Thanks for the opportunity to present our views today on behalf of the Canadian Labour Congress. We will be providing the committee with a written submission in the future. We just haven't gotten it translated yet.
We represent 3.3 million members across the country. We work in virtually all sectors of the economy. Although we are pleased to be here we're also concerned with the limited time frame allocated for the review of the temporary foreign worker program. In May, 2014, several thousand delegates to our 27th constitutional convention called for a full, open, and transparent review of the temporary foreign worker program. We feel like this review undertaken by HUMA does not meet that criterion so we hope you'll give it some further reconsideration.
I'd like to start by saying that it's long been our contention that the temporary foreign worker program is flawed in design and in use. The program is still being used by employers as a way of doing business instead of a last resort. Employers are not motivated to recruit Canadian workers in aggressive and innovative ways including under-represented workers such as immigrants, persons with disabilities, indigenous people, racialized individuals, women, LGBTQ, and youth. They are also not motived to invest in training for Canadians because they can access higher skilled migrant workers.
For migrant workers the design of the program creates a multitude of vulnerabilities for them. The program is completely driven by employer demand and gives employers all control over the labour relationship with the migrant workers. This allows for rampant exploitation and abuse of their human and labour rights. The perennial problem is, of course, of low compensation for migrant workers. Although employers are required to pay migrant workers the median, prevailing wage, they find ways around this.
How do they do that? They do it by hiring migrant workers at the lowest end of the wage range, not paying them for overtime, not allowing rest breaks, demanding work outside of the employment contract, and recovering fees for various business expenses. Paying migrant workers low wages does not provide employers with the incentive to raise the wage floor for all workers regardless of whether they are Canadian or migrant workers. The tactics contravene provincial employment standards and the federal government's own requirements.
I want to highlight two program elements that result in enormous vulnerabilities for migrant workers. First, the employer-specific work permit gives all control to the employer of the workers' employment and immigrant status, their compensation, their working conditions, and their health and safety. The fear of getting fired and deported traps migrant workers in involuntary servitude where they experience horrendous working conditions; diminished labour rights; wage gouging; contraventions of labour, health, and safety standards; abuse; intimidation; sexual advances; coercion of document retention such as passports; and being tricked into illegal status. The most vulnerable are lower-skilled migrant workers with language barriers who work in isolation, and in particular those who are in debt to recruiters.
The second issue is the issue of the four-in, four-out, regulation where a migrant worker can work in Canada for four years and then they're not eligible to work in Canada for the next four years. This is a revolving door of lower-skilled migrant workers, which reinforces how the program creates an underclass of disposable workers. The flawed regulation interacts poorly with other parts of the temporary foreign worker program and has a far-reaching impact on the lives of migrant workers. In Alberta, migrant workers are timing out under this rule because of the processing delays of their provincial nominee applications. Other program flaws are specific to the caregiver program and the seasonal agricultural worker program. For example, the cap on permanent residency applications where there has been none before is particularly harsh in the caregiver program. That has also imposed limitations to pursue further education and training, which has caused hardships for many migrant caregivers. For those in the seasonal agricultural worker program their living and working conditions can only be described as dire. Although migrant farm workers contribute to employment insurance they are not entitled to EI benefits. This was something that they had before 2012, at least access to special benefits. Yet it is the same seasonal agricultural worker program that requires migrant farm workers to leave by mid-December each year invalidating the social assurance and disqualifying them for EI entitlements.
Other concerns include predatory recruiters charging migrant workers exorbitant fees—often in the thousands—to match them with employers for lower-skill, low-wage jobs. The recruiters put migrant workers in debt bondage for years.
One of our biggest concerns is the inadequacy of enforcement of employer compliance. Only eight on-site inspections were initiated out of a total of 5,907 employers reviewed by Employment and Social Development Canada between and 2013 and 2015. It's not enough, as well, when only 340 reviews have resulted from 3,395 tips received between April 14 and December 15.
Finally, more regional and timely labour market data is needed in order to implement evidence-informed operations of the temporary foreign worker program.
We want to leave you with these recommendations.
Implement new pathways to permanent residency for all lower-skill migrant workers, including those in the agricultural program, and the caregiver program.
Concurrently transition towards eliminating employers' access to temporary migrant workers on tied work permits in the national occupational classifications C and D of the temporary foreign worker program, excluding the seasonal worker program and the caregiver program.
Put in place strict new eligibility requirements for employers seeking temporary work permits, including more robust economic needs tests, providing tools to enhance employers' recruitment of Canadians, and permanent residents, including under-represented workers.
Work with employers to provide more training to Canadian workers.
Replace the employer-specific work permits with open permits for lower-skill migrant workers, including the seasonal workers and migrant caregivers. In the transition, offer pathways to permanent residency for lower-skilled temporary foreign workers who are already in Canada.
Eliminate the four-in, four-out regulation, and remove the caps on permanent residency applications and the barrier to further training and education for migrant caregivers.
Change the regulation to qualify seasonal workers for EI benefits.
Aggressively enhance enforcement of employer compliance, particularly by increasing on-site inspections.
Ratify convention 189 of the International Labour Organization on decent work for domestic workers.
And last, greatly enhance labour market data collection. Obviously, we would be pleased to collaborate on this.
These suggestions are not things that don't work. We know they work, or at least some of them work, in the international mobility program, so these are things that we have proven can work.
Thanks for your consideration, and we'll look forward to your questions.