Number of federal inspections under foreign worker program on rise

2016/08/23 Leave a comment

As the Liberal government considers relaxing some of the requirements for the Temporary Foreign Workers program, it will be important to maintain an active investigation program both to combat misuse as well as ensure public confidence in the integrity of the program:

The number of federal inspections under the temporary foreign worker program is up dramatically this year and two businesses have been added to a public blacklist.

In response to complaints of poor working and living conditions, federal officials investigated Obeid Farms in Vanessa, Ont., where they concluded that 20 temporary foreign workers were consistently working seven days a week.

Officials also took issue with how the travel costs of workers were handled by AYR Motor Express, a New Brunswick-based trucking company.

Employment Minister MaryAnn Mihychuk personally signed off on the decision to publicly ban the two companies from the program temporarily.

The minister’s move comes as the Liberal government is weighing options for a further update to the temporary foreign worker program that will be announced later this year. In spite of sluggish economic growth, Canadian firms from coast to coast and across many sectors and skill levels continue to report labour shortages and insist that there is a genuine need for the controversial program.

Regarding Obeid Farms, a note to the Employment Minister submitted in Federal Court said this is the first time a public ban has been invoked in relation to the seasonal agricultural worker section of the temporary foreign worker program.

“Such determination would therefore have broader implications for this sector. It is likely that a determination of non-compliance will garner significant public and stakeholder attention,” deputy Employment Minister Louise Levonian wrote in a June 17 memo.

The threat of being named and shamed is a major source of anxiety for employers who hire temporary foreign workers. Many firms have hired lawyers in order to manage what are viewed by some as excessive requests for documentation.

Data obtained by The Globe and Mail reveal that in 2014, when the federal government launched a new inspection regime, no inspections were conducted under the new rules. That figure rose to 586 the following year.

However, officials have already conducted 1,537 inspections as of Aug. 15 of this year.

The spike in inspections is a result of sweeping reforms announced in 2014 by the then-Conservative government in response to high-profile cases of abuse in the program, including companies hiring foreign workers when Canadians were available. The 2014 reforms split the program in two, maintaining a smaller temporary foreign worker program while carving out areas like intra-company transfers and student exchanges into a new international mobility program.

The reforms raised the fees for obtaining a permit, called a labour market impact assessment, from $250 to $1,000. The added revenue was meant to cover the cost of increased inspections, with a goal of “thousands” of inspections a year.

Liberal Immigration Minister John McCallum recently told The Globe that those 2014 changes went too far and that the new government will be announcing further updates to the program later this year.

Source: Number of federal inspections under foreign worker program on rise – The Globe and Mail

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ICYMI: Le Québec en voie de dépasser ses cibles

2016/08/23 Leave a comment

One of the more recognized voice of settlement services in Quebec, Stephen Reichhold:

Québec sous-estime le nombre d’immigrants qui seront admis en 2016 et dans les années futures. C’est du moins ce que croit Stephan Reichhold, directeur de la Table de concertation des organismes au service des personnes réfugiées et immigrantes (TCRI).

À l’instar de la plupart des intervenants qui défilent depuis mercredi devant la ministre de l’Immigration, Kathleen Weil, dans le cadre de la consultation publique sur la planification de l’immigration au Québec pour 2017-2019, il penche en faveur d’une augmentation des niveaux d’immigration.

« Les cibles citées sont nettement sous-estimées », note M. Reichhold. Pour 2016, le document soumis à la consultation en cours sur la planification de l’immigration fait état d’un maximum de 6600 réfugiés au total. Or, en date du 8 août, le Québec avait déjà accueilli 6181 réfugiés syriens. La cible initiale est donc déjà dépassée, suppose-t-il, puisqu’il faut y ajouter les réfugiés d’autre provenance.

C’est « l’effort humanitaire exceptionnel » envers les Syriens qui explique ce dépassement, a indiqué au Devoir le ministère de l’Immigration, de la Diversité et de l’Inclusion (MIDI).

