, also the tradesman gets to know the apprentice better,” said David McDonald, chair of the OSCA.

The GTECA notes that the current ratio only applies to contractors with more than nine electricians.

In the month of July 2008, 69 per cent of GTECA members employed ten or less IBEW members, and 52 per cent employed five or less IBEW members.

“It is quite evident both for our respective memberships and the industry as a whole, the current three-to-one ratio does not apply,,” the report says.

“For the majority of contractors the effective ratio is already one-to-one,” the report concludes.

The Ontario Electrical League (OEL) says ratio levels can vary by the size of a project but there is no disputing the one-to-one ratio is the safest for apprentices.

“The one-to-one environment has proven to the safest across Canada,” said Mary Ingram-Haigh, president of the Ontario Electrical League.

“There is nothing showing that there is something unsafe about one-to-one.”

A change in ratios to help fill declining numbers of available skilled trade workers does not apply to electricians, explained O’Donnell. According to the Construction Sector Council the average age for electricians in Ontario is 40.

“The notion that there will be a huge exodus from the industry from retirements is also inaccurate,” said O’Donnell.

Ingram-Haigh said that many OEL contractors have reported difficulties in finding people for jobs.

Also, a contractor’s stance on the one-to-one ratio question, within the OEL, does not have a clear union-open shop divide a recent member survey revealed.

Ninety-one per cent of all OEL members surveyed supported a change to a one-to-one ratio.

Of those unionized members who took part in that same survey, 81 per cent supported a change to a one-to-one ratio.

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