The Canada Job Grant is gone. Here is what pays for training your staff now.
A Canadian employer can currently get 80% of training costs in British Columbia to a maximum of $300,000 a year, up to $10,000 per trainee in Ontario, up to $100,000 a year in Alberta, and federal support to cut hours instead of laying anyone off for as long as 152 weeks. What has changed is the framework above them: every province that ran a branded Canada-X Job Grant has renamed, replaced or scrapped it in the past 18 months.
Written and reviewed by
Chase Miller, Chief Business Development Officer and Co-Founder
Chase Miller is Chief Business Development Officer and Co-Founder of Impact Applications, a Calgary grant consultancy that works with businesses across Canada on federal and provincial grants, tax credits and interest-free loans, and manages the whole process from first assessment through claims and reporting. He runs the first assessment on client engagements, deciding which programs a business should pursue and in what order, and has worked on Canadian government funding since co-founding the firm in 2023. LinkedIn
Program facts checked against the official source:
- average funding secured per client
- $334,132 average funding secured per client
- approval rate
- 94% approval rate
What the Canada Job Grant became, province by province
It used to be the single national answer to how an employer gets its staff trained: one federal-provincial agreement, and a Canada-X Job Grant in each province. Checking each province on 8 September 2026, that framework has dissolved. Ontario renamed its version, Alberta replaced it with something that will not pay wages, Saskatchewan eliminated it outright, and Manitoba discontinued it.
This matters beyond trivia about names. A Saskatchewan employer building a training budget around a programme that no longer exists has lost a quarter. An Alberta employer who assumes the replacement works like the old grant will discover at claim time that wages are not eligible.
| Province | What it was | What it is now | Where it stands |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ontario | Canada-Ontario Job Grant | Ontario Job GrantOpen | Renamed and redesigned, launched 4 May 2026. Applications year round. |
| Alberta | Canada-Alberta Job Grant | Canada-Alberta Productivity GrantContinuous intake | Replaced. Alberta's own wording is that the Productivity Grant replaces the Job Grant. |
| British Columbia | Never branded as a Canada-B.C. Job Grant | B.C. Employer Training GrantOpen | Unchanged and open, and the most generous per employer in the country. |
| Saskatchewan | Canada-Saskatchewan Job Grant | NothingEliminated | Eliminated after the federal government cut $17.6 million in transfer funding. |
| Manitoba | Canada-Manitoba Job Grant | Building Up Manitoba ProgramContinuous intake | Discontinued in Manitoba's own words, and replaced by a programme we have verified. |
Manitoba's wording is the bluntest of the five. Its own page for the old programme reads: "The Canada/Manitoba Job Grant has been discontinued."
Who these programmes are built for
Established employers with a payroll to protect: manufacturers, processors, industrial and trades businesses, and companies carrying a workforce through a change in what they make or how they make it. Several of these programmes were expanded specifically because of tariffs, and the eligibility rules follow that. If you are a sole operator or you are looking for personal retraining funding, none of the programmes below apply to you, and the provincial employment services are the right door instead.
Federal: three programmes that stack into one another
Ottawa's employer training support is not a grant you apply to on its own. It is an agreement to cut hours instead of laying people off, a top-up that only exists once you hold that agreement, and a replacement that will absorb both.
Work-Sharing
Employment and Social Development Canada
An agreement to reduce hours across a group of employees instead of laying anyone off, with Employment Insurance topping up the lost income. A normal agreement runs 6 to 26 weeks and can be extended by 12, so 38 in total. The special measures brought in for tariffs stretch that to 152 weeks.
What most write-ups leave out
The special measures were extended by a year and now run to 31 March 2028. That extension is the single most useful fact here, because a plan built on the ordinary 38-week ceiling underestimates what is available by nearly three years.
Worker Retention Grant
Employment and Social Development Canada
Applications opened on 17 February 2026 under a $102.7 million envelope over two years starting in 2025-26. It raises what employees receive while they train during the hours they are not working, and the employer commits to supporting that training for a minimum period or until 31 March 2027, whichever comes first.
What most write-ups leave out
Roughly 80% of all applications received referred to tariffs, and the federal backgrounder names steel, lumber and auto. If you are in one of those sectors this is the closest thing to a programme designed for you. The grant ends 31 March 2027.
Workforce Retention and Retraining Program
Employment and Social Development Canada
Announced as the successor that combines Work-Sharing and the Worker Retention Grant into one programme. Workers would receive 70% of lost earnings for the time not worked, rather than 55% of insurable earnings. It covers businesses facing economic challenges including those related to tariffs.
What most write-ups leave out
No start date has been published. Do not wait for it: Work-Sharing and the Worker Retention Grant are both live now, and the federal page is explicit that they keep running in the meantime.
Ontario: a renamed grant and a $2.5 billion fund with one stream shut
Ontario has the most money in this cluster and the most confusion. The Job Grant changed its name in May, and the Skills Development Fund is really two programmes in opposite states that share one search term.
