Citizenship and Immigration Committee on May 5th, 2021

[Jolayne Farn]

Yes. From our workers, we are hearing concerns about first-come, first served. Also, they can't have support from an immigration consultant. They have to do all of it themselves and pay these fees with no reimbursement if something goes wrong. If every “i” isn't dotted and every “t” isn't crossed, they are out this money, and it is substantial to them. It's not only the English requirements, but everything that needs to be sent in.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you.

Is there anyone else?

[Sheri Somerville]

I don't think I'll speak up, Brandon. I don't think we're too aware of that right now and what the effect would be in Atlantic Canada.

As Jolayne alluded to, for anything that adds an extra step—an extra “i” that needs to be dotted or a “t” that needs to be crossed or delays—at this time, it's burdensome to employers. I don't know what the answer is to fix that, unless you get the processing time in terms of advance notice of language or what have you.... There's really no easy fix to it, I would say. If the program is being announced tomorrow—

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting, Ms. Somerville. Your time is up.

We will now proceed to our second round of questioning.

We will start our second round with Mr. Allison.

Mr. Allison, you will have five minutes for your round of questioning. Please proceed.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

To our witnesses, thank you as well.

Casey, my in-laws came to Canada from eastern Europe many years ago to work on a farm, and I think you've just hit the nail on the head: What a great way to get started. They did not know the language, not at all. If they'd had to pass a language test, they would have been cut out and wouldn't have had that opportunity.

Brandon, you talked about Tim Hortons employees. I can assure you, because I have been a Tim Hortons franchisee, that if we could get people locally, we would never want to go through the temporary foreign worker program, because it's costly. You mentioned that.

The reality is that people think, for some strange reason, that.... I realize that potentially there are people thinking that it adds to the system, but I'm going to say that, by and large, people treat these temporary foreign workers very well. At the end of the day, they do what they need to do. It's housing and it's all the things that go into that.

My question is for you, Jolayne. You talked about the LMIAs. It's interesting that we go through the same process every year, hoping that maybe something has changed and that we need to post online again because maybe magically we're going to get some employees to show up this year.

Talk to me about what we need to do to streamline that process or program so that we can make it easier. Is it a cheaper fee? Is that part of it? Is it a reduced waiting period? If you're obviously advertising one year.... Talk to me about what you think would make that program easier to manage.

[Jolayne Farn]

What would make it easier, first of all, is the advertising. When you're in agriculture, you're advertising all the time to get a Canadian to come and work for you. Why, two weeks prior to an LMIA, do you have to prove that you have been advertising to try to hire a Canadian? It doesn't make sense. We're trying to do it all the time.

Right now, with the four agriculture streams, there are four different rules to going into these LMIAs. Going forward, it would be nice to have more of a streamlined process. You have to fill out all the substantial information in all of these LMIAs—employer's letters, the proof of advertising—which then goes back to the Service Canada officer who is probably confused as to what questions they should be asking these people.

I think the LMIA process just needs to be more streamlined and have the right officers asking the question. If we could get Canadians to work, we would not be spending the money we spend on temporary foreign workers, but we cannot.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Absolutely.

Sheri and Brandon, you guys mentioned it before. The east coast is an amazing place. Obviously, when it comes to some type of economic stream for a path to residency, I would guess that you would support that in a big way because it is tough to get employees. At the end of the day, when you get people in your communities that can be a part of it, this would be something that I think would be beneficial in the long term for, not just the east coast but certainly all across Canada.

Talk to us about your specific experience in the east coast.

[Brandon Ellis]

I'll take this one.

We need a wide range of skill sets across Atlantic Canada. We're highly rural, which means we have employers that require a significant amount of skill from newcomers coming in, but also some that only require entry-level skill sets coming in. I know several employers here, even just in the St. John's area, that cannot get workers to work at their workplace. We need to look more internationally, beyond what we have here in Atlantic Canada.

We also have an older population. We will greatly need immigration as we go forward in the next couple of years as we see folks leaving the workplace and needing to be replaced.

Above all else, our members need access to qualified workers, no matter their skill.

[Dean Allison, Conservative, Niagara West, ON]

Thank you.

Sheri, is there anything else you want to add?

[Sheri Somerville]

As one of those who is in the aging population, absolutely; that's what we hear all the time.

We have a company that has said it's going to need 10,000 workers of all skill levels over the next five years. We have agriculture. We have aquaculture. Students are a great first line of defence, so we need to make sure we get international students coming to our universities and entrench them in our communities.

I just second what Brandon has said. Yes, we need more people in all of Canada, but in Atlantic Canada, I think the situation is just a little bit more acute. We have a great, beautiful place to live and we're trying to sell the heck out of it to everybody.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting, Ms. Somerville. Your time is up.

We will now proceed to Mr. Regan.

Mr. Regan, you will have five minutes for your round of questioning.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Ms. Somerville, I would say that Dean and I are definitely part of that aging population. I think you're a ways behind us and I think he'd agree with that. I see he's nodding.

I like what he said about the east coast being amazing. I'm glad he recognizes that. The Niagara region is pretty nice too. They have some nice wineries and great fruit, etc. My in-laws are in Ontario, so I have to say nice things about Ontario, besides.

