Citizenship and Immigration Committee on April 1st, 2008

[Al Brown]

I'm going to say that the argument of persuasion is fairness. It's simply put this way.

The first panellist asked me whether I couldn't just go and organize these people. Yes, I want to. In fact, that's what I do. I am the lead organizer for the province for the Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. So when I say these people, our temporary foreign workers, are afraid to organize because they're afraid of being sent back to their home country prematurely, it is a fact.

Please, whatever legislation is put in place, do not put us at a disadvantage for organizing these people. They must have multiple employers. Second, please do not use temporary foreign workers as leverage against Canadian workers. If Canadian workers are not filling a set of jobs because they will not work under those conditions or for those wages, please do not use temporary foreign workers as a way to leverage Canadians to work for lower standards and lower conditions.

Temporary foreign workers and immigrants coming to Canada should be treated as Canadians. They should have the same abilities to get work. They should be treated the same under the law, and they should have the ability to organize into local unions if that's what they desire. That's only fair. I think everyone in this room, and in Canada in general, agrees that fairness--looking at our laws, if we take them into account from a position of fairness--is what we should build our laws and our legislation on.

[Gil McGowan]

Canada is a country that's been built on immigration. We in the labour movement acknowledge that and we celebrate it. We also agree, here in Alberta and across the country, that there is a constant need for people to come to the country from elsewhere in the world. That's how we built our economy and that's how we'll do it in the future.

However, we don't think this particular program, the temporary farm worker program, is a way to build a workforce for the future. If we need people in this country to build houses, work on our construction sites, serve our coffee, then we should bring them in as permanent residents and prospective citizens, rather than as a new second class of disposable workers.

We're very concerned that what's happening with this program is incredibly counterproductive for the economic future of Canada. We are a country that relies on immigration, but we're afraid that we're in the process of tarnishing our hard-earned international reputation by allowing a program that is, frankly, mistreating workers. People from around the world have choices to make. They could go to other countries. If we continue down this road, we're going to be driving away exactly the people we need to build our economy.

We should stick with the tried and true. We have an immigration program that has worked for us. We have a social compact with immigrants. I think this is important. We've made a deal with immigrants historically: they come here, they work hard, and in exchange we give them citizenship. What we're doing now is saying we'll take your work, and when we're finished with you, goodbye. That's not the Canadian way, and it won't build the country we want for the future.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you, Mr. McGowan.

Mr. Komarnicki.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Thank you, and I'll be relatively brief.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

If you address your question to Mr. McGowan, that's the five minutes.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

First of all, I'd like to make a few comments.

I'd like to say to Ms. Alice Colak that we certainly appreciate the work the settlement and immigration people do. It seems that somebody needs to be on the ground to ensure there's an element of fairness and a potential for success for those who are there. I want you to know that we appreciate the work you do. I know there are many organizations like yours across the country, and they are a very valuable asset.

I know that our economy in Canada--Alberta in particular and Saskatchewan in large measure--has taken on a dimension that requires a number of employment positions to be filled. Whether we like it or whether we don't, the demographics show that although our population has increased over the last five years by 1.6 million, 1.1 million of that is through immigration. We're going to have to face the fact that we will be having newcomers coming to our country. The idea is how do we best do that and what systems do we put in place for it.

It's fine to say you can come through the regular system and not use temporary foreign workers. The fact is there's a backlog of 800,000 and a wait time of about six years in some cases. That's not what employers and people tell us they want. They want something faster that meets their needs in getting the right people in the right place at the right time. I think it's time for reform. There's no question about that.

With respect to temporary foreign workers, we are considering the option of having for some of them, including students who come in from foreign countries, the opportunity of applying for permanent residence in Canada after they've been here for a time, to give them permanent residence and then bring their families with them.

Do you see that as a positive step forward?

[Gil McGowan]

The short answer is yes. In fact, it's one of the recommendations that we included in the report from our foreign temporary advocate office. I hope you guys get a chance to look at this. We spent a lot of time working on the front lines on this issue, and as a result of our experience, we put together about 21 recommendations, about one-third of which relate directly to the federal realm. That is one of the recommendations we made.

However, I should make it clear that what we've heard from the federal government is that this experience rating will be extended to only a small number of workers. We're saying that if we're bringing these temporary workers into the country, they should all be able to apply for permanent residence once they've worked here for two years or so.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

That's a fair comment. But it's the direction that we're talking about, and generally that's a direction that you would agree with. Obviously, if we're going to meet some of these needs, the better way perhaps would be through an original application of immigration, but that's not working at present because of time and backlog. Those are two big things we have to overcome in the meantime.

