Conservatives Mismanage Temporary Foreign Worker Program

April 10, 2013

DOMINION, NS– Liberal Human Resources and Skills Development critic Rodger Cuzner made the following statement today on reports of foreign workers replacing Canadian workers:

“Under the Conservatives, the Temporary Foreign Worker Program has been consistently abused as a vehicle to replace Canadian workers with foreign workers.

We have seen this very recently with Canadian IT workers who were replaced with foreign technology service workers. This follows last year’s authorization by the Conservatives for a mining company in British Columbia to bring in temporary foreign workers, despite the sizeable availability of Canadian miners.

The Harper Conservatives are placing a higher priority on outsourcing Canadian jobs to foreign workers than on training our labour force to match unprecedented skills shortages across the country. On their watch, the number of temporary foreign workers in Canada has ballooned by nearly 200,000 or 140% since 2005, growing to 338,189 workers in 2012. This has all occurred while many Canadians across the country are facing serious difficulty securing employment.

The total mismanagement of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program requires immediate explanation from the government. That is why the Liberal Party is giving notice of a possible Opposition Day motion to conduct a thorough review of this program and recommend changes that will end further abuses once and for all.”

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Background:

The Liberal motion can be viewed here.