Mais tout indique que la tendance ne fléchira pas dans les prochaines années. « Ce qu’ils proposent ne correspond plus à la réalité », soutient le directeur de la TCRI. Il cite notamment l’objectif fédéral de 300 000 nouveaux résidents permanents en 2016, dont au moins 51 000 réfugiés, annoncé en mars par le ministre fédéral de l’Immigration, John McCallum. Ce dernier a réitéré mercredi ses intentions de ne pas faire fléchir cette tendance dans le cadre d’une série de consultations.

Le Québec possède ses propres pouvoirs en la matière, mais il reçoit une proportion de réfugiés correspondant à son poids démographique en vertu de l’Accord Canada-Québec relatif à l’immigration. Si le nombre de réfugiés augmente, et que l’immigration économique doit représenter 63 % du total en 2019 comme le souhaite la ministre Weil, les seuils totaux devront être gonflés.

Planification et français

« Il faut revoir les niveaux proposés », conclut M. Reichhold. Une estimation plus juste permettra de mieux planifier les programmes de francisation et d’intégration, juge-t-il.

Source: Le Québec en voie de dépasser ses cibles | Le Devoir

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Terry Glavin: Canada’s servile relationship with China | National Post

2016/08/19 Leave a comment

In Glavin’s diatribe against previous and current governments efforts to strengthen ties with China, some valid observations and concerns with respect to immigration policies and programs:

….Canadians were similarly hoodwinked by the Immigrant Investor Program (IIP). Begun by Conservative free trader Brian Mulroney and conceived mainly as a way to lure thousands of jittery cash-rich Hong Kong entrepreneurs to Canada, the IIP ended up as the primary means by which Canadian real estate became a favoured bolthole for all the money being spirited out of the People’s Republic. As the country descends deeper into the abyss, Chinese banks were drained of nearly a trillion dollars in illegal money transfers last year alone.

The IIP had to be folded up by the Harper Conservatives after it became clear — and as it took the South China Morning Post’s Ian Young to reveal — that Canada’s ragged refugee-class immigrants had contributed more to Revenue Canada than the IIP’s big-spender immigrant investors did over the life of the program. Now, in an inter-provincial ripoff far more outrageous than any of those “equalization payment” uproars between “have” and “have-not” provinces that have erupted from time to time, the Quebec government has taken over the immigrant-investor racket. Quebec scoops up an $800,000 loan from every IIP arrival – roughly 2,000 “investors” annually — nine out of 10 of whom then immediately get back on a plane and fly elsewhere, mainly Vancouver.

The B.C. treasury gets nothing out of this — and the B.C. government’s recent 15-per-cent sales tax imposition on properties bought by foreign nationals isn’t expected to change a thing. What Vancouverites have gotten out of this is one of the world’s least affordable cities, bitterly divided against itself. Average house prices in Metro Vancouver have nearly tripled over the past 15 years. Home ownership for working families is a thing of the past.

Now we’re being sold on a Chinese version of the temporary foreign worker program. Conceived as a short-term remedy to the occasional ailment of acute labour shortages in key industries, the indentured-labour service had to be dismantled by the Conservatives owing to its inevitably scandalous abuse by disreputable employers. By 2012, there were 338,000 temporary foreign workers in Canada. Last year the number was down to about 90,000. Now, McCallum is championing a ramped up, Beijing-vetted version. You would not be unwise to wager that this will not end well.

Source: Terry Glavin: Canada’s servile relationship with China | National Post

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Canada wants more Chinese workers, students and tourists, says immigration minister: Encouraging settlement outside of Vancouver, Toronto 

2016/08/19 Leave a comment

While there has been some increased immigration to smaller centres recently, the vast majority still go to major urban centres given that is where the jobs and support networks are.

And, given the mobility rights of the Charter, those that settle in smaller centres or regions are free to resettle elsewhere if circumstances or opportunities dictate:

In today’s scrum, reporters asked what the Liberal government would do to make sure its immigration push didn’t put more pressure on hot housing markets.

McCallum said the government’s intention is to encourage immigrants to settle outside of Vancouver and Toronto.

“We would like to spread the immigrants across the country relatively evenly,” said McCallum.

“The last thing we want is every immigrant goes to either Toronto or Vancouver.”

McCallum said he’s hearing appetite for more immigration at his consultation sessions across Canada, especially in the Maritimes with an aging population.

“There’s a significant feeling that Canada does need more immigrants, partly because we have an aging population, and so we need more young blood to keep our economies going.”

