Senate Recommends Adding "Temporary" Workers To Reflect True Immigration Numbers

Not too long ago, Canadians were fed the line that only 300,000 to 400,000 people were coming to Canada each year. The more “moderate” plan from the Conservatives supposedly was only 250,000 annually.

Is the Overton Window finally shifting? 5 years ago, this website reported that the true scale of people immigrating to Canada was vastly under reported. See here, here, here, here and here. In reality, the number is more like 1 million per year, and has been for a long time. The Annual Reports to Parliament from 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022 are available. 2023 will be covered shortly. In order to have a meaningful discussion on policy, accurate information has to be included.

Specifically, public discourse about “immigration levels” had focused primarily on the number of new permanent residents. This is misleading because it glosses over so-called temporary categories, including:

Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP)
International Mobility Program (IMP)
International Students

Each of these programs has options to transition to permanent resident, or at least to extend the stay via other means.

Finally, in the Spring of 2023, Statistics Canada finally began disclosing more realistic figures. The organization admitted that 2022 saw approximately 1 million people enter the country.

Now, the Senate has recommended changes in how the TFWP is reported. Does this mean that the TFWP will be scrapped, or greatly scaled down? Nope. What it does it include the numbers in the totals that are disclosed to the public.

The Temporary Foreign Worker Program was created in 1973 as a measure of last resort to bring foreign workers to Canada on a temporary basis to fill jobs for which qualified Canadians were not available. It is now clear that this program is essential and entrenched; it is therefore time to recognize this reality and adapt Canada’s migrant labour infrastructure accordingly.

In other words, it’s not going away.

However, to be more transparent with the totals, it’s not just the TFWP that needs to be addressed. There’s also the International Mobility Program, which is similar, but effectively an open work permit. Then there are the hundreds of thousands of student visas handed out every year.

RECOMMENDATION 3
The Standing Senate Committee on Social Affairs, Science and Technology recognizes that neither migrant work programs nor workers are truly temporary, and therefore, recommends that the Government of Canada:
.
–implement the March 2024 commitment to include temporary residents in the annual Immigration Levels Plans;
-provide more transparent pre- and on-arrival information about transitioning from temporary work permits to permanent residence;
-review the language and education eligibility criteria required to apply for permanent residence;
–expand the Provincial Nominee Program to allow more temporary and migrant workers to obtain permanent residence;
-make migrant workers eligible for integration services under the existing Settlement Program and increase funding to support the additional demand, including to community organizations already doing this work;
–develop Settlement Program services specific to temporary residents’ needs including targeted language and education resources to support greater integration and reduce barriers to obtaining permanent residence; and
–increase funding to the Migrant Workers Support Program and existing grassroots organizations to support dedicated services across the country to help migrant workers navigate Canadian bureaucracy before, during and after their stay, including accessing health care, social supports like Employment Insurance, and immigration needs.

While the bit about transparency is nice, the Senate also recommends increasing the number of temporary workers that obtain PR status. They also suggest increasing taxpayer funding across the board.

As for their recent report, (archived here), the Senate does show how many people are actually coming via “temporary” categories. Here are the official statistics, compiled from the last 20 years. Sources are the reports linked below.

Year	Stu	TFWP	IMP	Total
2003	61,293	82,151	–	143,444
2004	56,536	90,668	–	147,204
2005	57,476	99,146	–	156,622
2006	61,703	112,658	–	174,361
2007	64,636	165,198	–	229,834
2008	79,509	192,519	–	272,028
2009	85,140	178,478	–	263,618
2010	96,157	182,276	–	278,433
2011	98,383	190,842	–	289,225
2012	104,810	213,573	–	318,383
2013	111,865	221,310	–	333,175
2014	127,698	95,086	197,924	420,078
2015	219,143	73,016	175,967	468,126
2016	265,111	78,402	207,829	551,342
2017	317,328	78,788	224,033	620,149
2018	356,876	84,229	255,034	696,139
2019	402,427	98,310	306,797	807,534
2020	256,740	84,609	242,130	583,452
2021	445,776	103,552	313,294	862,622
2022	550,187	135,818	470,033	1,156,038

From the way the reports are worded, it appears that these are new visas being issued. In fairness, some are people who had one category expire, and are applying for another.

