To the editor:
How many more scandals will it take before the Conservatives finally get serious about fixing the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP), so it does not take jobs from Canadians?
We recently learned the government gave a positive labour market opinion for a pizza restaurant in Weyburn, Sask. that had its existing employees train temporary foreign workers (TFWs) and then fired those Canadian workers.
These actions violate the basic purpose of the program – to provide workers to fill shortages only in situations where Canadians cannot be found to fill the vacancies.
For years, the Conservatives turned a blind eye to this sort of abuse. During the recession, just as hundreds of thousands of Canadian workers lost their jobs, the number of TFWs rose dramatically, almost doubling by the end of 2012.
It was only when the negative press surrounding RBC and a British Columbia mine got too intense that the Conservatives were forced to do something. Yet, it clearly hasn’t solved the problem.
We are seeing the Conservatives pretending they are serious about fixing the program. Yet, their actions do not match their rhetoric.
The government won’t even begin an audit of the program until 2015/16, and it has set no deadline for completing it.
We need to get to the root of the problem. The number of abuses suggests there are very few safeguards in place to ensure the TFWP is used correctly and does not displace Canadian workers.
That’s why I wrote to the Auditor General to request an audit of its safeguards as quickly as possible so we can strengthen them to prevent this sort of abuse.
Canadians expect more from political leaders than just words. Hopefully, the Conservatives will finally get the memo.
John McCallum, MP
Liberal Immigration Critic