But McCallum admitted the government can’t require immigrants to live in certain places, as Quebec’s immigrant investor program has shown.

“That is against the Constitution of Canada. If they are permanent residents, we cannot require them to stay anywhere. They have the right to live anywhere in Canada they wish to live.”

Source: Canada wants more Chinese workers, students and tourists, says immigration minister – British Columbia – CBC News

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Directing MPs through new call centre for immigration cases disastrous, say critics

2016/08/18 Leave a comment

This has been raised at CIMM (the immigration committee):

Opposition MPs say they are incredibly frustrated with a new method for MPs to get information from the government about immigration case files, quietly introduced by the Liberals in April.

Both NDP MP Jenny Kwan (Vancouver East, B.C.), immigration critic for her party, and Conservative MP and immigration critic Michelle Rempel (Calgary Nose Hill, Alta.), say a new system of making immigration inquiries, which has their staff asking questions about immigration cases through a call centre, is creating a backlog of cases for their staff.

Prior to the change, which both MPs referred to as being “quietly” implemented by the government in April, MPs’ offices had two lines they could call: one was a direct Ottawa phone number that connected them to the Ministerial Enquiries Division within the immigration minister’s office, when they had complex or urgent cases and needed a ministerial intervention. The other was a line for simple inquiries, like updates.

With the new general line, information they are expecting to get back in the outlined two business days can easily turn into five days, the opposition MPs suggested. Ms. Rempel said in her office the two days has turned into 10, sometimes 15 days.

This article is the second in a series examining the challenges that Members of Parliament experience in their constituency office. In the first of the series, The Hill Times looked into the challenges associated with helping constituents with passport applications.

Remi Lariviere, a spokesperson for Citizenship and Immigration Canada, responding to questions about the concerns of Ms. Rempel and Ms. Kwan, said the new system has been set up “in order to streamline and enhance services to parliamentarians.” To do so, “a single point of contact dedicated for MPs has been implemented…to ensure that Members of Parliament receive the most expedient and informative service possible to assist them in helping their constituents and managing their cases,” he wrote in an email.

According to Mr. Lariviere, the Ministerial Enquiries Division is still providing the information, just by way of what he called the “information centre,” which is based in Montreal.

Ms. Rempel and Ms. Kwan said calling the Ministerial Enquiries Division directly for complex cases was an efficient and effective way of getting information for their constituents. The new call centre, however, is anything but that, they said.

“In this system, we’re put on hold. Calls can take up to an hour and a half for us to get the information, whereas before we were never put on hold, they had the information, and we were going to get the information expeditiously…[in] a far quicker turnaround time with way less bureaucracy,” Ms. Kwan said. The new system is frustrating she said, not only for her, but for her staff, and “most importantly,” her constituents.

Responding to complaints about delays in getting information, Mr. Lariviere wrote that the “service standard for simple case inquiries is to respond within two days, whereas more complex inquiries are responded to within 10 days. Those have not changed since the implementation of the new line.”

Source: The Hill Times

Filed under Immigration Tagged with ,

Canada’s immigration detention program to get $138M makeover

2016/08/17

Another shift compared to the previous government:

The Canadian government is committing millions to upgrade immigration detention centres across Canada.

Immigration detention facilities in Vancouver and Laval, Que., are also set to be replaced.

Canada’s Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale made the $138-million announcement Monday morning at the Laval Immigration Holding Centre. He said the objective is to make detention a last resort.

“In my first few months as minister responsible for Canada Border Services Agency, I have certainly heard the concerns about immigration detention, and I’ve studied those concerns with great care,” Goodale said.

“The government is anxious to address the weaknesses that exist and to do better.”

Samer Muscati, the director of the University of Toronto’s International Human Rights Program, said it was reassuring to hear Goodale address concerns about excessive use of detention in his remarks today.

“He’s saying the right things and it’s a positive development that he’s saying these things, but of course we’ll need to see what happens in terms of actions that follow,” he said. “The proof will be in the pudding.”

The government will soon begin consultations with stakeholders with the aim of finding alternatives and ways to minimize the number of minors in detention.