Mr. Ellis, you talked about the aftermath of the pandemic. Can you tell us when that's going to start? I'm only kidding, but you did talk about an increase in experiential learning. I'll ask you or Ms. Somerville: How would you envisage that, please?

[Brandon Ellis]

We simply need more government programs to increase experiential learning to give newcomers and also local, domestic Canadians opportunities to be in the workforce or to increase their skill levels.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

I represent the riding of Halifax West. I've seen reports years ago that suggested that this riding is the most diverse riding east of Montreal. I could say it's immigration central for Atlantic Canada, but it's good to see more immigrants coming to other parts of Atlantic Canada and throughout the area.

I would dispute your argument a little bit that the region is highly rural. It is more rural in terms of population than the rest of the country, and that's an important point, but over the past couple of decades, it has become considerably more urban. I think you'd agree.

Nevertheless, I want to ask you about the labour market challenges we face here in Atlantic Canada. To what degree do you find, from your members, that labour retention is an issue? How does it compare to attracting new talent? How does that dynamic work?

How do you think the Atlantic region, as a whole, is doing with its objectives of attracting and retaining newcomers? What role is the Atlantic immigration pilot playing?

[Brandon Ellis]

The Atlantic immigration pilot is a significant driver in the immigration efforts of our region. We greatly applaud the government for continuing to extend it and for implementing that program.

I will agree with you. I will not dispute your dispute that you're seeing a lot of folks within our region move to the more urban centres, but there is a lot of rural population across the region too, so it's important to find balance.

In terms of labour retention, with the immigration process as we're seeing it right now, as I mentioned, some of these wait times are between 12 and 18 months for some employers seeking entry-level workers. A lot of times, those newcomers who are coming to Canada are often also applying for their permanent residency.

It's become very hard to convince entry-level workers who go to a rural part of Canada to stay there after they are 12 months into their PR process and are no longer tied to the employer. If they have obtained permanent residency, they may be taking off to Toronto or to a larger urban centre, as you can imagine. It is greatly hurting some of our rural employers, for sure. There are issues around retention.

[Geoff Regan, Liberal, Halifax West, NS]

Let me ask Mr. Vander Ploeg about your experience with some of the pilot programs that the government has had, like the agri-food immigration pilot.

Do you see that this is a route the government should expand on, or are there elements of that which you think have been positive?

[Casey Vander Ploeg]

Certainly, that has been very important for the processing side of the industry. Cattle feeders are just as concerned with the labour shortages in our processing and agri-food facilities as we are on farm, because problems at that end of the supply chain trickle down to the farm level, and basically, result in lower farm income. We know that they are severely pressed on the labour front, so we work hand in glove with the processors to get that pilot program up and running.

The thing about the pilot is that it's an attempt to put a policy lens on the issue in order to come up with policy and programming that will work at the end of the day. One of the issues with the 90,000 that was announced was that it came out of the blue. It surprised everybody, and now there's a mad scramble to take advantage of it.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting, Mr. Vander Ploeg, but time is up for Mr. Regan.

We will now proceed to Ms. Normandin.

Ms. Normandin, you have two and a half minutes for your questioning. You can please proceed.

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

Thank you very much.

My question goes to all the witnesses. I have kind of shown my colours already.

We know that the labour shortage is chronic at the moment. It has been that way for a number of years. It is not a new phenomenon or one that is different from one year to the next. The employers are always the same, the employees are often the same and they do the same job for one year, five years, 10 years and sometimes even more.

In that context, I would like to hear what you have to say about the case for increasing the duration of work permits and the validity of labour market impact assessments, specifically in order to provide more predictability.

[Casey Vander Ploeg]

Thanks for that question, and I'll be brief.

What we're talking about here is building some more permanency into the system. It's realizing that these are not one-off issues that get resolved every time you put an LMIA in or get a worker and a valid work visa.

We need to take a more programmatic policy-oriented approach to it. I think that's the direction we ought to be going in, quite frankly, all with an eye to reducing the regulatory burden and the administration costs of it, and realizing that we're going to be in this game for a considerable period of time to ensure we get the workers we need into this country.

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

Does anyone from the Atlantic Chamber of Commerce have a comment? If not, I have other questions.

Go ahead, Ms. Somerville.

[Sheri Somerville]

Just quickly, I would agree with that. Again, it's going back to the less work we make for employees to do redundant activities.... If we can extend it and build flexibility into the program so that year after year they're not returning to do that, I would agree with Mr. Vander Ploeg for sure.

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

Great, thank you.

In terms of labour market impact assessments, should they be more flexible, that is, valid for a longer time, in regions where the unemployment rate is low, since we know that those regions will have a shortage of labour?

[Casey Vander Ploeg]

The unemployment rate is only one metric. Alberta has very high rates of unemployment, for obvious reasons, but that doesn't mean that, in specific parts of the province, there isn't a huge need for labour. Our jobs are rural. They're outdoors. They're agriculture. They're different. We need to keep that in mind. There are metrics other than the unemployment rate.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting, but your time is up.

We will now end our panel with Ms. Kwan.

Ms. Kwan, you will have two and a half minutes for your round of questioning. The floor is yours.