We’ve finally gotten beer into convenience stores, so perhaps now we can move on to addressing a far more serious issue in Ontario: the outdated and restrictive apprentice-to-journeyperson ratio in the skilled trades. While having easy access to a cold one is nice, there’s a much bigger challenge we need to face—ensuring Ontario has enough skilled workers, especially in trades like carpentry, to meet growing demand.
The Problem: An Antiquated System Holding Us Back
In Ontario, the current ratio mandates that one journeyperson can only supervise one apprentice at a time. This rule might have worked in a different era, but it’s a serious limitation today, especially with the growing shortage of skilled tradespeople. Red Seal carpenters and journeypersons are retiring faster than we can replace them, and this one-to-one ratio is making it harder to bring new talent into the industry.
At a time when there’s a high demand for construction, renovation, and skilled labour, Ontario’s rigid regulations are creating unnecessary barriers to getting more people trained. It’s a bit like trying to fill a bathtub while the drain is wide open—we’re losing tradespeople while struggling to train the next generation fast enough.
Why the One-to-One Ratio Hurts Us
The one-to-one ratio restricts how many apprentices a journeyperson can train, which directly impacts how quickly we can get new carpenters into the workforce. Apprenticeships in carpentry take around 7,200 hours (approximately four years), so bottlenecks in training mean fewer people are available to fill the growing need in the market. Making things worse, many of our most experienced tradespeople are nearing retirement. The result is fewer mentors available to train apprentices, which exacerbates the problem. We need a system that allows us to train more people at once if we’re serious about closing the skills gap and keeping up with demand.
The Medical Field Comparison: Why Not in Carpentry? To put this in perspective, let’s look at another field where supervision and training are critical—medicine. In a clinical setting, one doctor might supervise three or four medical students at a time, guiding them through environments where lives are literally on the line. If we can trust doctors to handle that level of responsibility, why can’t we trust carpenters to train more than one apprentice at a time?
Carpentry is a demanding profession, but it doesn’t carry the same immediate life-or-death consequences as medicine. Allowing a 2:1 or 3:1 apprentice-to-journeyperson ratio would enable Ontario to train more tradespeople without compromising the quality of training. If a doctor can supervise multiple trainees, surely carpenters can do the same.
Supporting Our Skilled Canadian Workforce
Ontario has a proud history of producing world-class tradespeople, particularly those who have earned their Red Seal certification, which is recognized across Canada as a symbol of excellence. We should focus on relying on skilled Canadians who have worked hard to achieve this status, rather than turning to large numbers of foreign workers who may not have had the same rigorous training and schooling. While immigration plays a valuable role in our economy, ensuring the next generation of Red Seal-certified carpenters is key to maintaining our high standards of workmanship and ensuring that Ontario’s economy thrives in the long term.
Why Hasn't This Changed?
So, why are we stuck with this outdated system? The Ministry of Labour, Training, and Skills Development and Skilled Trades Ontario are responsible for setting the regulations, but they’ve been slow to modernize the system. The concern seems to be that increasing the ratio might dilute the quality of training, but with the current skilled trades shortage, this rigid approach is creating more harm than good OSG CLAC
The irony is that while the government has talked about modernizing the skilled trades system, meaningful changes like revising the ratio haven’t materialized. Stakeholder resistance, fears about safety, and the complexity of making these changes have all contributed to the stagnation
The Solution: Modernize the Ratios, Strengthen the Workforce
It’s time to increase the apprentice-to-journeyperson ratio to 2:1 or 3:1 to keep up with demand. This change would allow more apprentices to get the training they need, while journeypersons could still ensure proper supervision and quality control.
The government has made strides in other areas—getting beer into convenience stores was a victory, right?—so let’s apply that same energy to fixing a much bigger issue. We need to create pathways for more apprentices to join the workforce and boost the number of skilled tradespeople in Ontario.
We’re facing a generational opportunity to revitalize Ontario’s trades. Let’s not waste it by clinging to an outdated system.
Add comment
Comments