Citizenship and Immigration Committee on April 21st, 2021

[Isabelle Leblond]

From our standpoint, the biggest challenge isn't really the administrative process. Nonetheless, we would appreciate a streamlined and expedited process for employers and employees, especially when it comes to renewing work permits. That isn't our biggest challenge, though.

The problem is really the burden of having to provide proof. We understand having to look for workers here, in Canada. We make every effort to hire locally and we are happy to prove it. However, we repeatedly have to provide proof, numerous times a month for the same plant, either because the deadlines don't all line up or because the program is being administered by new people. Having to prove that we are short on workers is an onerous process. That is probably the first issue I would tackle.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

Thank you.

That's probably all the time I have, but I think Ms. Nord had something to add.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Your time is up, Madam Normandin.

We will now proceed to Mr. Davies for six minutes.

Mr. Davies, welcome. Please proceed.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Banville and Madam Leblond both referred to the labour shortage. I want to ask a macro question. We know millions of Canadians have lost work due to the pandemic, and I'm just wondering, pure economics law of supply and demand would suggest many more people are looking for work or ready for work now.

I know in the restaurant industry here in Vancouver and the Lower Mainland restaurants are closing and many skilled workers are out of work right now. I'm wondering how that has impacted the sectors you represent. I know you touched on it, Madam Leblond, and it may or may not have an impact regionally, but generally, has that increased the supply of domestic workers available for work in our country?

[Louis Banville]

Thank you for your question.

The mindset tends to be that the unemployment rate and the number of people looking for work in a given area go hand in hand. Someone brought this up earlier, and I think it's an important point to keep in mind. The problem does not have to be widespread in order for there to be a labour shortage. By widespread, I mean affecting all sectors in all regions at the same time. I'll give you two examples involving two regions that are far apart.

We have a big plant in Red Deer, Alberta, with 1,700 employees. In 2004, when the oil and gas industry was booming, we had to make use of the temporary foreign worker program. Today, that same plant receives plenty of CVs and job applications, so it doesn't need temporary foreign workers. It has enough local workers to meet its labour requirements, and we are very glad about that.

Conversely, in Quebec in 2004, workers were coming to us. Labour was not in short supply there. Today, we already have 500 workers, if I'm not mistaken, and we will soon need another 600.

There will always be Canadians who are looking for a job, but labour requirements vary from one region to another. It's important to take into account the sector—that's a nod to my counterparts in the restaurant industry—the type of job and the region. We want to be smart about using the temporary foreign worker program; it's not a silver bullet. It cannot apply everywhere at the same time in the same way. Regional differences matter. We are quite glad to hire Canadians living in Red Deer whenever we can.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Thank you.

Ms. Nord, I think you mentioned some miscommunication between the ESDC and IRCC that your members have experienced. Can you elaborate on that?

[Leah Nord]

Yes, but I want to address your previous point as well.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Sure, please go ahead.

[Leah Nord]

Committee members, we often talk about this “either-or”, but it's a “both-and” moving forward. Labour mobility at a local level skills mismatch is a huge issue that's wrapped into labour mobility. That's from an individual motivations point of view, but it's also a regulatory burden between jurisdictions across our nation. To say a lot more about that, I went back to the member who had provided that example. This is what they said to me when I asked for the example, and there are a lot of acronyms here. They said, for an example, between IRCC and ESDC, if there is a change needed to ensure that the worker's name on the LMIA matched the work permit, it goes back to some place called STPS, to WALI, to the employer, to ESDC. It would be a lot simpler if there was a communication channel between IRCC and ESDC specifically. That's just an example.

We also understand, as we get through the pandemic period, there are a lot of changes happening rapidly, but within the temporary foreign worker program that sits in the ESDC, it's not coming through to IRCC as quickly as needed or we would like.

Thank you.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

I want to pick up on something my colleague Mr. Allison mentioned.

For the new pathways for TFWs to become permanent residents announced last week, there are caps in place for each stream for a total of 90,000, and 95 non-health sector occupations are competing for a cap of 30,000. That's an average of 315 applications per occupation. In your opinion, is that number equivalent or well matched to the interest to remain in Canada by the targeted groups?

I don't know if anyone has an opinion on that.

Ms. Nord.

[Leah Nord]

The short answer would be no. We'll see streams and approaches from sector to sector to sector, but across sectors and across skills levels, we need a little bit of everything.

There was a question earlier about whether we should do new streams or new pilots. What we need is an overall approach that's flexible according to the community and the needs of the sector they are in. Until we have the number of pathways to permanent residency that we have temporary foreign workers, it's never going to match exactly.

[Olivier Bourbeau]

I would add to that, yes, it should be adapted to sectors but adapted to regions as well, to Mr. Banville's point.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Mr. Davies. Your time is up.