According to the Canada Border Services Agency, there are, on average, 450 to 500 people who are detained at any given time under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

The End Immigration Detention Network says 15 people have died in detention while in CBSA custody since 2000. It says reforms are welcome, but the system is inherently unfair.

“Immigration detention including in immigration holding centres is imprisonment without charges or trial. It should end, not be expanded by throwing over a hundred million dollars at it,” said the Network’s spokesperson Tings Chak.

A Red Cross investigation in 2014 found numerous shortcomings at facilities for immigrant detainees, including overcrowding and inadequate mental health care.

Newcomers are often held in provincial jails or police facilities alongside suspected gang members and violent offenders.

The government’s reform objectives include:

  • Increasing the availability of alternatives to detention.
  • Reducing the use of provincial jails for immigration detention to prevent the interaction of immigration and criminal detainees.
  • Avoiding the detention of minors in the facilities as much as possible.
  • Improving physical and mental health care offered to those detained.
  • Maintaining ready access to facilities for agencies such as the Red Cross, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees as well as legal and spiritual advisers.
  • Increasing transparency.

Source: Canada’s immigration detention program to get $138M makeover – Montreal – CBC News

A selection of more critical views, largely focusing on the need for oversight:

Migrants advocates welcome Ottawa’s reforms of the immigration detention system, but say the government is falling short on creating proper oversight of the agency responsible for the enforcement operations.

“It is encouraging the federal government is promising actions and reforms to the immigration detention system. Detention of immigrants needs to be absolutely the last resort and the government recognizes that,” said Josh Paterson of the British Colombia Civil Liberties Association.

“The thing is we need to put an end to housing migrants in criminal population. The money dedicated to the immigration infrastructure must not become the reason to detain more migrants and for longer period of time.”

….Anthony Navaneelan of the Canadian Association for Refugee Lawyers said what was missing in Goodale’s announcement was creating an independent oversight of the Canada Border Services Agency, which is responsible for enforcement of immigration laws including immigration detention.

“Building more detention beds is not enough. We need to keep people out of detention,” said Navaneelan.

 New Democrats immigration critic Jenny Kwan agreed.

“We need a complete and strong oversight to ensure these issues are addressed and the agency is accountable to the public. So many lives are in jeopardy,” said Kwan.

In July, more than 50 immigration detainees in Ontario held a hunger strike to protest prison conditions that include increasing lockdowns and the use of solitary confinement. They demanded to meet with Goodale — a request that was denied.

“We need an overhaul of the laws and policies governing detentions, including placing a limit of 90 days on detentions, not build new prisons,” said Tings Chak of the End Immigration Detention Network.

“Immigration detention is imprisonment without charges or trial. It should end, not be expanded by throwing over a hundred million dollars at it.”

Ontario Human Rights Commission chief commissioner Renu Mandhane said the federal government should be applauded for recognizing the need to provide adequate services to immigration detainees with mental health disabilities.

“We need to make detention more humane. Some detainees are caught in legal limbo for years,” Mandhane said. “They are faceless and hidden from the public, but their human rights should be respected.”

Conservative public security critic Erin O’Toole said there was no money in the federal budget earmarked for the immigration detention reforms and he felt the Liberal government was rushed to make the announcement without a plan.

“The devil is always in the details. This is a considerable amount of money,” said O’Toole. “A community supervision program has not been developed. Are we going to detain only the high-risk detainees? Are we going to stop using the provincial jails? These are the details I want before we decide if we need to build the new facilities.”

Immigration detention reforms fall short on oversight, critics say

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John McCallum wants to ‘substantially increase’ immigration to fill Canada’s labour needs

2016/08/15 1 Comment

Does suggest that the on-line consultations exercise, launched this summer, was more cosmetic than substantive.

I find the call for increased immigration levels has a bit of “field of dreams” quality, rather than being evidence-based:

If Immigration Minister John McCallum gets his way, Canada will significantly increase immigration beyond its current record level as a way to fill the country’s labour needs.

Pointing to an aging population and looming labour shortages, McCallum made the pitch in Manila during a speech to the Canadian Chamber of Commerce in the Philippines on Friday.

“So why not substantially increase the number of immigrants coming to Canada? And that is, I think, I hope, what we are about to do,” McCallum said, according to a transcript of his remarks obtained by CBC News.

