Some of the biggest changes in years have recently been applied to Canada’s temporary foreign workers program (TFWP).
The shakeup is aimed at emphasizing the “temporary” in the TFWP and providing stronger protection against exploitation for temporary foreign workers (TFWs) through stricter employer accountability.
The new regulations, which came into effect April 1, propose some major changes to how employers fill positions with foreign workers.
“We saw a need for clear regulations to better protect workers from poor treatment and to ensure that the temporary foreign worker program continued to address short-term labour and skills shortages,” Minister of Immigration, Citizenship, and Multiculturalism Jason Kenney said in a press release.
The major changes include:
- allowing Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) to publish the name of a blacklisted company on its website;
- a two-year TFWP ban for employers;
- a broader four-year cap on work permits for some job categories; and
- a more rigorous front-end approach to the TFWP approval process.
The crackdown comes after several cases of exploitation of the program.
And while the government maintains its main intention is to enforce Canada’s immigration policy and protect workers, the new regulations expose employers to more risk than previous policy, according to Meera Thakrar, an associate immigration lawyer with Egan (allied with Ernst and Young LLP).
She warns that employers need to be more careful in ensuring they’re compliant with the new regulations.
The government can now look back at the previous two years to ensure employers have honoured all of the terms and conditions offered to a TFW when he or she is initially employed. If they haven’t, they could be blacklisted publicly on the CIC website and banned for two years from using the TWFP.
They will, however, have a chance to provide justifications for any wrongdoings found by immigration authorities.
“There are some justifications the employer can provide if it seems like something went offside,” Thakrar said. “It’s not that it’s immediate [and] your name goes on the list the next day.”
While the government is reporting that the changes are aimed at making businesses more accountable, Thakrar cautioned that even business owners with the best of intentions can wind up in hot water.
For example, she said that an employee wage increase is technically not in compliance with the way the new regulations are drafted.
She advises employers to include wage clauses that are “subject to performance increases” to avoid any problems and emphasized the need for employers to inform immigration authorities about major changes to a TFW’s position.
“Once your job duties are going really far beyond what you were initially brought in for, that’s where most likely you have a duty to go back to immigration and notify them and potentially get a new work permit,” she said.
The approval process is more aggressive now. The government focuses more on its front end and uses a “more rigorous assessment of the genuineness of the job offer.”
The new four-year cap, which will affect a wider range of job categories than previous caps, will not be retroactive.
Any TFWs that fall under the new cap will be subject to it as of April 1, 2011, and the soonest they can reach the limit of their permit is April 1, 2015.
“This is a broader cap,” said Thakrar.
“There were caps before, but they were more narrow. It’s going to limit the lengths of certain types of work permits to four years, where previously there was no such limit. They want the temporary foreign workers to be temporary.”
After the four-year cap is reached, a TFW would not be granted another permit to work in Canada for another four years.
To account for labour and skills shortages, the federal government has allowed exemptions from the cap in some sectors.