The TFWP: Let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater

A recent piece in The Walrus argued that the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP) is beyond hope, repair, or salvation and should be scrapped. With over 15 years of experience working with businesses of all stripes and in practically every industry, I can confidently say that the article is misguided, and, frankly speaking, a little lazy.

To say that a massive public policy should be scrapped is really only a fair comment if you have some idea of what the alternative could be, or if you can show that you've dealt with the minutiae of a program accessed by 20% of small businesses across Canada. 

Canada is too big a country, with too small a population, and too diverse a set of already active industries and communities to look only inwards for sustainability. If those who want to see the TFWP completely dismantled, like Adnan Khan, are also arguing that some Canadian industries should be decimated and put out of business, that’s an entirely different conversation. It’s a conversation worth having, but let’s have it honestly.

So let’s actually acknowledge that we're a country in its second year of zero population growth. Under this backdrop, there just isn’t a magical untapped labour pool in every Canadian town and city with the skillset and availability needed for every industry that those communities support.

It is also important to recognize that while the TFWP is a nationally accessible program, the impacts of it are not nationally uniform. The need to access the TFWP outside major urban hubs is not going to be the same as the needs in non-urban-hub communities.

Relatedly, the needs in one industry are not going to be the same as the needs in another. Even the same industry across different geographies won’t be having uniform conversations about company needs or sustainability plans.

Does the TFWP need fixing? Absolutely. Do immigration consultants need more oversight and reigning in? Absolutely. Are immigration lawyers like myself often overpriced and inaccessible to clients? Absolutely. 

Is Canada with two years of zero population growth able to be selfsustaining without migrant workers? Absolutely not.

Reform takes work and insight. Bludgeoning a program that is a lifeline for countless businesses across every conceivable industry in Canada with no alternative is short-sighted, at best, and disingenuous, at worst.