Despite assurances last year that the TFW (Temporary Foreign Workers) program was being reformed because of a myriad of reported abuses, those assurances, like so many other pronouncements and assertions coming from the Harper regime, appear to be false.
Business continues to abuse the program, with what one can only assume is the tacit permission of Employment Minister Jason Kenney. The latest offenders, as reported by CBC, are three McDonald's outlets in Victoria, British Columbia, which are currently employing 25 temporary foreign workers.
"The pattern is that the temporary foreign workers are getting more shifts and that the Canadians are getting less,” said employee Kalen Christ, a McDonald’s "team leader" who has worked at the Victoria location for four years.
And unlike the usual excuse used by business that they cannot find Canadian workers willing to do the job, McDonald's has been caught red-handed, with numerous attestations of Canadian applicants being denied jobs:
Tim Turcot is a 21-year-old local resident who said he applied to work there during the same period. He wasn’t hired, despite his four years of restaurant experience.
“I don’t know why they didn’t hire me. I told them I am available 24/7 and just never got the job,” said Turcot.
As well, those Canadians 'lucky' enough to have a position with the house that Ronald built are seeing their hours slashed, hours taken up by the temporary foreign workers, according to team leader Christ, who himself has seen his job dropped from 40 a week to 36 then 32.
Another employee, who didn’t want to be named, also said hours have been cut and people fear losing health benefits next, because they need full-time hours to qualify.
“There’s a guy with a kid who works here who is getting his hours cut. In a minimum-wage job. That isn’t right.”
Now that the problem has been exposed, the office of Jason Kenney has predictably gone into damage control. You can read it here, should you have an especial interest in Harper regime propaganda.
“What? – I’m – Shocked!” Jason Kenney is the guy who should be wearing this one on his chin and undershirt instead of pretending to be the guy that’s going to straighten it out. All of the manipulations of the various components of the TFWP that have occurred under the Harper regime have been babies born of the incestuous relationship that, with Jason’s encouragement and guidance, business organizations such as the CFIB and practitioners in the transnational labour mobility industry sought to develop with the immigration process.
ReplyDeleteOfficially, the TFWP was a responsibility of Diane Finley while she was at HRSDC, but Kenney decided that he wanted to run it from his perch at Immigration where he was fulfilling the self-appointed role of chief multiculturalist and enthnopanderer of the CRAP Party. The trail of evidence is too obvious for Kenney to attempt any denials. The opposition should be ramming this program down his throat. It’s time to call him on the “I-know-nothing” act and hit him with the scores of other abuses that have taken place under his supervision.
I agree entirely with your assessment here, John. But the Cons are so used to spinning their tall tales, and so contemptuous of the intelligence of the average Canadian, that I am sure they are confident that their fantasy response will be uncritically swallowed by people far and wide.
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