My name is Gabriela Ramo, and I am the chair of the national immigration law section of the Canadian Bar Association. The CBA is a national association of 37,000 members, including lawyers, judges, notaries, academics and law students, with a 120-year-old mandate to seek improvements to the law and the administration of justice.
Thank you for inviting the CBA to comment on the implications of closed work permits in the temporary foreign worker program. The observations we make today have been communicated to IRCC in written submissions, all of which are available on our website.
The number of temporary foreign workers entering Canada on an annual basis continues to grow exponentially. The share of workers entering Canada through the agricultural and low-wage streams is quickly increasing. These workers are among the most vulnerable and at risk of abuse and are often disproportionally racialized. We must ensure they are protected from exploitation and abuse and provided with opportunities for becoming permanent residents of Canada.
The CBA agrees with the finding of the UN special rapporteur that the issuance of closed work permits to these workers, which prevents them from changing employers, increases their vulnerability to abuse. However, the issuance of open work permits may also open workers to exploitation. While open work permits allow nationals to change employers, they provide no compliance mechanisms to ensure that employers provide foreign nationals with acceptable terms and conditions of employment. As they are also fully open with respect to position and industry, they may also do little to address the labour shortages in particular industries that the temporary foreign worker program is intended to address.
We make six recommendations today.
Our first is that sector- and occupation-specific work permits for low-wage and agricultural occupations be established. Sectoral work permits would allow individual foreign workers to work in a particular occupation in a particular sector for any employer in the sector who had registered with the program. Workers could move from employer to employer within the sector without having to obtain a new work permit by simply notifying the authorities of the change. The ability to change employers without having to wait for the issuance of a new work permit would prevent the creation of a dependency relationship in which the foreign national’s immigration status is tied to remaining with the employer named on their closed work permit.
A set number of LMIAs per occupation could be issued, allowing employers in the sector who have been pre-approved to hire workers for the specific occupation. To be approved, employers would need to undertake to provide workers with the terms and conditions of employment set out in the LMIA. A website or portal would list employers participating in the program as well as the terms and conditions of employment.
Our second recommendation is that employers in the program be subject to frequent and unannounced in-person inspections to review their compliance. Those found to be non-compliant and exploiting workers should face substantial penalties. To address the governance gap, the federal government should conduct inspections in coordination with provincial authorities responsible for enforcing employment standards and occupational health and safety.
The current employer inspection regime follows a one-size-fits-all approach for high-wage and low-wage foreign workers. Given that high-skill workers under the international mobility program are not vulnerable in the same way, we recommend that inspection and compliance resources be shifted to the low-skill program to allow for increased and more thorough inspections.
Our third recommendation is that specific PR programs for low-wage workers, with substantial annual targets, be established. The majority of low-wage and agricultural workers are generally unable to qualify for permanent residence because they cannot obtain the same level of points in areas such as education, language and arranged employment that high-wage workers can. Allowing the annual admission of large numbers of low-wage temporary foreign workers who then have to compete with high-wage workers for a limited number of permanent residents spots available each year creates permanent guest workers who can never advance to permanent residence status.
Our fourth recommendation is that the government implement tougher controls on recruiters and agents and work closely with local governments in source countries to enforce the prohibition of fees payable by foreign workers. This would address the serious issue of debt bondage. As the number of low-wage and agricultural temporary foreign workers in Canada has continued to increase, so have the numbers of recruiters, consultants and other agents who assist in recruiting foreign workers. Often they charge the foreign workers large fees to assist them in obtaining work permits.
Our fifth recommendation is that foreign workers have access to clear and transparent information, in their own language, on how the program works, on the prohibition on the payment of fees to recruiters and agents, on their rights while in Canada and on how they can report abuse. The government should also be transparent and ensure that vulnerable foreign nationals understand up front that entering the program is not a guaranteed path to permanent residence.
Our final recommendation is that this committee expand its study to address the other substantial issues raised in the special rapporteur’s report.
Thank you for the opportunity to address the committee.