New Canadians know more about Canada than those born here: Survey

Immigrants to Canada claim a stronger knowledge of the country's history than those who were born here, according to one of the surprising results of a nationwide survey probing Canadians' grasp on the past.

More than 2,300 people were polled this fall by the Montreal-based Association for Canadian Studies for a year-end report that explores respondents' perspectives on Canada's history, including how they assess their own command of the subject.

About 82 per cent of survey respondents who identified themselves as being born outside of Canada claimed to have "very strong" or "somewhat strong" knowledge of Canadian history.

In contrast, only about 70 per cent of respondents born in Canada rated their historical knowledge strong or very strong.

Notably, nearly twice as many immigrant respondents (27 per cent) as born-in-Canada citizens (16 per cent) described their history knowledge as "very strong."

ACS executive director Jack Jedwab suspects the reason immigrants are more likely to claim a solid command of Canadian history is that they have — in many cases quite recently — been required to familiarize themselves with highlights of the country's past as part of the process of gaining citizenship.

"Those people are exposed to our citizenship test, which has a historical dimension," said Jedwab, referring to the multiple-choice examination that immigrants must pass before becoming full-fledged Canadian citizens.

While native-born citizens get a Canadian history education during their elementary and secondary schooling, they don't get the "refresher course" newcomers receive in their quest to gain citizenship.

Jedwab also notes that polling repeatedly shows a correlation between high levels of education and knowledge of national history and that immigrants are — relative to average schooling levels among born-in-Canada citizens — better educated.

He also speculated that immigrants may be more attuned to the story of Canada's growth and evolution because of their direct connection to the country's multicultural identity, which Jedwab says "is becoming the dominant narrative in Canadian history. They see themselves as part of this."

Citizenship and Immigration Canada, under the direction of Immigration Minister Jason Kenney, revised and updated the 63-page Discover Canada citizenship guide last year as part of an effort to underline the need for newcomers to learn about Canada's past.

"Whether we are citizens by birth or by choice, we should all learn about our history, heritage and citizenship," the federal department states on the website for the Discover Canada study guide, which is subtitled "The Rights and Responsibilities of Citizenship."

The department also raised the passing grade for the 20-question test to 75 per cent, from 60 per cent, and implemented a random-scramble system to ensure no two tests are identical and thus subject to copying and memorization by applicants.

Last December, Kenney argued that the changes wouldn't prevent earnest newcomers from passing the citizenship test.

"We reject completely," he said at the time, "the condescending notion that new Canadians aren't smart enough to learn some basic facts about the country's history and values."

The survey results suggest that — at least as far as they see themselves — immigrants are quite confident in their knowledge of Canadian history.

The polling was conducted for ACS in late September and early October by Leger Marketing.

A representative sample of 2,345 Canadians were surveyed online, and the results reflect a potential margin of error of two per cent, 19 times out of 20.

Fat personal debts, euro woe threaten Canada, OECD says

The outlook for Canada's economy has dimmed considerably, but the country will still outpace most of its G7 counterparts for the next two years, according to a new OECD forecast.

Over all, the Paris-based Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development projected today that growth in the economies of the group will slow to 1.6 per cent next year, then rebound to 2.3 per cent a year later. It also projected the jobless rate among those nations to remain at 8 per cent over the two-year period.

But all of this assumes that policy makers take "sufficient action to avoid disorderly sovereign defaults, a sharp credit contract, systemic bank failures and excessive fiscal tightening." That last point certainly would not apply to several of the euro nations that are now in the eye of the storm.

Canada's economy will just about keep pace with that of the United States in 2012 and 2013, the group said, and together will lead growth among the G7.

The OECD projected Canada will see growth of 1.9 per cent next year and 2.5 per cent in 2013, almost at the pace of 2 per cent and 2.5 per cent forecast for the U.S. Japan, whose economy is seen contracting this year, will see growth of 2 per cent next and 1.6 per cent in 2013.

The new forecast calls for growth of 0.6 per cent and 1.9 per cent in Germany, 0.3 per cent and 1.4 per cent in France, and 0.5 per cent and 1.8 per cent in Britain. Italy's economy is forecast to contract by 0.5 per cent in 2012, before recovering to growth of 0.5 per cent a year later.

"The outlook for the Canadian economy has weakened significantly, mainly because of a deteriorating external environment," the OECD forecast said.

"Heightened risks from renewed financial market turmoil linked to the European sovereign debt crisis and high levels of household indebtedness are eroding consumer confidence. While business investment continues to expand robustly, weaker prospects for the global economy and persistent strength of the exchange rate are projected to restrain export performance, tempering the speed of economic growth. Underlying inflation will remain subdued due to continued significant economic slack."