However, the reports are confusing as to how many people are counted across multiple programs. A cynic may wonder if it’s done deliberately.

This point had been made before, but is important to go over again. (See archive). In 2013/2014, the “Conservative” Government of Stephen Harper faced backlash for how many TFWs were coming into the Canada, and the effect of reducing wages. In 2014, following public backlash at the TFWP being abused, subsequent reports splits it off with the IMP, to help camouflage what was going on.

The Issue of Employer-Specific Work Permits
An overwhelming majority of migrant workers, migrant worker advocates, academics and economists told the committee that employer-specific work permits are the single most egregious condition of vulnerability. While employer-specific work permits are most often associated with the TFWP, Judy Fudge notes that “approximately one-third” of IMP participants also hold them.

Catherine Bryan summarized that the closed work permit is a primary concern for migrant workers because it imposes barriers on their ability to “contest any difficulties that they are encountering and it makes it almost impossible for them to leave.” Elizabeth Kwan added that these permits make “migrant workers vulnerable to abuse and exploitation and provide employers with a stable low-wage and compliant migrant workforce.”

Page 34 of the Senate report recommends scrapping the requirement that foreign workers stay with a single employer.

On some level, it’s nice to see an initiative from the Senate to reflect the true scale of people coming to Canada. However, they seem content with increasing the numbers overall. Not exactly a win.

There’s also the problem that Ottawa doesn’t know how many people remain in the Canada after their visas expire. It was just 2016 when it was announced that a proper entry/exit system would be implemented. Before this, there wasn’t really any passport tracking of who had left.

This Senate report will be followed up.

(1) https://sencanada.ca/en/committees/SOCI/44-1
(2) https://sencanada.ca/en/info-page/parl-44-1/soci-temporary-and-migrant-labour/
(3) https://sencanada.ca/content/sen/committee/441/SOCI/reports/2024-05-17_SOCI_Migrant_Report_e.pdf
(4) Canada Senate SOCI Report 2024
(5) https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/canada-to-begin-collecting-exit-passport-data-1.2947418

One Reply to “Senate Recommends Adding “Temporary” Workers To Reflect True Immigration Numbers”

I suspect that Canadians will never recognize that armies can invade without wearing a uniform. Take the uniform off any soldier and no one can tell what their occupation is.

When you see millions of fighting-aged men in great shape flooding in under one pretext or another, you are watching an army at work, moving into position. They seem extremely co-ordinated in their movements and actions.

While the invading army is here, we are educating them, financially supporting them, feeding them and housing them in the best of hotels. Despite the fact that the un-uniformed soldiers belong to cults that want to end our way of life and eliminate all Christians, Jews and Hindus, in particular, we pretend none of this is anything to worry about. That’s how dumbed-down Canadians have become.

Worse, fighting-age Canadian men are drugged to the hilt, waiting for their next fix. No one seems to remember the legend about how an invading force gave the city they were invading, a huge Trojan-horse as a gift and that massive wooden horse turned out to contain soldiers who had an easy time of killing off the drunk and disorderly soldiers.

We are seeing history repeating itself in slow motion … The UN Trojan-horse migration pacts, the NGOs etc … all bringing in soldiers dressed in civilian clothes.

Until they get the word from their leaders abroad to attack unsuspecting Canadians in full force, the un-uniformed soldiers simply engage in violent crimes with impunity, because they know the invasion was planned and aided by the invaded ‘government’. The catch and release programs were implemented to ensure the criminals get to practice in peace.

The returning jihadiis supported by the Canadian taxpayer are organzing these hordes into attacking forces right under our noses. If you think that what HAMAS did to innocents on October 7th, 2023 in Israel was bad you have no idea the carnage Canada will soon see.

The facts, evidence and history are all there to see.

The massive increase in violent crime in Toronto alone has turned it into a no-go zone. The crime sprees are simply training exercises –practice, for when they are called to actually do what they came for.

Senate Recommends Adding “Temporary” Workers To Reflect True Immigration Numbers

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