Hi Chandresh,

Please do keep us informed on any radio/TV shows you appear on beforehand, so we can listen to/watch the same.

You sound like quite the character.

Thx

http://www.thestar.com/News/article/197341

Ontario licenses record number of doctors


The proportion of females in the 2006 physician population was at its highest in seven years, comprising 31.4 per cent of the total workforce

Mar 29, 2007 10:09 AM
Canadian Press

Almost 3,000 doctors received licences in Ontario in 2006 – the most ever issued in any one year by the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario.

The licensing body's annual report, entitled Small Triumphs, Big Challenges, shows 63 per cent of the 2,961 licenses issued were for doctors from outside Ontario, including a large number of international medical graduates.

Of all licences issued, 42 per cent went to international graduates compared to 37 per cent for Ontario graduates.

College president Dr. Jeff Turnbull says there have been many important policy initiatives by the college, government, and other stakeholders to address doctor shortages.

"These initiatives help explain why we had such a robust year in licensing so many doctors," he said.

The survey also revealed just 9.6 per cent of doctors surveyed were accepting new patients in 2006. That was a sharp decline from 1999, when 39 per cent of family doctors reported they were accepting new patients. The exception was northern Ontario, which saw a 2.4 per cent increase.

"It is evident that much more action is required and the trends flagged in this report need to be addressed," said Turnbull.

"A long-term plan is needed to create more doctors – we cannot rely on recruiting international medical graduates as the primary solution to our physician shortage."

Other highlights of the 2006 survey show that the average age of practising physicians in 2006 was 50.9 years of age, down from 51.7 in 2005.

The proportion of females in the 2006 physician population was at its highest in seven years, comprising 31.4 per cent of the total workforce. More than half of all physicians under the age of 35 – 51.1 per cent – were female.

http://www.ppforum.ca/common/assets/agendas/en/fcr-agenda.pdf

Scroll to April 19, 8.40-9.30 am

Recognize one of the speakers?

Man, Chandresh, so you work at TML? Cool. How about a meeting with Mark Mobius when he shows up in July?

Would be highly grateful if you could arrange such a meet. Are you a fund manager like the man, Rohit Sehgal at Dynamic? What is the outlook for the BRIC fund.

Do you know I have money invested in their flagship Templeton Growth fund for 25 years? Great fund at one time. Still one of the top funds over a 25 year span.

I like the way they start their yearly seminar here in TO at the Metro Convention centre- with a prayer! Something unusual. They don't even do that in India. Nothing to Laxmi nor Ganesh! Except during Diwali.

Congrats Chandresh!!

Maybe I am late, but I just visited this thread today and so delighted to know of this wonderful opportunity. I am sure you will make most of it for the benefit of new and propective immigrants.

There are many ideas already here and I trust you have your own agenda, but I am not sure if you have covered the issue of 'over qualified' professionals - thats been the case with many a CA (atleast few that I know of) who cannot even get basic accountants job and have to turn to factory labour jobs to make ends meet!!

I doubt the government can do anything to influence the decision of private enterprises to hire new immigrants - though tax benefits are 1 of them, but then there is always the possibility of exploitation at work - hire new immigrants to do undesirable jobs and take the tax benefits - also there is a potential this will benefit the temporary agencies who place new immigrants into factory labour. An immigrant is new for how long?

But definitely, the CIC can take action on 2 accounts :
1. Give higher points to plumbers and electricians compared to engineers and doctors - if that is what they want actually.

2. Pre-immigration evaluation of credentials of engineers education and experience and assess thier eligibility to obtain a CIT/ PEO designation upon arrival and the relevance of his/her education/experience to the canadian society.

Stress should also be given on the changing demography of the canadian society where there are now lesser european immigrants and more of Asians (mostly south asians) and Middle East immigrants - that will have a major effect on the customs and traditions, eating and dwelling habits, socialising habits and business practises. (I wouldnt be surprised if the Chinese new year will be a global holiday in the near future). The future immigration policy should be able to address this change. Personally, for eg..we feel more comfortable getting treated by an Indian doctor who understands our habits and past treatment.

These are just the thoughts that came to my mind at the spur of the moment - maybe they are not so relevant - treat them as a rant if you may...

All the best and look forward to your update.

Hiren

Hi Chandresh,

So like your day came. How bout some lowdown on how it all went. Think something positive will come from it. Will people walk the talk?
The conservative govt has put the foreign credentials agency on hold. Is it gonna be revived? Will that even help? And if it does. How much?
Do let us know what transpired.
And why as many have asked was it held in Regina and not Toronto, Vancouver or Montreal? It's like they aren't giving it much attention- though the people of Regina might take offense to such a stance.

I too was invited as a speaker at the Public Policy Forum last year in TO. Do let us all know what transpired.

One of my suggestions for the past year is a bit radical but one which could immediately remove some of the hidden barriers to employment.