Ontario Job Grant
Government of Ontario · formerly the Canada-Ontario Job Grant
Ontario's own words: the province is launching the redesigned Canada-Ontario Job Grant under the new name Ontario Job Grant. It launched on 4 May 2026 and accepts applications year round, assessed on an ongoing basis. The higher $15,000 ceiling applies where a small employer trains a previously unemployed new hire.
What most write-ups leave out
It is still federally funded underneath. Ontario states that funding is provided in part by the Government of Canada through the Canada-Ontario Labour Market Development Agreement, which is why the shape of the programme survived the rename.
Skills Development Fund, Training Stream
Government of Ontario
Ontario's page states that the application period for the Training Stream has now closed. It runs in rounds rather than continuously: a release of 4 June 2026 described the sixth round, awarding nearly $8 million across Northern Ontario projects.
What most write-ups leave out
This one stream is behind most of the roughly 9,070 monthly searches for the Skills Development Fund, and it is shut. The programme names a targeted response to U.S. tariffs for skilled trades and industrial sectors including automotive and manufacturing.
Skills Development Fund, Capital Stream
Government of Ontario
Round two opened on 29 November 2024 with over $74 million and takes applications continuously, with no deadline. This is the door that is actually open, and almost nobody searching for the Skills Development Fund knows the difference between the two streams.
What most write-ups leave out
The fund as a whole is a tariff response. A release of 6 May 2025 expanded it by $955 million over three years from 2025-26, taking it to $2.5 billion, explicitly to protect Ontario workers in the face of tariffs and economic uncertainty.
Alberta: a replacement that will not pay wages
Alberta swapped its Job Grant for a productivity grant with a narrower definition of what training is. The difference matters more than the name change.
Canada-Alberta Productivity Grant
Government of Alberta · formerly the Canada-Alberta Job Grant
Up to $5,000 per existing employee per fiscal year, up to $10,000 for training an unemployed Albertan, and up to $100,000 per employer per fiscal year. Training must be productivity-focused in one of three categories: business process and operations management, technical expertise, or digital and technological skills. It must be completed within 52 weeks and delivered in Alberta by a qualified instructor.
What most write-ups leave out
Eligible costs are direct training costs only: tuition or course fees, textbooks, software, examination fees, approved travel and required materials. Employee wages are excluded. That is the sharpest contrast with Ontario and British Columbia, and it changes which training is worth putting through the programme.
British Columbia: the most generous cap in the country
The one province in this group whose programme did not change. It also pays the highest share and allows the highest total per employer.
B.C. Employer Training Grant
Government of British Columbia
Open for the 2026/27 fiscal year, for training beginning on or after 1 April 2026. The $300,000 annual ceiling per employer is the highest in this cluster by a wide margin, which makes it the only programme here that can carry a whole department through a retraining programme rather than a handful of courses.
What most write-ups leave out
New priority points are given for training through a B.C. public post-secondary institution and for trades training at apprenticeship levels 3 or 4. Budget 2026 adds $12 million over three years aimed at doubling apprenticeship seats by 2028-29, so trades applications are the ones the province is steering money toward.
Saskatchewan: eliminated, with no replacement
The clearest single fact in this cluster, and one no competing page mentions.
Canada-Saskatchewan Job Grant
Government of Saskatchewan
A provincial news release of 19 March 2025 states the Canada-Saskatchewan Job Grant is to be eliminated as a result of the federal government cutting $17.6 million in Labour Market Transfer Agreement funding. Since 2014 the grant had provided $10.191 million.
What most write-ups leave out
A Saskatchewan employer searching for this programme in 2026 will find guides that still describe it as though it were running. It is not, and the province said so in a release titled around delivering training despite federal cuts.
Manitoba: discontinued, and the replacement is already verified here
Manitoba is the one province where the successor programme is already a checked record on this site rather than something you have to go and find.
Building Up Manitoba Program
Government of Manitoba · formerly the Canada-Manitoba Job Grant
Manitoba's page for the old grant says it plainly: the Canada/Manitoba Job Grant has been discontinued. In its place is Building Up Manitoba, described as a new initiative to strengthen support for small and medium-sized employers. It cost-shares employee training at up to $10,000 per employee and HR strategy development at up to $25,000, both at 50%, to a $100,000 maximum across both streams.
What most write-ups leave out
No discontinuation date is given for the old grant and no launch date for the new one. Manitoba's page carries no last-modified date, so the discontinuation notice is the only dated thing about it, which is its own reason to confirm before you build a plan around timing.
Quebec: a wage subsidy rather than a training grant
Quebec is not in the English search data, so most guides skip it. It runs a different shape of support and it is worth naming.
