Evidence of meeting #36 for Citizenship and Immigration in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was caregivers.
A recording is available from Parliament.
4:05 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Social Work, University of Toronto, As an Individual
I'm still digesting the information. Let me see if I can understand the question.
The caregiver numbers dropped, meaning people who are currently working as caregivers who are entered in the caregiver program—
4:05 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Social Work, University of Toronto, As an Individual
—they will reduce the numbers there. The question on the status of two-parent households, can you clarify that?
4:05 p.m.
Conservative
David Tilson Conservative Dufferin—Caledon, ON
You're from Toronto. I have a riding just north of Brampton called Dufferin–Caledon. It's a rural-urban community. I used to have a lot of people asking for caregivers, and there are fewer and fewer. In fact, recently I haven't had any. Now the minister says he's dropping by 4,000 the number of caregivers that will be allowed. You spent a lot of time in your presentation talking about caregivers, so my question is what your thoughts are on that.
4:05 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Social Work, University of Toronto, As an Individual
Thank you for clarifying.
I'm actually very concerned. I think it was last month the minister announced they will be repealing the live-in caregiver program, removing it from the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. What we leave in place is just the caregiver program, which does not guarantee access to permanent residence. In fact, it has caps on the caregivers. It may end up requiring people who come to Canada as caregivers to be a cycle of temporary foreign workers who must have a work permit. Then, once it is expired, there's no option to apply for permanent residence, and they return to their homes. I think this is the exact opposite direction that many caregiver communities have been advocating for. I think it is a cause for concern.
4:05 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Borys Wrzesnewskyj
Thank you, Professor Bhuyan.
Welcome, Mr. Angus, to our committee. You have seven minutes.
November 1st, 2016 / 4:05 p.m.
NDP
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair. I want to apologize for being late. It's great to see you in this role.
I want to thank our witnesses for the excellent testimony.
Ms. Gerente, I would like to start with you. I thought you were very eloquent and powerful. You speak to what, to me, immigration in this country should be: that we give opportunity to young people to build a future.
I want to ask you about your experience. You were talking about the abuses of the people you know that are going on in the system, on the front lines. What kind of support is there? Are they told their rights? Are they aware that they have rights? Or in fact are they a secondary class of workers who can be abused?
4:05 p.m.
As an Individual
No, some of these workers—they're mostly women—don't particularly know what their rights and freedoms are when they go to Canada. Some of them think that because they're foreigners, they don't have the same equal rights as the people who live here. If they are abused, if their employer works them beyond the hours they have to work, it's normal. They don't have any knowledge when it comes to these things. The fact is, they're scared and uneducated about the laws of Canada when it comes to immigration and working status.
4:05 p.m.
NDP
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
Thank you for that.
Ms. Bhuyan, you were talking about the changes in the caregiver program that would create a permanent cycle of temporary foreign workers, as opposed to actually creating the opportunity for people to work here and eventually build a life here with their family. What effect do you think these changes will have on the abuse that the caregivers are exposed to and their sense of a lack of rights?
4:05 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Social Work, University of Toronto, As an Individual
In addition to what Lean was saying about their not knowing their rights, we've been meeting with a lot of caregivers who actually are quite knowledgeable, at least in Toronto, although I will say that there are differences regionally for caregivers who work in more remote or rural areas; for example, in suburbs outside the centre of Toronto, as well as—with our research in Alberta—those more remote caregivers, for example, coming out of the tar sands region, who are very vulnerable because there are not community resources.
There are caregivers who know their rights, but they cannot exercise their rights. There are very few protections in place. If an employer disagrees with their claim of abuse, the option for the employer is to let the worker go.
As far as I know, there is not a lot of oversight to implement the labour laws that we have to protect those workers. I feel that this is an issue that affects all temporary foreign workers who are tied to their employer and have a closed work permit. We will see more of that type of abuse if caregivers are not provided the option to apply for permanent residence.
4:10 p.m.
NDP
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
Thank you.
I want to ask about the issue of the closed permit and its implications, because it does give an enormous amount of power and potential for abuse. Even if someone does know their rights, if they are let go, they lose their status here.
I have seen this in other areas. I'm not going to talk about individual cases, but I became aware of a young girl who was going to be deported. She was in a home in which they were physically abusing her. They told her that if she spoke up, her permit would be revoked, and she'd be deported. It almost happened.
If I became aware of something like this, then I'm sure things like this happen a fair amount of the time.
If we are going to have a just system of immigration and care work, you're suggesting that we need to be able to allow families such as Ms. Gerente's to come and be part of our Canadian society and that we need to move beyond the closed permit so that there is some level of right for the person, if they are in an abusive, unfair relationship of work, to find other work.
4:10 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Social Work, University of Toronto, As an Individual
Yes, and I think we can take examples from within our current programs.
I entered Canada as a migrant worker. However, because my job skill was considered high skilled by the Canadian government, I was permitted to enter with my spouse and our child.
When we entered Canada, I presented our documents at the border. I received a closed permit tied to my employer; my spouse was given an open work permit, and our child was given the opportunity to go to school.
We have within our system two very different programs. Some workers are allowed to maintain family unity, and we see that they're able to demonstrate whether they want to settle and decide whether they want to stay permanently in Canada. Then there are those who are considered unworthy.