Markets rally
Global markets are rallying this morning, but much of the optimism appears based on rumour and speculation related to the euro debt crisis.

"We are seeing an unusually strong start to the week by recent standards for shares in London," said David Jones, chief market strategist at IG Index.

"Once again it is expectations surrounding Europe driving the rally, although weekend reports that the IMF are discussing a bailout for Italy have been strongly denied by the organization," he said in a research note.

"However, there is still speculation that politicians have a newfound sense of urgency and are stepping up attempts to stem the crisis. Unsurprisingly there is a wave of relief flowing through the financial sector with banks the biggest gainers on the day so far. It will take a few more days of positive moves to convince traders that this rally actually has some solid foundations and is not just a dead cat bounce built on rumour and hope."

Tokyo's Nikkei climbed 1.6 per cent and Hong Kong's Hang Seng 2 per cent. In Europe, London's FTSE 100, Germany's DAX and the Paris CAC 40 were up by between 2.1 per cent and 3.8 per cent by about 7:15 a.m. ET.

Dow Jones industrial average YM-FT and S&P 500 ES-FT futures also climbed.

For some observers, there could actually be something behind what's driving the markets today, notably some movement toward easing the euro crisis. Having said that, markets have seen this time and time again over the past two years.

"Another day, another positive start to the trading day," said senior economist Jennifer Lee of BMO Nesbitt Burns.

"Yes, I know, I know. We’ve been down this road before," Ms. Lee said in a report.

"The day starts tentatively higher, then bam! Everything gets tossed out the window shortly after. However, today, there may be something more to this rally. Reuters reported over the weekend that France and Germany are working on a much faster way towards euro zone integration, and instead of involving all 27 EU countries, will start off with a core group of around eight to 10. There is a goal to release details of such a plan by the Dec. 9 EU summit in Brussels, which is the last one for 2011."

Europe under pressure
The euro zone remains under intense pressure again today, amid reports that are all over the map as to what measures its leaders could take.

Borrowing costs are still high, and Moody's Investor Service today issued a warning on the credit ratings of all euro countries.

Belgium, which was downgraded on Friday, paid a high yield of almost 5.7 per cent at a €2-billion auction of 10-year paper, while Italy saw yields on 20-year bonds climb to 7.3 per cent. But that offering was shy of what it had planned to sell.

"Rising yields in Germany (where the two-year has risen from 0.295 per cent on Nov. 15 to 0.46 per cent today, while the 10-year has risen from 1.74 per cent to 2.31 per cent ...) suggests that the market is suddenly pricing in the risk that Europe poses to Germany," said senior currency strategist Camilla Sutton of Scotia Capital.

"Essentially that any ‘solution’ to the crisis lies with a cost to Germany, likely through either closer fiscal ties (which would entail a German-led funding of the more debt-laden countries) or an EMU breakup (which includes the loss of trade ties, uncertainty and an acceleration in the weakening of the European economy)."

Cameco gives up on Hathor
Canada's Cameco Corp. CCO-T has given up its quest for Hathor Exploration Ltd. HAT-T, alowing mining giant Rio Tinto Ltd. to win the spoils of a bidding fight.

“After careful consideration we cannot justify increasing the price beyond our current offer and accordingly, we will let our offer lapse,” said Cameco's chief executive officer Tim Gitzel. “Cameco has remained disciplined through the bid process to ensure that we make the best decisions for our company and its shareholders.”

Rio Tinto upped its friendly bid for Hathor to $4.70 a share earlier this month, topping Cameco's $4.50-a-share bid. The Rio Tinto bid values Hathor at about $654-million, The Globe and Mail's Brenda Bouw writes.

Cameco is the world's biggest uranium producer, and Mr. Gitzel said the decision to bow out of the fight for Hathor won't hurt his plan to double annual production to 40 million pounds by 2018.

“Our plan involves existing assets in our development pipeline and we remain on track to meet our objectives," he said in a statement. "We will continue to explore other growth opportunities, but only where there is a clear benefit to our shareholders."

What to watch for this week
We'll get a sense of the state of the Canadian recovery when Statistics Canada reports Wednesday on how the economy performed in the third quarter and then releases its key jobs reading for November on Friday.

Economists expect to see that the economy rebounded in the third quarter, by about 3 per cent annualized, after stalling in the second. Still, the outlook is dimmer.

