2
TEMPORARY MIGRATION AND LABOUR MARKET RESPONSIVENESS
IN THE PRAIRIE PROVINCES AND THE NORTH
Speaking Notes for
Robert Vineberg
Director General
Prairies and Northern Territories Region
Citizenship and Immigration Canada
for
“Should I Stay or Should I Go?”
Metropolis Presents:
Policy-Research Seminar on Temporary Migration
March 12, 2008
Library and Archives Canada
395 Wellington Street
Ottawa, Ontario
· Intend to provide an overview of the role of temporary migration as a component of the broader labour market in the Prairie Provinces and the North.
· Also will look at the links between temporary and permanent migration in the context of today’s western economy and labour market.
· Given the nature of this symposium, at which we have been asked to be controversial, the opinions expressed in this presentation are mine and not, necessarily, those of Citizenship and Immigration Canada.
· Canada’s labour market has been evolving over the years but in recent years the pace of change has accelerated.
· In recent history, Canada’s labour market problem had always been how to employ Canada’s surplus of workers entering the labour market each year.
· This was driven largely by a number of factors over the years:
o The large scale entry of women into the labour force during WWII and, unlike after WWI, the decision of many to remain in the workforce
o The large number of servicemen returning to the labour force at the end of WWII
o The Baby Boom
o High levels of immigration
· Throughout the post-war period all these factors led to high levels of unemployment and therefore the ability of the domestic labour market to meet all but certain specialised needs that could be met by immigration.
· Temporary migration, in the pre-air travel days, was almost non-existent.
· The current TFWP was only introduced in the 1970s and was clearly designed to be an exceptional response to unique needs.
· Unemployment remained high in Canada as the points systems for permanent residence came into effect in 1966, followed in the seventies by the TFWP.
· Both were policy responses to a time when government struggled with surplus of labour in Canada. Permanent residents, other than family members, needed an occupation in high demand or an approved job offer or both to be admitted.
· TFWs could only come to Canada if they were filling a high-skilled position and if the prospective employer had established that no Canadian resident was able and willing to do the job. The bar was high because politicians and policy makers wanted it that way.
· There were, early on, some exceptions:
o On a reciprocal basis – Student Working Holiday Programs
o Seasonal Agricultural Workers Programs (Caribbean – 1966 and Mexico- 1974)
o Live In Caregivers Program (mid-80s)
· However, beginning in the late 90’s and accelerating into the first year of this decade, there has been a huge change in the Canadian labour market:
o Boomers retiring
o Economy booming (especially in the west)
o Canadians are increasingly better educated and unwilling to take low-skilled jobs
o Immigrants also increasingly better educated and less willing to take low-skilled jobs
· Today, we need to look at the labour market as a whole before focussing on temporary migration. In the three Prairie Provinces, employment rates are the highest in Canada and unemployment is the lowest in the country – about 4% or less in all three Provinces.
· We can expect that this will continue. The Conference Board of Canada is projecting that the three Prairie Provinces will have the fastest growth in the country throughout 2008:
o Manitoba – 3.7%
o Saskatchewan – 3.6%
o Alberta –3.3%
· In 2006, the robust Alberta economy had a net gain of some 60,000 inter-provincial migrants, almost 21,000 immigrants arrived and over 22,000 temporary foreign workers were in the province – over 100,000 people on a population of 3.2M. With natural growth added in, this represents a growth rate of almost 3% per year and skilled jobs still go wanting in Alberta.
· The situation is not much better in Saskatchewan and Manitoba with “help wanted” signs everywhere.
· Overall, in the last 10 years, while immigration to CIC’s Prairies and Northern Territories Region has doubled from 17,000 to 35,000/year, the number of TFWs has about tripled from 10,000 to over 28,000 in 2006 and the number may have doubled again by the time we have the 2007 numbers.
· However, in a Prairies labour market of over 2,750,000, immigrants and TFWs will never be an answer to all the requirements. Retraining Canadians, developing the job skills of aboriginal youth and encouraging older workers to stay in or return to the labour market all must be pursued.
· However, policy makers have been slow to abandon the “we’re here to protect jobs for Canadians” mentality and even slower to modify policies designed to keep foreign workers out of the Canadian labour market.
· While IRPA changed the test for LMO opinions from the “no Canadians to do the job” to a “greater benefit to the Canadian economy test”, Service Canada regulations remain the same.
· So what has happened on the ground?
· Local pressures started arising in the 90’s. In particular, shortages of nurses in Manitoba resulted in, for the time, a large-scale TFW movement. This was handled exceptionally but was justified as nurses were skilled workers.
· Ironically, the first challenge to the ban on low-skilled TFWs was as a result of the growing shortage of sewing machine operators in the Winnipeg apparel industry. This industry was booming as a result of the Canada-US FTA but was destined in not too many years, as a result of the WTA, to transform itself by off-shoring the manufacturing and focussing on high-skilled jobs related to design, product development, supply chain management and marketing. (I will return to this later.)
· But in 1994-95, the industry needed sewing machine operators and was not about to accept “No” for an answer when TFWs from the Philippines were ready and willing to meet their needs.
