Question Period Note: Temporary Worker Facilitation

Facilitation measures for temporary workers during the pandemic.

• Temporary foreign workers are an integral part of a number of industries in Canada, including our food supply chain, and we have a duty to keep them safe.

• The Government is facilitating the safe arrival of temporary workers from overseas. IRCC continues to process work permit applications and has prioritized resources towards in-demand occupations like health care, agriculture, food, and seafood production.

• We have also supported temporary workers already in Canada through a number of measures, such as allowing them to switch employers quickly once they’ve found a new job, providing more flexibility to renew their status if it expired, and allowing visitors to apply for a work permit without having to leave the country.

• In addition a new one-time pathway to permanent residence for essential workers will allow those currently employed in our hospitals and long-term care homes and on the frontlines of other essential sectors to apply for permanent residence, ensuring that Canada has the workers it needs to fuel its economic recovery.

• In 2019, IRCC issued approximately 405,000 work permits to temporary foreign workers. This is a 20% increase compared to 2018. In 2020, work permits issued dropped to approximately 211,000, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. While the total number of work permits issued drastically decreased, the arrival of agricultural workers remained relatively stable as compared to previous years. Temporary workers play an important role in many sectors of the economy, including those related to food security. The arrival of temporary workers in March through June is critical for Canada’s growing and harvesting seasons.

• Approximately 56,000 workers enter Canada each year to support crop planting and harvesting. Key source countries are Mexico, Guatemala, Jamaica and ten other Caribbean countries. An additional 4,000 workers support food processing. Workers largely come from China (fish and seafood) and the Philippines (meat).

• While travel restrictions are currently imposed to limit the spread of COVID-19, there are exemptions to the travel ban for temporary workers coming for a non-discretionary purpose. This includes those coming to work in critical industries, including agriculture, food processing and health.

• While agriculture represents a small share of all work permits issued, a lack of workers in this sector affects businesses and Canada’s food security. As a result, both Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada and Employment and Social Development Canada are prioritizing work permit applications for the agriculture sector.

• While COVID-19 has disrupted processing networks, applicants outside Canada can continue to submit work permit applications. Any person who is outside Canada at the time of application must apply online and applications are triaged to offices where there is processing capacity.

• For temporary workers already in Canada, IRCC has introduced several measures to help clients affected by the disruption in services and travel due to the coronavirus outbreak.

• For example, IRCC has taken steps to encourage and support foreign nationals eligible to do so to apply for extensions (e.g., by providing more time to provide documentation or to complete biometrics). Foreign workers who submit an extension application benefit from “maintained status”, which enables individuals to remain legally in Canada while awaiting a decision on their application. Moreover, many temporary workers may continue to work while on maintained status.

• New regulations took effect on April 20, 2020 to ensure that arriving temporary foreign workers abide by their requirements to remain in quarantine upon arrival in Canada. The regulations also require employers of foreign workers to support the quarantine period of their workers, including through the payment of wages. Employers who do not support the quarantine of their employees can be subject to penalties under the employer compliance regimes of Canada’s temporary foreign worker programs.

• As of May 12, 2020, IRCC established a process that will allow temporary workers who are in Canada with an employer-specific work permit to quickly change employers when they find a new job.

• In addition, a public policy was put in place on July 14, 2020, that provides temporary workers, among other populations, the opportunity to restore their status if it expired after January 30, 2020 and they remained in Canada during this period. This public policy was extended and expanded to include those who lost status between January 2020 and May 2021.

• On August 24, 2020, a third public policy was announced that allows visitors who are currently in Canada with valid job offers to apply for an employer-specific work permit without leaving the country. This measure not only aids temporary residents who would like to contribute their labour and skills to Canada’s recovery from the pandemic, but also employers who continue to face difficulties in finding workers. This public policy was extended and expanded to allow visitors in Canada up until August 31, 2021 to apply for an employer-specific work permit from within Canada.

• IRCC continues to open pathways to permanent residency for temporary foreign workers.
• On April 14, 2021, IRCC announced a new, one-timepathway to permanent residence for over 90,000 essential temporary workers and international graduates.
• Beginning May 6, 2021, applications will be accepted under the following three streams:
o 20,000 applications for temporary workers in health care
o 30,000 applications for temporary workers in other selected essential occupations
o 40,000 applications for international students who graduated from a Canadian institution.

• To promote Canada’s official languages, 3 additional streams with no intake caps have also been launched for French-speaking or bilingual candidates.

• These new pathways complement existing pathways, including the Agri-Food Immigration Pilot, launched on May 15, 2020 which offers pathways to workers in the agriculture and agri-food sectors. Other programs include the Rural and Northern Immigration Pilot, the Atlantic Immigration Pilot and the Provincial Nominee Program.

None