Citizenship and Immigration Committee on March 10th, 2021

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Thank you very much.

Is there any idea of how long that processing time would take for that refugee resettlement application right now, if there are any?

[Dr. Nicole Giles]

Again, it depends on the circumstances, and I would flag here that we have a very important file for urgent refugee applications, which is our urgent protection program, which we work on in coordination with international partners, including UNHCR. It allows us to facilitate the urgent resettlement of refugees who are facing an immediate threat to their lives or their safety.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Thank you.

I want to talk about the COVID measures for temporary foreign workers. With respect to living arrangements provided for temporary foreign workers, how many compliance inspections were conducted?

[Caroline Xavier]

We run this program in conjunction with our colleagues at Service Canada and ESDC, so we manage part of it for those who are exempt from LMIA, but if you are asking for those who would have needed LMIAs, who came over as temporary foreign workers, I recommend we redirect the question to my colleagues at ESDC, who will be able to speak to the compliance with this program.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Were any tips or allegations of non-compliance received?

[Caroline Xavier]

Again, I would recommend that my ESDC colleagues answer that question.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

That's fair.

I'll move on to the LMIA—

[Caroline Harès, Acting Director General, Temporary Foreign Workers Program, Integrity Services Branch, Department of Employment and Social Development]

I can answer the question, Madam Chair.

With regard to the tip line that is available for the workers, we have received 749 tips and allegations since April. These were pertaining to employers or workers. These trigger inspections when we receive them. We do referrals based on the information that we get. For the egregious cases, once we have established the information and when we have analyzed the file that we received tips on, it is triggered within 48 hours.

As far as the statistics of inspections in 2020-21, since April we have launched 4,907 inspections. Of those, 2,590 were completed. These are the statistics that I have. I can say that 16% of the employers had to make corrections to be compliant.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Have there been any penalties or fines issued out of those?

Can we get a number for those?

[Caroline Harès]

Yes, there have been penalties issued. There have been 27 cases of non-compliance issued. Two of them were COVID-related. There was one permanent ban.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Can we get a breakdown of what industries those were?

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Mr. Hallan, your time is up.

I will request that the officials provide those numbers in writing, if they can.

We will now proceed to Madam Martinez Ferrada.

Madam Martinez Ferrada, you have six minutes for your round of questioning. You can start, please.

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I would like to thank all the witnesses here with us today.

I was struck by what Ms. Bégin said earlier about the job vacancy rate, which has basically stayed the same as it was before the pandemic.

Could you talk to us about the labour shortages we've seen since the beginning of the pandemic and how the situation has evolved?

In which areas have there been the biggest changes? How could we better hone our approach on immigration whilst keeping in mind the labour requirements in different regions? Would it be possible to adopt special or innovative approaches in order to fill job vacancies and better serve our communities, for example?

[Caroline Xavier]

I presume the question was for Ms. Bégin?

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

Ms. Bégin can answer, but if other witnesses have something to say, by all means.

If I'm not mistaken, Ms. Bégin, you are a representative of ESDC, Employment and Social Development Canada?

[Josée Bégin]

I work at Statistics Canada.

I can indeed give you more information. My colleagues from ESDC and IRCC can talk about this as well.

I mainly talked about job vacancies from October to December in my presentation. At the start of the pandemic, Statistics Canada concentrated on programs that are essential to its mission, such as the labour force survey and the consumer price index.

Our survey, which allows us to measure labour shortages, those job vacancies, was not carried out between April and September. That's why the information I gave you only covered the months from October to December.

I will be able to provide you with more information on unemployment and employment rates per region. At the end of March, I will also be able to give you detailed information from our job vacancy and wage survey on the skills required for the vacancies, broken down by region and by industry.

If the committee believes that this information could be useful, I will be able to get it to you, but only at the end of March.

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

Perfect.

My next question is for the witnesses from ESDC and IRCC.

Why are we keeping the rate for foreign workers capped at 10% in Quebec?

Why is it still necessary to maintain this rate?

Could you also explain to us why the rate is still capped?

[Caroline Xavier]

I will ask my colleagues from ESDC to answer your question.

[Philippe Massé]

Hello.

Thank you for your question, Ms. Martinez Ferrada.

I can tell you that the percentage of workers that can be hired in certain industries is subject to caps, especially those industries where wages are lower. In general, it is capped at 20%, which was brought down to 10% in 1994. That's why the percentage is capped at 20% for certain employers and at 10% for others. When the new measure was applied, employers who were already subject to a 20% cap stayed at that level. It is a measure that we are studying carefully. We are aware of the arguments that have been brought forward.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting, Mr. Massé. Can you hold the mike closer to your mouth, please?

I'm sorry for that. You can resume.

[Philippe Massé]

My apologies.

The pandemic has created a lot of uncertainty in the labour market and we are closely monitoring the situation. We have looked at the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic and the need to protect workers' safety. Over the next weeks, we will be studying these aspects of the program more carefully as we look to economic recovery.

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

Thank you.

Are there any programs or tools that the federal government and Quebec are working on jointly to alleviate labour shortages?

[Philippe Massé]

We have an excellent working relationship with Quebec. I myself have weekly meetings to discuss issues related to the program. Actually, they are bi-weekly meetings. We talk about conditions for farm workers who will be coming or are still coming here. We continue to discuss the measures that need to be taken in the future. I would like to stress that we took measures at the beginning of the pandemic to facilitate workers' access to the labour market in certain industries. We established priorities for applications and we lengthened the work periods.

We have worked to help ease the labour market shortage. The caps apply to many industries, not only agriculture. We will therefore be working with the provinces, including Quebec, when the economy picks up.

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you.

Madame Normandin, you have six minutes for your questions.