· The industry mobilized its political clout and gained the support of the provincial government which, in turn, lobbied the Federal Government and the Sewing Machine Operator Pilot was born.
· As often has been and is the case, Government responded with a pilot. It was born among misgivings but its success encouraged Manitoba to join others in pressing for regional tools to meet local labour market needs. The Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) was the result and the connection between the PNP and TFWs is very important:
o Many PNPs start as TFWs
o Others approved as PNPs are allowed forward as TFWs while the PNP application is being processed
· The experience of the apparel industry in Winnipeg was noted by other industries. In particular the Oil Sands and in meat packing. HRSDC was under pressure to respond and allow low skilled workers to come forward as TFWs. Again the response was a pilot – the low-skilled pilot.
o In 2002 restricted to 1 year – had to leave country for 4 months before re-applying
o Finally in 2006 increased to 2 years – again must leave for 4 months at end of work permit.
· The requirement to leave is a policy response to the repugnance to a Guest Worker program
· Yet TFWs have a place in the economy:
o Oil Sands (2004 CIC, HRSDC, Alberta Agreement – provides for priority processing)
o Meat Packers
§ Lakeside Packers in Brooks
§ Maple Leaf Foods in Brandon (60% of its workforce of 1,700 are Foreign Workers)
§ Hospitality and Retail industry in Alberta
§ Even in the NWT – Diamond Cutters & Polishers from Armenia and other countries
§ In the Mackenzie River pipeline goes ahead – will create another demand source for TFWs
· Provinces expecting more from Feds
o Responses include TFW Working Groups –
§ AB-06;
§ MB-07;
§ SK-08.
§ Occupations under pressure lists
· As pressures mount, government is seeking ways to respond:
o Off-campus employment of foreign students
o Foreign students allowed to work for 2 years after graduation
o Canadian Experience Class (CEC)
· But the Canadian Experience Class will be limited to high skills (NOC, 0, A and B)
· At this point, the only way to regularize low skill TFWs is via PNPs. Provinces not keen on being the only “relief valve”
o However they are responding - in Manitoba a temporary foreign worker with an ongoing job offer can apply for the PNP after 6 months in Manitoba.
· So what’s next:
o Federal Government has offered the provinces the possibility of having an TFW annex to Federal-Provincial Agreement
§ Negotiations ongoing with Ontario & Alberta
· However, the low skill pilot is about to pose challenges. Started about 2 years ago so first participants will soon see their WPs expire.
o Some will want to leave – some will go underground
o Some employers won’t want to lose their investment in productive workers – will apply pressure
§ On provinces re PNP
§ On feds re changing pilot on allowing lower skilled to apply through CEC
· Plus this is a challenge to Canada’s longstanding position that those we allow to come to Canada will be allowed to stay, become Permanent Residents and, in time, Citizenship if they so choose.
· Low-skill pilot challenges this model.
· Reality is employers seek workers and if government responds through either temporary or permanent immigration, what Canada gets is human beings and their families.
· Concern remains that low skilled workers are most vulnerable.
· There is no question that compliance resources are needed at the provincial and federal level to ensure working and wage conditions are respected.
· There is also the concern that low-skilled workers are most vulnerable to economic slowdown and, therefore, most likely to lose their jobs.
· But is this part of the old paradigm?
· If low skilled jobs are going unfilled in huge numbers and demographic trends suggest this will only get worse, is perhaps this actually becoming a rather secure part of the Canadian labour market?
· Also perhaps we are perpetuating a premise that low skilled are always low skilled.
· I said I’d return to the Sewing Machine Operator pilot in Winnipeg. The apparel industry that employed some 9,000 workers as recently as 1996 now employs maybe half that number. Except in specialty niches such as military uniforms, production has been moved off-shore
· So where are the SMOs?
o Many were in their late 30’s – 40’s when they arrived and now are happy to retire
o Others have obtained new skills and moved on
o Some have stayed in the industry but moved to furniture manufacturing sewing upholstery in an industry that is still very important to the Manitoba economy.
· Where they are not is: - unemployed or on welfare!
· The worries that they’d become a burden on Social Services never materialized.
· Similarly live-in caregivers - also low-skilled TFWs who have the ability to transition to PR status have by a large margin established successfully.
· The CEC seems to be the natural continuation to allow skilled TFWs to make a seamless transition to permanent residence. It will be welcomed by the TFWs, and Foreign Students who qualify and by the employers who hire them and, in the West, the provinces and territories in desperate need of workers.
· So in the face of this evidence of Winnipeg’s SMOs and Live-in Caregivers across the country, I think we need more research and analysis to inform policy-makers prior to coming to a viable policy response to the question of what to do with our so-called low-skilled temporary foreign workers
· So, what of the low skilled TFWs whose work permits are about to expire: Not all will want to stay. Many of the oils sands workers are part of an international labour force that moves from one high-paying mega project to another and have no intention of staying.
· But what of those low-skilled workers who want to stay?
· Before we pronounce a categorical “No way”, we need to examine objectively whether our fear that they are too vulnerable to stay permanently and settle is well-founded or not.