Posted: Sunday, 10 January 2010

The CLC has a long standing and critical interest in Canada’s Temporary Foreign Worker (TFW) program. Although, we were pleased to learn of regulatory changes being put forward, we are disappointed with their limited scope and imbalance between employers and workers’ interests.

The opportunities for substantial regulatory reforms have been supported by the Auditor General’s (AG) Report on the TWF program which provided considerable criticism of how the current system operates. The AG report noted an absence of clear processes, no assurance that either CIC or HRSDC is doing the assessment to determine if job offers are genuine, and there is a lack of clarity and consistency in directives intended to ensure all factors are being met by employers. In short, there is a lack of confidence in systems that can ensure migrant workers are really needed or that the offers, terms, and conditions, are in fact genuine.

This submission provides our analysis of the proposed regulatory amendments and the regulatory impact analysis statement. Please take note of our recommendations we believe are urgently needed to meaningfully serve the interests of migrant workers and the domestic workforce.

Summary of shortcomings with the proposed regulations amending Immigration & Refugee Protection Regulations:

• Fails to put in place measures that take responsibility for the explosive growth and subsequent exploitation and abuse many migrant workers face under the TFW program.
• Fails to fulfill the duty of fairness to migrant workers.
• Unduly favours employers while penalizing newcomers.
• Enables a systemic and gender specific discriminatory impact for some migrant workers seeking permanent residency status.
• Fails to reflect meaningful evaluations, recommendations or audits of the TFW program.
• Fail to present a rigorous benefits and costs methodology or accurate estimate of the number of migrant workers at risk.
• Fails to candidly portray the inputs received by labour as part of the ‘engagement strategy’.
• In addition, the proposed regulatory amendments do little to provide meaningful protection for vulnerable migrant workers already in Canada.

Read more - Download the PDF.