Citizenship and Immigration committee  Yes.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  And as I said yes, I wanted to make sure.... A lot of—

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Pardon me?

Citizenship and Immigration committee  As I said yes, I was thinking about Prince Edward Island.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  No, I don't believe that we have an office in Prince Edward Island, but I do believe that we have staff co-located with Service Canada in Prince Edward Island. I'll have to double-check on that, Madam Chair, but I do think we have staff co-located.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Madam Chair, I would note a couple of things. One is that we do have service provider organizations that provide services in Prince Edward Island, and in every province and territory in Canada, as a matter of fact, outside of Quebec. Quebec, as you know, manages its own settlement and integration program.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Madam Chair, there's a separate allocation for the refugee assistance program. It's about $55 million. Refugees are eligible for settlement services for that $600 million or so, but there is a separate envelope dedicated to specific supports for refugee assistance, including income in the first year and other supports around that.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  In the last fiscal year.... I'll back up just a bit. There is a separate accord between Canada and Quebec related to immigration. Under the accord, Canada provides a grant to the Province of Quebec in recognition of settlement services provided. It's based on a formula. The formula has a couple of different aspects to it, and I'm happy to speak to that.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Madam Chair, this is, I think, one of the toughest issues we deal with for a number of reasons. I'll just back up a little bit. The process of credential recognition in regulated occupations is a tough one, in part because of jurisdictional issues. It's provincial jurisdiction, and then provinces have further subdelegated responsibility to the regulatory bodies themselves.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  The federal government delivers almost none directly. They're delivered by service provider organizations. We work with about 700 service provider organizations that we choose, by and large, through call for proposals. This enables us to assess good value for money in terms of who we're funding and what services they're providing in their offering.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  That's exactly right.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Madam Chair, as we've noted, the government increased settlement funding in 2005-06 to about $600 million. This year we will spend, I believe, $584.5 million on settlement and integration services, so about $600 million. With the increase in funding, we have been able to focus in clear detail on the three primary needs in the settlement and integration services.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Madam Chair, one of the things that's happening in conjunction with the increased number of new arrivals expected this year with an increased level plan is that we're also seeing an increase in skills on the side of skilled workers who are coming. So there's a certain offset that happens between those two things.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Thank you very much, Madam Chair. As you've introduced, my name is Catrina Tapley, and I am the assistant deputy minister for strategic and program policy at Citizenship and Immigration Canada. My colleagues and I are pleased to appear before your committee. We hope that our testimony today will be helpful as you undertake your study on promoting economic prosperity through settlement services.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  There are three main programs that will be part of the express entry: the Canadian experience class, the federal skilled worker program, and the federal skilled trades program. As well, a portion of the provincial nominee program will also come through express entry. For the most part, provincial nominee programs will work as they have in the past, but there will be a top-up to provincial nominee programs.