WATCH: After asking for months whether funding would be renewed staff at Parker Skills Development Centre found out Tuesday that the Carpenter’s Assistant Training Program was being cancelled. Global’s Marieke Walsh reports.
HALIFAX – After asking for months whether government funding would be renewed, staff at the Parker Street Skills Development Centre found out Tuesday that all funding for the carpenter’s assistant training program would be cut.
The program is designed to give chronically underemployed or unemployed people the skills they need to get back into the workforce.
The funding agreement with the province was set to expire on July 4. However, when last year’s agreement expired, the province renewed it. Parker Street staff were expecting the same thing to happen this year as well.
“It was our understanding that the program funding was going to end, but there was going to be something else,” said Rob MacNeish, Skills Development Officer with Parker Street’s Carpenter’s Assistant Program.
“That is why we are now surprised that there isn’t going to be anything else.”
The funding comes from Nova Scotia’s Canada Job Grant agreement with the federal government. Administered through the Works For You program in the province’s Labour and Advanced Education department, a spokesperson said the stop in funding isn’t a program cut because the dates on the funding agreement were clear.
“The department did not cancel any Works for You projects. Every project has a start and end date,” said Spokesperson Chrissy Matheson in an emailed statement.
But MacNeish said he was never told the funding was going to stop after the current agreement expired.
“If that was the message they wanted us to receive, that wasn’t clear. We were always under the understanding that after the funding was going to end, that there would be something else.”
The provincial government said Nova Scotia received less money through the Canada Job Grant for 2015 compared with last year.
“With less funding we want to be sure Nova Scotians still have access to the best services, training and support possible,” said Matheson. “The decision was made to move forward with other projects that will benefit Nova Scotians.”
Twenty-nine year old Adam Mitchell is now one of the last people to go through the skills training program.
After living on Employment Insurance for more than a year, Mitchell said the program has turned his life around.
“It gives you the skills. It gives you worth. It gives you a title,” said Mitchell. “It brings you into society again, whereas unemployed, you’re an outcast.”
The current group of students will finish their course at the end of June, at which point MacNeish said the program will end. However, Parker Street plans to bring back a scaled-down version of the program in September.
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