With that, our first round of questions comes to an end.

We will now proceed to our second round of questioning. We will have four minutes each for Mr. Saroya and Mr. Regan, and then two minutes each for Madam Normandin and Ms. Kwan. We will start with Mr. Saroya.

You will have four minutes for your round of questioning. You can please proceed.

[Bob Saroya, Conservative, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Madam Chair, thank you so much.

When it comes to the restaurant industry, I could write a book on it. I was associated with the restaurant industry for 30 years until recently. I was a director of sales for one of them that had hundreds of restaurants and we always had issues with labour.

When we were opening new stores up north in Ontario, we were taking the labour from downtown Toronto and putting them in hotels. That problem still exists today.

This morning I got a call from a McDonald's franchise owner in my riding of Markham—Unionville. He owns seven restaurants between Richmond Hill and Markham. “Can you advise the government”, he asked me, “that the restaurant industry was overlooked by the government?” These are servers or cashiers in the restaurant industry. “They should be part of the new announcement made last week.”

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting. We will stop the clock.

The bells have started ringing for the vote to happen in 30 minutes. I would suggest that we continue, finish this second round and end at 5:30.

Do I have unanimous consent to proceed with the meeting until 5:30?

Seeing everyone is in agreement, we have unanimous consent. We will end the meeting at 5:30.

Mr. Saroya, you may start and I will start the clock.

[Bob Saroya, Conservative, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Thank you so much.

Mr. Bourbeau or anybody else can take the question.

[Olivier Bourbeau]

Yes, indeed, to your point, we had a big labour shortage problem pre-COVID. In addition to that, it's going to be bigger, especially when we see provinces like B.C., Ontario and Quebec closing everything. As I said in my opening remarks in French, because of the COVID cycle, a lot of people have changed their minds and found jobs elsewhere in other industries.

Yes, it's going to be extremely important for us to have more and easier access to temporary foreign workers and also to reduce the administrative burden. We need to find an easier way to get access to these people, because we need them. We need these qualified people.

[Lauren van den Berg]

I just need 12 seconds.

[Leah Nord]

Go ahead.

[Lauren van den Berg]

Thank you very much.

The short answer is yes, I do think the restaurant industry was overlooked. Yes, I do think the restaurant industry frequently is overlooked when it comes to labour shortages, because there is the idea that there's always a restaurant at the end of your street.

I think this crisis has taught us that, no, there won't necessarily be one. The recent announcement is a great first step, but it was disappointing that restaurants were once again left off the proverbial menu.

[Bob Saroya, Conservative, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Thank you so much.

I'm also disappointed that the restaurant industry was overlooked. It's one of the biggest industries throughout the country. The small and medium-sized restaurants are overlooked.

Also, I am getting the complaint that this LMIA program is too expensive, it takes too long and it's arbitrary. An employer says they need this person for this reason, but those people are rejected and the reasons given are not to the employer's satisfaction.

Is there anything you would like to add?

[Leah Nord]

I will add that the Canadian Chamber of Commerce actually has a recommendation to insert an appeal process, which is currently absent, into the TFW program.

I also want to highlight the point here about small and medium-sized businesses and administrative burdens. The restaurant sector is an example, but 98% of businesses across this country are small and medium-sized. They're struggling.

I will give you any number of stats from across sectors at a macro level, but we need to simplify, to make it easier and to help them not only through this crisis but beyond.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Ms. Nord.

Mr. Saroya, your time is up.

We will now proceed to Mr. Regan.

Mr. Regan, you will have four minutes for your round of questioning. Please proceed.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

My question is actually for all three groups, but in the short time I have, I think I'll start with Ms. Nord.

In relation to critiques of the temporary foreign workers program, one of the things we've heard about is the need for employers to be able to access workers more quickly. You may be aware, of course, that Monday's budget dedicates $29 million to maintaining enhanced capacity to serve visitors applying for temporary resident visas and permits. You may be aware that this will help preserve departmental capacity to process documents such as work permits.

Along the same lines, what actions do you think the federal government could be taking, or should take, to further speed up processing and get people filling these vacancies?

[Leah Nord]

Absolutely anything that moves these processes online, and faster tracking processes.... We welcome many of the announcements from the budget this week. That's the biggest among them.

Again, I'll come back to my original recommendation. Number one is a trusted employers program. We can reduce the administrative burden of having to apply for things over and over again by using a NEXUS-preferred program, like they do in the global talent stream with the NOC codes. This would allow that process to be eliminated. It would allow assessments on the application itself and even possibly get us to a point where we don't have to do it any more. Again, I have spoken to the appeals process. There are any number of things to do, but I would say that is number one and where the lowest-hanging fruit would be.

Thank you.