Earlier in the week, McCallum was in Beijing, where he sought to open more offices where Chinese can apply for visas, in the hope of attracting more high-skilled workers.

The Trudeau government is already seeking to admit between 280,000 and 305,000 new permanent residents in 2016 — a record increase from the 260,000 to 285,000 newcomers the previous Conservative government had planned to welcome by the end of 2015.

Key to the Liberal government’s larger plan to promote innovation and grow the economy is McCallum’s three-year immigration plan, which he plans to unveil this fall.

McCallum said no final decision on immigration has been made and that he has to get his cabinet colleagues on board with his new plan and convince Canadians it’s the right thing to do.

“But the direction in which I would like to go is to increase substantially the number of immigrants,” McCallum said Friday.

Reducing ‘barriers’ to immigration

The express entry system launched under the previous Conservative government promised transformative changes to Canada’s economic immigration policy.

McCallum will ease some of the rules to make it easier for international students to come to Canada and become permanent residents.

He is also going to eliminate what is known as a labour market impact assessment (LMIA) —  a document all employers need to hire foreign nationals over Canadian workers.

Businesses have said it is the biggest flaw with express entry, a requirement the previous government borrowed from the temporary foreign worker program.

The Liberal government also tasked a parliamentary committee with a review of the controversial foreign worker program, but Parliament adjourned before the report was tabled. It will now be made public in the fall.

“So we’re going to make it easier for international students, we’re going to reduce some of the barriers in our immigration system … we don’t think that every immigrant needs to go through what we call a labour market impact assessment process. We think it can be simplified. We think there are some rules which are no longer necessary,” McCallum said.

“Now, we have to convince Canadians of this. But I think it’s a good idea.”

Source: John McCallum wants to ‘substantially increase’ immigration to fill Canada’s labour needs – Politics – CBC News

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ICYMI: Ottawa poised to ease rules for temporary foreign worker program

2016/08/13 Leave a comment

Getting rid of the LMIA, if followed through as the Minister indicated, is significant:

The federal government is setting the stage for a loosening of temporary foreign worker rules after vocal complaints from Canadian employers that recent Conservative changes went too far.

A Liberal-dominated House of Commons committee has completed a report on options for altering the controversial program and will make the recommendations public next month when Parliament resumes.

The report is expected to acknowledge the need for temporary foreign workers in specific sectors and will stress the importance of providing foreign workers with options to become permanent Canadian residents. The number of foreign-worker approvals has been on the decline in recent years in light of a softer jobs market in some regions and tighter rules brought in by the Conservatives after high-profile allegations of abuse in the program.

The report by the human-resources committee was completed in June but wasn’t made public in time for the summer recess. The government has said it is waiting on those recommendations before moving ahead later this year with changes to the program. However, Immigration Minister John McCallum tipped the government’s hand this week in an interview with The Globe and Mail in China when he said the Liberal government will make it easier for companies to bring in foreign workers.

“We’re also going to reduce some of the barriers and the silly rules … in order to give companies freedom to bring in the best and the brightest,” said Mr. McCallum. “We’ll get rid of many of these [required] labour-market impact assessments which slow things down enormously.”

A spokesperson in Mr. McCallum’s office said the minister’s reference to silly rules relates to some of the restrictions that apply to visiting professors. The spokesperson also noted that the minister has said the government is looking at waving labour-market impact assessments in certain cases where that would help attract top talent to come to Canada.

“What the minister wants to do is just find a middle ground,” said the spokesperson.

A labour-market impact assessment is a government screening process designed to ensure there is a legitimate need for a temporary foreign worker and that no Canadian is available to do the job. The minister said the Conservative changes went too far and the Liberals are trying to strike an “intermediate” position. Government officials stressed Wednesday that no final decisions have been made.

Opposition MPs on the committee said Wednesday that the minister’s comments reflect the view of the Liberal majority that worked on the report.

Conservative MP Bob Zimmer, the committee vice-chair, said Mr. McCallum’s comments are “absolutely” in line with the conclusions of the yet-to-be-released study.

“The government was wanting to go in one specific direction and wanted the report to back them up,” he said. Mr. Zimmer said he agrees with the Liberals that there are some legitimate industry needs for foreign workers, but that requests need to be constantly weighed against economic realities.

