A person working in a strawberry field.
Despite the critical need for migrant workers in Canada, our federal government continues to fail them. Credit: Tim Mossholder / Unsplash Credit: Tim Mossholder / Unsplash

Since November 2022, the Senate committee on social affairs, science and technology has been studying Canada’s temporary and migrant labour force.  

In September, senators visited New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island to meet with workers, employers and local officials to better understand the role temporary and migrant workers play in Canada’s labour market.

Independent Senator Ratna Omidvar, who has represented Ontario since 2016, was included in this study. 

The study looked into the conditions of work from the perspective of both workers and their employers. New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island were chosen for the study due to the diverse job market in both provinces.  

“They have agriculture, aquaculture, care needs, housing [construction] needs,” Omidvar explained. “In a short time, we were able to visit and talk to migrant workers who were working in different sectors. We were able to talk to employers and we were able to talk to employer associations and migrant worker advocates.” 

The problematic path to permanent residence 

In conducting interviews, Omidvar said a fear of reprisal for speaking up was clearly conveyed by workers. In an effort to encourage migrant workers to share their experiences more freely, senators met workers at off-site locations. 

At the end of the interviews, Omidvar understood that workers were prepared to accept subpar working conditions in order to eventually reach the “Golden Grail” – that being permanent residence. 

READ MORE: Navigating Canada’s broken Temporary Foreign Worker program

Through the temporary foreign worker program, obtaining permanent residency is extremely difficult — and this is something which is almost never fully explained to those who make the decision to come to Canada. 

During her time in Atlantic Canada, Omidvar spoke to a farm-owner in a small town in New Brunswick who hired temporary foreign workers and sponsored them to obtain permanency. Once these workers were permanent, they were able to bring their families. The farm-owner said the influx of young adults and children completely revitalized their small rural community.

Omidvar would like to see more employers taking the lead to sponsor their workers – especially when every employer, without exception, told the committee that they would have to close down their business were it not for temporary foreign workers. 

But it’s not just employers who need to step up – the government must also improve the policies in place in the temporary worker program. 

Niger Saravia, organizer with Migrant Workers Alliance for Change, believes studies like the one which took place in the Maritimes are vital for progressive change in Canada – and must reflect the conditions and abuses workers endure in the hopes of gaining permanent residency.

“The temporary foreign worker program has been designed to give the corporation maximum power to exploit migrant workers while depriving them of the ability to assert their rights and obtain services that Canadian society enjoys,” Saravia said in an interview with rabble.ca. 

Troubling power imbalance for migrant workers 

It is estimated New Brunswick has between 2,000 to 3,000 migrant workers. 

There are two ways most migrant workers come to New Brunswick, Saravia explained. 

The first is through the bilateral agreement between Canada and Mexico: workers coming through that agreement apply with the Mexican ministry of labour who process the paperwork. It’s the same for Jamaican and Filipino workers as well.

In Atlantic Canada – and especially New Brunswick – however, more temporary and migrant workers come directly to the employers. In that case, the workers look for an employer. This process usually involves recruitment agencies, and most of the time these agencies take advantage of workers by charging them a minimum $3,000 just to secure a spot to work in Canada. 

While charging a recruitment fee is illegal in Canada, the government isn’t on top of enforcing this rule.

Regardless of how workers arrive in Canada, they are then locked into a closed work permit that means they can only work for that specific employer. 

“What we are seeing is employers taking advantage [of employees] because they know that the workers cannot go to work for somebody else,” Saravia explained. “Employers, having all this power over the workers, [can then] decide where workers can live, who they can hang out with, where they can buy groceries. They decide, if the worker gets sick, whether that worker can go to the hospital.” 

Under the Temporary Foreign Worker Program, employers hiring foreign workers are required to provide workers not covered by provincial or territorial health coverage with private health insurance — however, this is also rarely enforced. 

LISTEN NOW: The push to change unjust labour laws with Justice for Migrant Workers

To go further, Saravia explained, the system is designed so that when employers experience a shortage of work, they simply don’t pay the workers. And, while workers pay into employment insurance, in most cases they are unable to access this social safety net. 

The push for regularization, clear path to permanency 

The Canadian government also needs to acknowledge that temporary and migrant workers are valuable employees, Saravia says. These workers are skilled in growing and harvesting food, processing seafood, construction work, care for children and elders, and more labour intensive work which many Canadians are choosing not to do. 

Despite the critical importance of these workers, the Canadian government is clearly failing them. 

“What we want is a program that grants permanent resident status for all the migrant workers because that’s the only mechanism that the migrant workers have identified to get a solution to all these program problems that are attached to the closed work permit,” Saravia said. 

Saravia would like the Senate report to acknowledge that migrant workers are asking for permanent resident status, the opportunity to bring their spouses and children, as well as the chance to put down roots and become engaged members of their new communities.

Migrant Workers Alliance for Change wants to remind Prime Minister Trudeau that he made a promise in December 2021 to regularize the estimated 500,000 undocumented people and give permanent resident status to migrant students and workers. 

To date, no program has been implemented.

“We want to be able to protect ourselves,” Saravia explained. “Give [migrant workers] the tools to protect themselves from abuse by employers and ensure workers the benefits that Canadian society enjoys.”

Regularization would also end the downward pressure placed on wages and working conditions that is a direct result of employer exploitation of migrants that trickles down to impact all Canadian workers.

Comprehensive regularization will add at least $1.1 billion dollars to the public purse annually through contributions by employers who currently don’t pay taxes.

Over 500 civil society, labour and environmental organizations support this proposal and are calling for full and permanent immigration status for all migrants in the country, as well as permanent resident status for all migrants arriving in future. 

The Senate committee concluded witness testimonies on October 5 when they heard from the United Nations special rapporteur, Tomoya Obokata.

Obokata’s UN report on contemporary forms of slavery called Canada’s temporary migration streams a “breeding ground” for exploitation and slavery.

During a 14-day visit to Canada, Obokata heard accounts of exploitation and abuse. In his end-of-mission statement Obokata stated: “Employer-specific work permit regimes, including certain Temporary Foreign Worker programmes, make migrant workers vulnerable to contemporary forms of slavery, as they cannot report abuses without fear of deportation.”

The September 2023 statement also emphasized the urgent need for Canadian authorities to regularize the status of foreign migrant workers and dismantle the closed work permit system. 

Obokata called for the establishment of a clear pathway to permanent residency for all migrants, aimed at preventing the recurrence of abuses within foreign-worker programs.

What happens next with the report? 

The Senate will now move into a reflection phase with their final report expected to be made public in March 2024. After the report has been adopted by the Senate, it will pass onto the government who then has an opportunity to respond to the findings and recommendations.

Once the report has been tabled by the government — which does not mean it has been adopted by the government — Omidvar expects many senators will begin advocating for the recommendations by meeting with officials and even tabling legislation if that seems appropriate.

Omidvar said: “My committee members are very engaged, and I can pretty well see that some of them will be taking up the call to action.” 

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Doreen Nicoll

Doreen Nicoll is weary of the perpetual misinformation and skewed facts that continue to concentrate wealth, power and decision making in the hands of a few to the detriment of the many. As a freelance...