I think we can learn from the practices we currently have what is working when we allow workers to arrive with their families, to establish their ties, and to begin contributing as families and communities. I think we could probably extend this much further than we currently do to a broader group of workers.
4:10 p.m.
NDP
Charlie Angus NDP Timmins—James Bay, ON
Thank you.
Ms. Gerente, what's your vision for your future here in Canada?
4:10 p.m.
As an Individual
I clearly see myself finishing high school and then eventually finishing college.
I really want to be involved with this thing, because first-hand experience will allow me to help the people who are experiencing this pain, who are in this case and do not really know how to move and how to act.
I also want to build a family eventually—in the long future, not the near one—and be satisfied and content and not worry about my immigrant status, or my sister's status and mine, or where we're going to be 10 years from now.
4:10 p.m.
NDP
4:10 p.m.
Liberal
4:10 p.m.
Liberal
Ali Ehsassi Liberal Willowdale, ON
Let me first ask Mr. Harohalli a question.
I understand that your principal misgiving is that when families want to sponsor a relative, they have to state what their household income is. As far as I understand, you're in favour of modifying those particular provisions or the amounts. I was wondering if you could share with the members of the committee what you have in mind in terms of modification.
4:10 p.m.
As an Individual
This is with respect to the requirements or the low-income cut-off, which every year increases. I understand it's because of inflation.
I myself work in the private sector for a company owned by an individual. When it comes time every year to go for an appraisal, it's not in line with the current inflation rate. They may just give 2% or at the max 3%, and that too, only if you are very close to your manager or they have put in a recommendation. But when it comes to the low-income cut-off, every year we try. I have tried working two jobs to meet that level, but every year it goes on increasing, but at the same time the income we receive is not in line.
Especially in the GTA, the level of income is very high compared to where we come from—the Cambridge, Waterloo, Kitchener area—so it's not in line. If that's something that the committee or the government can look into, that would be....
4:15 p.m.
Liberal
Ali Ehsassi Liberal Willowdale, ON
Essentially, all you are requesting is that it not be indexed to inflation.
4:15 p.m.
Liberal
Ali Ehsassi Liberal Willowdale, ON
Thank you.
Now let me ask Professor Bhuyan a question.
Thank you very much for your testimony. I understand that you come with many years of experience. You've done a lot of research on issues that are before this committee. Specifically I refer to a paper that you authored called “Unprotected, Unrecognized: Canadian Immigration Policy and Violence Against Women”. Also, judging from your testimony, you obviously are very much aware of terrible things that are happening and abuse that is taking place.
I wonder whether you could share with us any specific recommendations you have to make sure that, to the best of our ability, we can prevent these types of incidents from happening. The incident you talked about, someone being denied food, is a terrible thing. It's really significant that we look into it and try to the best of our ability to change it.
4:15 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Social Work, University of Toronto, As an Individual
Certainly. Thank you for the opportunity.
I think this calls for a broad visioning. I understand that the Minister of Status of Women has formed a federal strategy against gender-based violence and that there is in place a gender-based analysis plus requirement for all departments to analyze how different policies are affecting various groups, based on their vulnerability. I think this is an opportunity to reconsider what role the federal government can play to provide protection for immigrants, including those with temporary visas who are being abused by their sponsor or their employer.
We have, for example, a trafficking visa in Canada. I don't think it's implemented well, but it presents some framework for acknowledging that some people are abused in the process of migration and that some of the immigration rules we have can trap people in these relationships.
The exception for abuse and neglect, frankly.... As a project, we were trying to repeal the conditional permanent residence but not throw away the development of the immigration process in which it acknowledged.... For me it was exciting to see the federal government acknowledge that people who are sponsored can be abused and neglected by their sponsor.
The federal government has a role to play in ensuring that they're not trapped in a relationship. This is specific to the conditional permanent residence, but it already existed. There is a long-term phenomenon in Canada called “sponsorship breakdown”. This refers to people who are sponsored as a spouse inside Canada and are waiting for their application to be processed.
Usually, if a relationship breaks down, it's “we're done”, but if it's breaking down because of a pattern of domestic violence, then I think the government has a role to ensure that the person's rights are protected and that they're not deported because the person they intended to have a relationship with is holding them in an abusive cycle.
Similar laws have been passed in other countries. In the United States they have the violence against women act, which has specific measures for immigrants who are being abused by their sponsor, whether it be a spouse or a parent. I think we can learn transnationally about what other governments are doing. Again I think this requires a federal strategy, because this is true for workers as well as for sponsored family members, including parents and grandparents.
4:15 p.m.
Liberal
Ali Ehsassi Liberal Willowdale, ON
Speaking, as you did, of transnational experience, I'd be remiss if I didn't ask whether you could kindly offer us your expertise insofar as the Yazidi community is concerned. As I'm sure you've heard, they will be coming to Canada through the immigration process. Given that your expertise is violence and abuse and things of that nature, is there anything that you think we should be mindful of?
4:20 p.m.
Professor, Faculty of Social Work, University of Toronto, As an Individual
Maybe you could help me clarify. Do you mean about the Yazidi as a community that has experienced a high volume of violence?