Temporary Foreign Workers - Blog

In Canada, our labour laws extend to all workers, both in the public and private sectors. These laws include the maintaining of proper and safe working conditions, and ensuring that complete wages are issued. All workers, be they citizens, permanent residents, immigrants or temporary foreign workers, documented and undocumented fall under this protection.

Unfortunately, despite our laws incidents of abuse, including the withholding of wages still occur in Canada, and often in connection with temporary foreign workers. Read more »

In 2009 Citizenship and Immigration Minister Jason Kenney promised significant reforms to Canadian immigration policy before the end of the year. In the last months of 2009, several small changes were introduced, including improvements to the Live-in Caregivers program and better recognition of foreign credentials. We are still awaiting the major changes.

But before the changes are announced, Minister Kenney and the government should consider what Canadians really think about immigration. Read more »

In the past month, Citizenship and Immigration Minister, Jason Kenney has been announcing a series of small changes to Canada’s immigration policies. The most recent changes concern the Live-in Caregivers program. This program is just one of many within Canada’s Temporary Foreign Workers (TFW) Program, allowing qualified individuals to provide care to children, elderly people or people with disabilities within a private home.

On Saturday Kenney announced what he called “significant improvements” for Live-in Caregivers (LiCs) in Canada. Read more »

Last week Auditor-General Sheila Fraser tabled her fall report in Parliament, part of which critically evaluated Canada’s Temporary Foreign Workers (TFW) Program. Fraser criticized the management of the program, and specifically the federal government’s failure to ensure the safety of workers or to monitor the status and location of workers. These criticisms generated responses from very different points of view.

One point of view included concerns for improving the well-being of people entering Canada through the TFW program, while another called for the overhaul of the system with a refocus on highly skilled workers within immigration policy. Read more »

Last May, the Ontario Legislature passed a bill meant to enhance the protections for temporary foreign workers.

But protections for temporary foreign workers have been few and far between. And with the numbers of such workers rising, these protections are even more important. Read more »

In thinking about the upcoming web feature I'm writing about immigration, temporary foreign workers and other newcomer issues, I suddenly became overwhelmed. So much has been going on in this area of public policy - too much of it below the radar - that I need to sort out my thoughts around this a bit.

And I figured the blog could be a good place to start a bit of a discussion on this! Read more »

It’s a bit hard for me to believe that the Canadian Social Forum began exactly a week ago today. I’ve now been back in the office for almost two days, and I feel like I’ve only begun to process all that I saw, heard and experienced in Calgary. Read more »

Canada’s live-in caregiver program has been in the headlines recently, due to allegations that a Member of Parliament may have mistreated caregivers in her home. The affair has shone a spotlight on a very vulnerable population in Canada: Temporary Foreign Workers.

What hasn’t received so much attention is a report from the House of Commons Citizenship and Immigration committee, released last week. The report examines the situation of temporary foreign workers, and recommends changes to the program in order to reduce worker vulnerability and respect the social rights of workers. Read more »