"Looking forward, economic momentum is likely to cool as headwinds facing Canadian households grow stronger," said economist Diana Petramala of Toronto-Dominion Bank. "An unsatisfactory pace of job growth - zero net gains in employment since July - in combination with poor consumer confidence and ongoing losses in equity markets are expected to slow the pace of spending growth over the next few quarters."

The employment report, in turn, isn't expected to be as bad as the one for October, when the country lost 54,000 jobs. But the jobless rate isn't expected to come down either.

Economists expect to see job creation of anywhere from 5,000 to 25,000, with the unemployment rate remaining at 7.3 per cent or perhaps ticking up to 7.4 per cent.

"With external uncertainties cited as the main reasons for a more constrained business outlook (as cited in the Bank of Canada’s Business Outlook Survey) the pace of domestic hiring could continue to suffer from dampened expectations for U.S. demand, and the slings and arrows of an escalating euro zone crisis," said Emanuella Enenajor of CIBC World Markets.

Markets will be far more focused on the U.S. jobs report, also on Friday, given the crisis in the U.S. labour market after the recession that threw millions out of work. But there, economists expect to see that about 100,000 jobs or more were gained in November, with, as Sal Guatieri of BMO Nesbitt Burns put it, "companies likely inspired by the recent modest upturn in consumer spending." The unemployment rate is projected to remain around 9 per cent.

There are some key earnings this week, as well, as the major banks begin reporting fourth-quarter results. Among them are Bank of Nova Scotia, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Toronto-Dominion Bank and Royal Bank of Canada. Bombardier Inc. also reports results.

"We forecast provisions for credit losses to remain stable with risks increasing, while we expect capital markets to remain depressed in the immediate period, with risks tilted to the downside," said UBS Securities Canada.

Canada accused of still failing its poor

It's been more than 20 years since the House of Commons unanimously resolved to end child poverty by the year 2000. But a national advocacy group says it's shocked by how little progress has been made.

The economy has more than doubled in size since that 1989 resolution, but the incomes of the poorest families in Canada have stagnated, Campaign 2000 says in its 20th annual report card on child and family poverty released Wednesday.

"Every year I am shocked by the lack of progress made in poverty eradication," said Laurel Rothman, national co-ordinator of Campaign 2000. "The gap between rich and poor families has continued to widen, and low-income and average-income families are left struggling to keep up."

The group says 639,000 children still live in poverty in Canada — one in every 10 children. Among aboriginal children, the rate is one in four. Above-average poverty rates are also seen among children of immigrants and among children with a disability, as a parent frequently has to stay home to look after the child.

That's not to say there has been no progress in the fight against poverty. The rate of child and family poverty was 9.5 per cent in 2009, down from 11.9 per cent in 1989. But Campaign 2000 calls that 20-year change "strikingly small" given the growth in the Canadian economy since then.

Nationally, the group is calling for a federal minimum wage of $11 an hour. Currently, there is no federal minimum wage — provincial minimum wages range from $9 to $10.25 hourly. Only in Nunavut is the minimum wage $11.

But it says a higher minimum wage by itself will not close the gap. It also recommends that the child benefit for low-income families be boosted to $5,400 per child (the current maximum is $3,485).

Campaign 2000 refers to what it calls "cautious optimism" in describing some provincial efforts to tackle child and family poverty.

Quebec, for instance, has adopted poverty reduction strategies that have seen the province's poverty rate plunge from 16.1 per cent in 2000 to 7.7 per cent in 2009. In Newfoundland and Labrador, the poverty rate dove from 17.9 per cent to 9.3 per cent over the same period.

Newfoundland is the only province that provides enough social assistance for a single parent with one child to live above the poverty line. In every other province, welfare rates keep a single parent with one child living in poverty — sometimes just below the poverty line, but sometimes as much as $5,000 below the low-income cut-off mark.

Even having a full-time job is no guarantee of escaping poverty. Figures show that one in three low-income children lives in a family where at least one parent works full-time year-round. One in four workers in Canada was in a low-wage job in 2010 — one that pays less than $13.32 an hour.

The group calls for more government attention to child care, noting that fewer than one in five children has access to a regulated child-care space.

It also wants to see a national housing strategy to address the 750,000 children under the age of 15 who live in housing that, in its words, is either "unaffordable, substandard, overcrowded or all three."

The Campaign 2000 report also noted that the federal Conservatives' decision last year to make the long-form census voluntary will make the group's job more difficult.

"Census data is the only reliable source of information on poverty rates with demographic breakdowns," it says. "Until the long-form census or a similarly reliable data source is introduced, we will not be able to track child poverty rates among selected social groups for 2010 or after."