Évolution-Compétences
Ministère de l'Emploi et de la Solidarité sociale, with the Commission des partenaires du marché du travail
Funded by the Workforce Skills Development and Recognition fund. It reimburses part of an employee's salary, part of a mentor's salary, and the cost of refresher training the company delivers itself. Canada and Quebec announced $24.7 million over five years in March 2026 for apprentices in 18 Red Seal trades.
What most write-ups leave out
The distinction matters when you compare programmes. Alberta will not pay a wage and Quebec substantially will, so the same retraining plan has a completely different cost in each province.
Why all of this changed at once
Most of the money in this cluster is tariff response money
Work-Sharing's special measures were implemented in response to the impact of tariffs and, after a one-year extension, now remain in effect to 31 March 2028. Roughly 80% of the applications received for the Worker Retention Grant referred to tariffs, and the federal backgrounder names steel, lumber and auto. Ontario expanded the Skills Development Fund by $955 million over three years from 2025-26, taking it to $2.5 billion, explicitly to protect Ontario workers in the face of tariffs and economic uncertainty.
That is worth knowing for a practical reason rather than a political one. If tariffs are the reason you are retraining or reducing hours, you are the applicant these programmes were expanded for, and you are almost certainly eligible for more than training money alone.
What stacks, and what quietly does not
Training money is easier to combine than most funding, because it usually pays for a cost nothing else touches. The exceptions are worth knowing before you file.
Federal and provincial, on different costs
Work-Sharing pays employees for hours not worked. A provincial training grant pays the course fee. They are different costs, which is why the same workforce can sit under both at once.
The Worker Retention Grant does not stand alone
It is a top-up on Work-Sharing and requires an approved and implemented agreement already in place. Applying for it first is the most common wasted step in this cluster.
Wages are the line Alberta will not cross
Alberta pays direct training costs only and excludes employee wages. British Columbia and Ontario are broader. The same retraining plan therefore costs a different amount depending on where the employee sits.
Training grants and SR&ED rarely collide
Course fees and tuition are not experimental development and were never in a claim. Where they can collide is salary: if an employee's hours are being funded, do not also claim them. See our SR&ED guide for how to keep the schedules apart.
Three things no government page currently states
These are published as open questions rather than filled in with someone else's guess. Every one of them is a question we ask the programme directly before advising anyone.
When Alberta last changed the terms of the Productivity Grant
The Alberta page carries no last-modified date, so its terms cannot be dated. The applicant guidelines were published in July 2025, which is the earliest official date we could find for the programme, and the old Job Grant portal domain is still live alongside the new one. Our own record of the programme was verified on 1 September 2026, and we confirm the current terms with the programme before advising anyone to build a plan around them.
Whether a seventh round of the Skills Development Fund Training Stream opens, and when
Round six was awarded in June 2026 and the fund holds $2.5 billion through 2027-28, so further rounds are likely. Nothing has been announced, and we have not found a government page that says otherwise.
When the Workforce Retention and Retraining Program starts
Ottawa has published the design and the amounts but no date. Until it comes into effect, Work-Sharing and the Worker Retention Grant continue, and that is what a plan should be built on today.
Where every fact on this page came from
Each source below was read on 8 September 2026, and the date shown is the date that page carried itself. Where a government page states no date, that is recorded too, because a page with no date is a page you should confirm before relying on it. Nothing here comes from another firm's summary.
- Work-Sharing, Employment and Social Development Canadadate modified 4 September 2026
- Worker Retention Grant backgrounder, Government of Canadapublished 17 February 2026
- Workforce Retention and Retraining Program, Government of Canadadate modified 4 September 2026
- Ontario Job Grant launch notice, Employment Ontarioposted 4 May 2026
- Ontario Job Grant, Government of Ontarioupdated 31 August 2026
- Skills Development Fund Training Stream, Government of Ontarioupdated 2 October 2025
- Canada-Alberta Productivity Grant, Government of Albertano date published; applicant guidelines dated July 2025
- B.C. Employer Training Grant, WorkBCread 8 September 2026
- Delivering Essential Skills Training Despite Federal Government Cuts, Government of Saskatchewannews release 19 March 2025
- Canada-Manitoba Job Grant, Government of Manitobano date published
Where to go next
The Regional Tariff Response Initiative, if tariffs are why you are retraining.
Every federal and provincial programme responding to tariffs, in one map.
Our verified record of the programme that replaced the Canada-Manitoba Job Grant.
The credit to keep separate from any wage-funded hours in a training claim.
Employer training funding: common questions
Answered against each government's own published material, checked 8 September 2026.
Find out which of these you actually qualify for
The call is a diagnostic, not a pitch. We settle which programme fits the province your employees are in, whether your training costs are eligible where you are, whether Work-Sharing is worth pairing with a provincial grant, and what has to be in place before you apply. If the honest answer is that your best route is a tariff programme rather than a training one, we will tell you that instead.
Check what my company qualifies forNo obligation · we will tell you if we are not the right fit