New bill could see veterans given advantage when applying for government jobs in NS
Posted Oct 29, 2014 10:58:35 AM.
This article is more than 5 years old.
A new provincial law may be passed by the only independent MLA in the Nova Scotia legislature.
MLA for Hants West, Chuck Porter, has proposed a bill that would see former military members get job preference for civil servant positions over a candidate with the same qualifications, if it came down to a tie between the two applicants.
Porter has put forth the notion to give veterans an advantage when applying for positions with the provincial government, and he said the bill has already gone through its second reading.
“A lot of people retire from the military at 45 and 50 years old with 25 or 30 years of service already in, who still want to be part of the workforce,” he said. “And the other side of this, and the bigger side of this really is, Nova Scotia holds the biggest number of service personnel here, and we want to keep these folks here.”
Porter said the idea behind the bill is a way of saying thank-you to former military members for their service.
“That’s really what this is saying,” he said. “We appreciate what you’ve done for us over your career and over your years.”
The idea, he says, sprouted from a similar practice he heard about in New Brunswick.
