The P.E.I. government has launched a newspaper ad campaign urging Islanders, who have family and friends working out West, to try to convince them to move back home.
The ad reads: "It's about time to get your family back home … join the movement to bring Islanders home."
Minister of Innovation and Advanced Learning Alan Campbell, who has four siblings who have left the province, said it's an issue he's "keenly interested in.
"So you know, we're targeting former Islanders and trying to collect information around skill sets and that type of thing that we may be able to tap into as a workforce down the road through Innovation PEI and perhaps have some former Islanders return home."
A pilot program is already underway in western P.E.I., gathering information about people who are from the area, but are working in Alberta, and what skills they have, said Campbell.
He'd eventually like to see such an inventory done right across the province, he said.
A recent survey by the Residential Construction Sector Council found that nearly half of the 100 tradespeople questioned, who are working out West, plan to move back to P.E.I. within three years.
The workers cited low wages, a shortage of full-time work, and little or no benefits as being among the reasons they left the Island.
via www.cbc.ca
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