“The conditions in our economy simply have changed,” he said. “He can’t just say broadly that we need them absolutely. We always need to be looking at what our economy is doing.”

Source: Ottawa poised to ease rules for temporary foreign worker program – The Globe and Mail

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Neat map: Attitudes towards foreign visitors

2016/08/05 Leave a comment

Map attitudes foreign visitors

Filed under Immigration, Multiculturalism

Shaping the future of Canada’s immigration system

2016/08/04 Leave a comment

A number of opinions on the issues set out in the current immigration consultations (see earlier Collacott: Immigration ‘conversation” is public relations exercise, IRCC Discussion guide on immigration: What about citizenship?).

In addition to my comments below, views of Debbie Douglas (faster processing of family reunification), Harald Bauder (more funding for settlement, pathways from temporary to permanent residency), Jeff Reitz (greater efforts on employment) and the Conference Board (increased immigration levels, spread across the country):

Having inherited an immigration system plagued with backlogs and heavy-handed enforcement, the Liberal government says it’s keen to hear what you think needs to be done about Canada’s immigration future.

Since the beginning of the summer, Immigration Minister John McCallum and his parliamentary secretary, Arif Virani, have held more than two dozen roundtable meetings across Canada with settlement services organizations, businesses and community groups to get their thoughts.

Although the meetings are by invitation only — more are coming in August — the public can submit ideas by email to the minister. Since early July, more than 2,500 online submissions have been received. Submissions end Aug. 5.

“Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada will be reviewing the feedback from Canadians to help guide decisions on how many people we will welcome in the coming years and the future of immigration in Canada,” said a department spokesperson.

While the final report won’t be ready till at least the fall, the Star interviewed a group of immigration experts to weigh in on the national dialogue by identifying gaps in the system and offering solutions.

Meaningful and accessible citizenship:

Andrew Griffith, a former director general at the immigration department, said Canada largely has its immigration policies and programs right, but an independent review by a royal commission would be helpful.

He said the consultation questions are biased towards economic class immigrants and miss out on important areas such as citizenship.

“Most immigrants choose to become citizens as part of their integration into Canadian society. If we believe in immigration integration, we should support political integration, in addition to economic, social and cultural,” said Griffith.

“The main instrument for doing so is citizenship, given that allows for full participation in the political process.”

Canada’s naturalization rate has been declining, from the peak of 93.3 per cent for immigrants who came before 1971, to just 36.7 per cent among those who arrived between 2006 and 2007.

Griffith said Ottawa must set targets for naturalization as a benchmark, to assess whether its policies strike the right balance in making citizenship accessible and meaningful.

Officials must also regularly review citizenship requirements to ensure that different ethnic groups and immigration classes (economic, family and refugees) have comparable outcomes. Reducing the hefty application fee from the current $530 would make citizenship more financially accessible.

Source: Shaping the future of Canada’s immigration system | Toronto Star

The Hill Times has the political reaction to the (trial balloon?) of differential immigration fees:

The federal government is seeking public feedback on letting some immigration applicants pay more for faster processing.

That idea is one of many put forward in an online consultation document the government is asking members of the public to fill out as it gears up for an overhaul of the immigration processing system.

The NDP’s immigration critic and a pair of Liberal and NDP MPs say bringing in a two-tiered Canadian immigration system is out of the question.

“I wouldn’t support it,” said NDP immigration critic Jenny Kwan (Vancouver East, B.C.). “By doing that, effectively you’re saying you can buy your way into the system and bypass everybody.”

“They’re absolutely creating a two-tiered system if that were to proceed,” she said.

However, Liberal MP Peter Fonseca (Mississauga East-Cooksville, Ont.) and a Toronto immigration lawyer say such a system could help to improve immigration processing.

The issue is one close to MPs’ hearts as much of their constituency work is tied up in helping constituents with immigration questions, including application processing.

Many MPs have two staffers in their riding offices and at least one attends to constituents’ immigration needs. The most common complaints of constituents about immigration issues are related to long delays in the processing times of applications for family reunification, refugees, spousal sponsorship, temporary foreign workers, visitor visas, and Canadian citizenship applications.

Immigration reform

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