The Govt gives incentives to several socially disadvantaged groups or groups that need a 'leg up'. e.g. First Nations, handicapped, pregnant women, youth etc. In the same vein, they should extend assistance to the generations of taxpayers that immigrants bring by giving concessions to the private sector as an incentive. Companies that provide an immigrant their first job in their designated field would get some tax concessions. I put this forward to the Parliamentary committee on Citizenship in '05 also. Last year Diane Ablonzky from AB (Conservative) picked this up but dropped it as fast!

I am so happy that you are getting involved in this advocacy - do email me - we will definitely do an interview.

Nick

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http://www.thecanadianimmigrant.com" rel="nofollow">LINK

Hi all,

Came back on Friday night/Saturday morning after spending 2 1/2 days in Regina.

The conferance went well, and while I am glad I was there, the other participants found my presence and speech to be a major discussion point.

We were three immigrants who kick started the conferance by telling our experiences. While one of them simply spoke which is nothing new, the other guy produced a small survey he had done with I think 6 immigrants and statistically produced results which also are known to us all. I had taken a slightly different approach in which I divided my speech into four sections:

1. My own story - which included not only what all I did to get a job, but also showed to the audience what silly advices do these HRDSC offices and job finding clubs give that result into a professional only reducing his perceived worth. I also related to them instances from the temporary or low level jobs that I had done which spoke louder than anything else as to how immigrants' skills perceived and oppressed. One of my dramatic presentation included this paragraph:

At this moment, ladies and gentleman, I request you to close your eyes for a moment. Picture a man dressed in a suit and having million dollar discussions with bankers and directors of big companies. He finishes the discussions, shakes hands with people who make million dollar decisions, comes out of office, is driven by a chauffer to Krispy Kreme, where instead of buying a dozen doughnuts for his children, goes in through the counter, changes into work uniform with a mask on his mouth and an apron, and comes out to start filling doughnut with custard crème and then serves it to a Canada born Canadian.

2. Mentorship that I went through and that got me a job in my field

3. A collective perspective of professional immigrants regarding immigrantion policies and recognition of their skills, and

4. Suggestions.

There were many people who came up to me and said that my speech brought a different aspect to their thinking and approach and it really held the audience even though I had exceed the time limit by far (actually initially I was given a limit of 20-25 minutes which they later changed to 12 minutes).

The participants were from Federal Govt., provincial govts and NGOs of Ontario, BC, NS, Qubec, Manitoba, SK and AB. To my surprise and disbelief, they had not called any private sector employers!!!

While some of the speeches were rhetoric, and included only what each agency has been doing, some people actually produced facts of results achieved by taking different actions. It was sad to know that though all of them were more than aware about problems immigrants face, they have been spending years in simply discussing what should be done. It appeared to me that most believed that all immigrants, whether professional of trades people, need to be retrained when they come to Canada. However, there were a few who thought otherwise and we all put forward a simple sentence and thought - immigrants do not need new degrees and diplomas - if at all, they need some basic training in the new workplace and some trade related language instructions.

Some of the provinces have developed wage subsidy programs (specially Quebec) which included 50% to 100% subsidies for different things. Both the advantages (of getting an immigrant a job in private sector through government funding) and disadvantages (employers exploiting temp employees with no threat of monetary loss or cost to them) were discussed too.

Tax incentives were discussed, but I opposed that with my reasoning:

For Big corporations such small tax incentives will not mean anything - they spend more money on their own training and development.

for SME, tax incentives are not really incentives since they work backwards on their income statement - they decide how much tax they have pay and then prepare their books accordingly.

NS (Halifax) has started a scheme called WINS (Work in Nova Scotia) whereby they get an internship for immigrants with employers of thier choice (which should be backed by a good reason) for six weeks. This is similar to the co-op prog that Peel region does, but is of half the duration which is good for an immigrant.

I also gave them a suggestion that some of this money should be directed towards would be immigrants who are ready to spend some time to study in Canadian universities to learn the Canadian rules or whatever. These students (whether young or experienced, should be bonded, and work in Canada for a few years after completing their education, to take advantage of that free education - or if they leave, they should have to pay back the money spent by the govt for their education. This would eliminate the various bottlenecks that locals speak about like:
a. knowledge of English language
b. knowledge of Canadian codes and laws
c. canadian experience - by including in studies practical work experience at work-place
d. a proper test of their skills and knowledge, etc. etc.

Some of these participants were themselves one time new first generation immigrants and were able to contribute ideas and express their anger at what they had gone through 10 - 25 years ago. We also discussed how feasible it was for an immigrant to go for further studies both from direct cost (tuition fee etc.) as well as family responsibility point of view.

Overall, it was a good conference and since I was the only professional immigrant who stayed there for the full conferance, was able to contribute a lot to the otherwise rhetoric discussions and planning of govt bodies and NGOs. I have brought back some business cards of people who found my story and experiences and suggestions worth thinking deeply into and I hope to help in their and our mutual cause!

Chandresh

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Chandresh

Advice is free – lessons I charge for!!