Thank you, Mr. Chair.
My thanks also go to the members of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights for giving me the opportunity to share with you Employment and Social Development Canada efforts to protect migrant workers and ensure employer compliance within the temporary foreign worker program.
I would like to provide a broad overview of the program, then discuss some of the issues facing vulnerable foreign workers and finally outline some of the steps the department is taking to better protect foreign workers from any type of exploitation.
As mentioned by my colleague at IRCC, the program allows employers to hire a foreign worker in order to meet their labour needs when no Canadians or permanent residents are available.
The program is jointly administered by ESDC and IRCC with the support of the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA).
ESDC is responsible for processing and issuing labour market impact assessments, LMIAs, at the request of employers who wish to hire TFWs. As part of that application process, employers agree to be bound by program requirements aimed at protecting migrant workers and the Canadian labour market. ESDC is also responsible for administering the program's employer compliance regime.
We know that workers coming into Canada under low-wage streams—caregivers and primary agriculture workers—are the most vulnerable to exploitation. As mentioned by my colleague, these groups are more vulnerable because of language barriers, isolation, and lack of access to accurate information on rights and protections. Some also fear retribution, including the threat of being returned to their home country if they speak out.
ESDC takes the protection of TFWs very seriously and is committed to ensuring that they all have the rights and protections of Canadians while working in Canada. We have a system of checks and balances in place to identify and prevent exploitation, and are continually working to improve it.
ESDC has the authority to conduct administrative inspections to ensure that employers meet certain requirements when they first apply for the program, and continue to meet them while the TFWs are here in Canada. However, ESDC has no jurisdiction over criminal matters such as human trafficking, and it refers such cases to the CBSA and to the RCMP.
Before requesting a labour market impact assessment, an employer must advertise positions to Canadians and permanent residents and must be registered on the Government of Canada's Job Bank service.
Job Bank has developed security and validation practices to assess the genuineness of employers and employment opportunities advertised on its platform.
In terms of the LMIA process itself, it includes the assessment of the genuine status and past compliance of employers. More specifically, Service Canada officers must consider four factors to confirm whether a job offer is legitimate. These include whether the employer is actively engaged in a business; whether the position being offered is a reasonable employment need; whether the employer can demonstrate that they are able to fulfill the conditions of the offer; and whether the employer was compliant in the past with federal, provincial, and territorial laws that regulate employment and recruitment.
One way of supporting worker protections is to provide information to TFWs about their rights, including human trafficking, through a number of channels. The government produces a pamphlet entitled "Temporary foreign workers: Your rights are protected" in the seven most used languages among TFWs. It contains information on their rights while in Canada. In the near future, Service Canada will provide information directly to TFWs when they apply for their social insurance number, and we are developing a dedicated web page on TFW rights and protections.
Furthermore, we are facilitating informing TFWs of their rights by working more closely with migrant worker support organizations. For example, in December 2017, the Minister of ESDC announced that the Government of Canada provided a grant of $93,000 to the Migrant Workers' Dignity Association in British Columbia to develop 17 different workshops, information tools, and materials aimed at informing TFWs on topics such as labour trafficking, access to benefits, job contracts, and other rights.
ESDC has a comprehensive compliance framework in place to ensure that employers are following program rules, which in turn helps to protect TFWs. Employers can be inspected on a number of criteria including wages, working conditions, and that the workplace is free of any type of abuse.
Stemming from the recommendations, both by the human resources committee and the Auditor General, we have taken a number of initiatives to improve the compliance regime. To better target our resources and efforts, we have launched a new risk-based predictive model to help identify which employers to inspect, prioritizing the highest-risk cases.
The department has significantly increased its on-site inspections, strategically focusing on employers of vulnerable workers. Since April 2017, the department has conducted approximately eight times more on-site inspections than in the last fiscal year.
For inspections completed since April 2017, approximately 50% resulted in employers needing to take some sort of corrective action measures to become compliant. Most employers are quick to address any issues identified during an inspection. However, when they cannot be brought into compliance, employers can be subject to an administrative monetary penalty, ranging from $500 to $100,000 per violation. They can also be subject to bans of various lengths, including one, two, five, and 10 years, and permanent bans for egregious cases.
Employer information, the violations, and the penalties are all posted on a public-facing website managed by IRCC. This is an important worker-protection tool for individuals who are looking at potential employers and job opportunities.
ESDC also operates an online fraud reporting tool and a 1-800 tip line. These tools provide TFWs and the general public with a vehicle to report potential program abuse. All allegations are reviewed, and the appropriate action is taken, including referring allegations where there are potential criminal activities to law enforcement agencies.
We continue to identify other ways to make the integrity regime stronger, including an ongoing focus to address the recommendations of the human resources committee and the OAG, such as accelerating our efforts to complete an analysis of the feasibility of conducting unannounced on-site inspections.
ESDC continues to work with partners and stakeholders on enhancing worker protections to better prevent abuse and exploitation of workers.
The program works closely with other federal departments such as IRCC, CBSA and RCMP to ensure that any findings that point to abuse or criminal wrongdoing are immediately directed to the attention of law enforcement agencies.
In addition, ESDC is a member of the federal human trafficking task force, which serves as the focal point and centre of expertise for the government's anti-trafficking efforts.
The program also works in close collaboration with provincial and territorial partners to enhance information-sharing agreements and promote formalization of support services to resolve employer-employee disputes, better prevent abuse, and support TFWs who need assistance. As mentioned previously, we've been working more with employers, unions, and community organizations devoted to the protection of vulnerable workers to better inform them of their rights while in Canada. We continue to work with foreign governments and international associations on worker protection issues.
In conclusion, the TFW program is working on a number of fronts to continually enhance worker protection and minimize risks of human trafficking.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you today.
We would welcome any questions you may have.