Citizenship and Immigration Committee on March 10th, 2020

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Okay, that would be very helpful. When I raised these cases I wasn't trying to say they were specific cases that I wanted an answer from you on, but rather to say they are examples of what happens in the system. It's like what Ms. Dhillon was trying to raise. These are standard examples.

I have another situation where an individual has been abused by multiple employers, and then through that process was left unemployed. Her work permit is still active here, and because she had to pay multiple employers for an LMIA and other fees, she was broke. Then she ended up in a shelter. In her situation, through that process, someone told her about the open work permits for vulnerable workers. She went to apply under that, thinking she would get some support there. Instead of getting support, she was told she was in violation of her financial eligibility because she was living in a shelter. That is her reality right now. What good is this program when it operates in that way? Again, in her instance, she was able to prove that the employer charged her fees, which they are not allowed to do. That is an active case just sitting in a dark hole somewhere. In the meantime, she's been traumatized.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'll have to end this. Your time is up, Ms. Kwan.

We're left with eight minutes, so we can do two rounds of questioning of four minutes each by the Conservatives and the Liberals, if that is okay. We'll go to Mr. Seeback for four minutes, and then Mr. Tabbara for four minutes.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

I want to pick up a bit on the questions that were brought forward by Ms. Kwan. Is there a path to PR for a temporary foreign worker right now?

[Matt de Vlieger]

There are several paths to permanent residency for temporary foreign workers. Of all the principal applicants who come in through the economic program, 62% of them were previously here on a temporary basis, either as former international students or as temporary foreign workers, so it is a supply stream into our permanent programs.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

But they have to go to a separate stream. If you've been a temporary foreign worker for 15 years, coming back for 15 years routinely to work, there's no path for you. You wouldn't qualify under the Canadian experience class or something like that.

[Matt de Vlieger]

They may very well qualify under several of our programs. Within the provincial nominee program, there's the Canadian experience class. Through express entry, points are provided for those who have been here and are getting temporary foreign worker experience, which is why we see so many come through and into our permanent programs. Built into each of these permanent programs I mentioned are specific incentives, points and eligibility criteria related to that temporary foreign work experience.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Is there any way a temporary foreign worker in a low-wage job, particularly in the agricultural sector, would be aware of these programs? My experience is that people who are routinely coming here year after year to work in the agricultural sector have no idea that there is a pathway forward for them to permanent residency. Do you have programs in place to try to make sure that people coming on temporary foreign worker permits are aware of their options and ability to apply for permanent residency?

[Matt de Vlieger]

The government has announced a new pilot program, the agri-food immigration pilot. It's going to launch and be open for applications at the end of the month, on March 30. We're doing promotion. We're engaging with the agri-food sector. It's specifically open to four industry groups: mushroom, greenhouse production, meat processing and livestock raising. A lot of communication is happening with those communities to let them know about that opportunity. One of the requirements is that they've been on a non-seasonal work permit temporarily. That gives them access to this new permanent resident pathway quite directly.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Is there a process, a service standard, for a decision on LMIAs? Do you have a set standard that we expect these to be processed in x amount of time?

[Katie Alexander, Executive Director, Temporary Foreign Worker Program and Work-Sharing Program, Department of Employment and Social Development]

The program has two set service standards.

One is for the global talent stream, and that's to have the LMIA process within 10 days, and we're meeting that service level.

The other is regarding a couple of factors that are identified in the policy: highest skill, short duration. Those also have a 10-day service standard.

Across the rest of the program, we're actually doing a service standard review to try to establish service standards. Given the investment that we've made to improve processing, we feel we're in a good position now to start looking at setting service standards in the coming year.

Over the course of the last year, we have improved the service level of the program by 22 business days, so we're seeing great improvements across the program in all streams.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

What would that 22-day improvement be? Would it be from 200 days to 178, or what are you suggesting?

[Katie Alexander]

On April 1, 2019, in the program the average processing time was 54 days. Now for February 2020, the average processing time is 32 business days.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

One of the complaints we have from the CFIB is about the difficulty of getting in contact regarding the process, say, for an LMIA, specifically with phone numbers. The phone number listed to get in touch with them is under the ESDC corporate information section, where very few business owners would ever think to look.

Are you considering making a phone number more readily available and apparent on your website and in other ways for businesses to get in touch to find out what's going on?

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Maybe we will have to find another opportunity to get the answer. Your time is up.

We will go on to Mr. Tabbara for four minutes.

[Kyle Seeback, Conservative, Dufferin—Caledon, ON]

Could you maybe answer that subsequently?

[Marwan Tabbara, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here.

I want to briefly talk about the start-up visa program and I'll give some credit to the Conservatives. This program started in 2013.

[An hon. member]

What are you doing?

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Marwan Tabbara, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

I'll end on a light note. The program was made permanent in 2018-19.

I want to talk about its successes and turn to the high-tech sector. I had an individual who came to my Waterloo region, whose name is Vikram. He started a website movnorth.com and is really trying to get a lot of the talent from Silicon Valley. As you know, some of the individuals have been on work permits for six-plus years in the United States. I'll just read a quote from an article:

Immigration things are getting a little out of control. There are all these...restrictions and arbitrary reasons for cancelling things. You live someplace six years, you want some kind of permanence, not a work visa forever.

Have we been able to harness the talented workers who are in the United States and elsewhere, because of restrictive visa measures? Can you share some success stories you've seen, and maybe an increase in numbers of immigrants coming particularly for high-tech jobs from this program that was started in 2013, now made permanent in 2018?

[Marian Campbell Jarvis]

Under the start-up visa program we've had about 420 principal applicants, who have launched about 250 new businesses over the past five years. There are currently about 29 business incubators, 23 venture capital funds and nine angel investor groups in the program.

I don't have the breakdown on the high-tech sector specifically, but anecdotally we're certainly hearing that's a big receptor for that.

On the evaluations so far, we're finding that the entrepreneurs coming through are younger, better educated and proficient in English or French, and some of them are settling in some of the smaller regions, so that's the stickiness factor. We've had 18% in Atlantic Canada.

It's a fairly small program but it seems to be having quite a big impact.

[Marwan Tabbara, Liberal, Kitchener South—Hespeler, ON]

Excellent.

I'll leave it; that's okay.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Mr. Tabbara.

Thanks to all of the witnesses for coming today for the start of our new study. Maybe during the course of our study we might request that you come back again.

I will suspend the meeting for a few minutes so that we can go in camera for committee business.

Thank you.

[Proceedings continue in camera]