If we're going to continue to use the temporary foreign worker program, I gather from many of you in what you've said that we need to have some basic national standards that employers would have to abide by, regardless of what province it is and what the labour standards of each province might be. That's what I see.

You're union people, I guess, and you're concerned about cheap labour, you're concerned about people in Canada being displaced. But put that argument aside, because we can argue that back and forth, if you like.

Would you be prepared as a union to sort of shepherd or advocate on behalf of temporary foreign workers if you had a baseline to work from, bring them in under your umbrella?

[Gil McGowan]

Well, we already have. In fact, there's a growing number of employers in unionized settings who are bringing temporary foreign workers into the country. When they come in, we move very quickly to get them involved in our organizations. In fact, both IBEW and UFCW have been leaders in that regard in Alberta. We offer them settlement services. We offer them English as a second language.

I want to make it clear that we are certainly not suggesting that we stop bringing people into the country from other parts of the world, and we're certainly not suggesting that the problem is with individual temporary foreign workers. The problem is the program, not the people.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

I appreciate that. That's why I think it's ripe for reform. The point....

Are you cutting me off?

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Yes, your time is up.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

All right.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

It's been pointed out to me that we have only three people on our next panel. I believe it's only three on our next panel. So we might go five minutes over the time here, because I have about three questions people want to get in. They're telling me we have a very interesting panel before us now, and I couldn't agree more.

So, Ed, I'm going to leave you right there and I'm going to go to Ms. Beaumier for a minute or so, and then to Mr. Telegdi and Mr. Carrier.

Go ahead, Ms. Beaumier.

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

It is clarification I want. Mr. Mahl, from the previous panel, told us that in Alberta it is against the law to take a fee from workers. Mr. Toal not only says that they are taking fees from workers, but he's named the companies. It's been reported to the government, and there has been no prosecution against these companies by the authorities. Is this against the law in Alberta or is it not against the law?

[Gil McGowan]

It's against the law. It's against the Fair Trading Act.

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

Why, do you believe, has prosecution not occurred?

[Michael Toal]

We have not received any answers to that. We have asked the questions. We have not received any answers from the provincial government. The provincial government continues to endorse that particular company in the Philippines.

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

Okay, the company is located in the Philippines.

[Michael Toal]

The company is located in the Philippines.

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

But it is still being endorsed by the government.

[Michael Toal]

Absolutely. I have it on good authority that the company has made its way to Calgary to try to track down the 195 workers.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Toal.

We'll go to Mr. Telegdi.

[Andrew Telegdi, Liberal, Kitchener—Waterloo, ON]

Thank you very much.

We have a broken immigration system. The last set of changes, which make it impossible to endorse workers that the economy needs, be it trades or be it lower skills, has created a real problem.

That blueprint was drawn up by the bureaucracy. Make no mistake. When you hear that the minister has this power or that power, it's the bureaucrats in action. One thing I've found about the bureaucracy is that they're not so interested in defending their minister as in defending past decisions. This whole process of cutting back, of eliminating from the point system people they commonly need, really gives a push to the undocumented worker category. Instead of admitting the mistake and doing some regularization programs and fixing the system so that we actually get people here as landed immigrants, the new fix is to have the temporary foreign worker. If you're dealing with captains of industry or what have you, I have no problem. But when you're dealing with people with no power, which is most of the temporary foreign workers, I have a huge problem.

We brought in the Chinese to build the railway. It seems to me that they want to bring in another group to build the tar sands and to then get rid of them.

The sooner we can get and limit the program, the better. It's so bothersome when you know you have agricultural workers coming back year after year after year, for decades. They should be able to come in as immigrants. They're contributing to the economy. The EI they pay is just ridiculous; they can't collect EI. That should be paid to an advocacy group.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Does anyone want to make a comment on what Mr. Telegdi said?

If not, we'll move along to Mr. Carrier. You can do a wrap-up comment, maybe, to his comments.

Go ahead, Mr. Carrier.

[Robert Carrier, Bloc, Alfred-Pellan, QC]

I have a question for Mr. Michael Toal. Earlier he spoke of a company that was found to mistreat temporary workers, and there was a judgment. I would like you to perhaps repeat the name of the company that was accused of mistreating its temporary employees.