Canada’s job growth is showing signs of improving, according to Statistics Canada – but a new Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) study has found that most of the new jobs are being filled by temporary foreign workers (TFWs).
The organization’s research – based on statistics from the Labour Force Survey and Citizenship and Immigration Canada – concludes that the influx of TFWs to B.C. exceeded the number of new jobs created between 2008 and 2011.
In that period, B.C. created 52,100 net new jobs (the total number of new jobs after lost jobs are deducted), and in 2011 there were nearly 70,000 TFWs in the province, the CLC reports.
Other provinces saw similar trends. In Saskatchewan, 65% of net new jobs created between 2008 and 2011were held by temporary foreign workers, the CLC report found.
“Roughly 75% of the new jobs created in Canada in 2010 and 2011 were filled by temporary foreign workers, despite the fact that 1.4 million Canadian residents were unemployed,” said CLC president Ken Georgetti.
“Employers and the federal government have tried to deny what is happening, but we have crunched the numbers and the trends are clear. In most provinces, the importation of migrant workers accounts for more than 50% of net new jobs in the years [between 2008 and 2011].
“We believe that employers and Ottawa are using the import of vulnerable migrant workers to promote a low-wage strategy in Canada.”
A recent TD Economics report shows that 12,500 net new jobs were created in Canada in April, an improvement over the 54,500 jobs lost the month before. Wage growth rose from 2.1% in March to 2.9% in April.
Recent high-profile cases of Canada’s TFW program being abused by employers – HD Mining’s hiring of 200 Chinese coal miners in B.C. and RBC’s plans to have their Canadian employees train TFWs to replace them – have prompted the federal government to make it more onerous and expensive for employers to hire TFWs over Canadians.
“We welcome migrant workers when there are demonstrated shortages of workers in Canada, but we want to ensure that those migrant workers are protected on the job and welcomed into the community,” Georgetti said. “They should be placed into the permanent immigration stream, not exploited in temporary migration schemes.”
