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Marketing local clients to employers who typically hire TFWs
Editorial by Christian Saint Cyr
National Director / Canadian Job Development Network
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I’m not one to make grand predictions about the labour market. There are so many things that can go wrong, depending on what the economy does. And yet, if I were to make a prediction, I would say Canada is about the move into a major labour shortage this winter with a rapidly growing number of unfilled jobs.
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Why? Because the Government of Canada has made multiple decisions in the past year that is going to severely limit the number of available workers in the next few months. These decisions include:
- 35% reduction in the number of international students who can come into the country; many of whom transition from school to work.
- The limiting of post-graduate work permits for international students in college programs.
- Reducing the number of hours international students can work from unlimited to just 24 hours per week.
- Reducing the number of years Temporary Foreign Workers (TFW) can stay in Canada from two years to one year.
- Limiting the TFW share of an employer’s workforce to just 10%, which was set at 20% just this past March.
- Reducing the number of temporary foreign workers who can apply for permanent residency.
- Eliminating an employers’ ability to hire TFWs who are situated in large communities where the unemployment rate is higher than six per cent.
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There are exceptions to the ban on low-wage TFWs. Jobs in agriculture, food processing, fish processing, construction, and healthcare are exempt from these changes, both for seasonal and non-seasonal roles. The low-wage TFW program will still be available to businesses in small cities and rural communities which don't constitute a Census Metropolitan Area.
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The latest change came last week when the Prime Minister announced Canada’s immigration target for 2025 will drop from 500,000 to 395,000. He also shared that in 2026 the goal is 380,000 and in 2027 the goal is 365,000.
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I realize immigration is a highly controversial issue. More immigrants make housing more expensive, increases demand on our health care system and is a huge challenge to the overcrowding of schools and other municipal infrastructure.
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On the other hand, immigrants are necessary in a country where half a million jobs are going unfilled and we need skilled labour to serve in the health care, construction and educational sectors.
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And while the rapid acceleration of immigration in 2019, both for permanent residents and international students and temporary foreign workers may not have been the best approach, so is taking multiple efforts to severely limit immigration all at once.
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Here is the problem. Baby Boomers are retiring right now and we just don’t have the Gen Z’ers we need to fill the job market. When the 2021 Census was taken, there were 2.5 million Canadians ages 60 to 64 but just 2 million young people between 15 and 19.
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Simply put, we are short 20% the number of workers we need just to fill retirements. There are presumable 500,000 jobs that are going to become available in the next five years that we don’t have workers to fill, and that’s not even counting the new jobs that come from a growing economy which could amount to as many as 1.25 million new jobs. The math is simple – over five years, we have two million young people to fill 3.75 million jobs. Immigration has to be part of this equation.
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What Canada needs is a predictable and reasonable approach to temporary foreign workers, immigrants, refugees and permanent residents that doesn’t dramatically swing based on the rhetoric getting tossed back and forth in the run up to an election. We need to look at our demographics, the jobs and sectors that need to be supported and tailor our immigration system to meet that need. But honestly, who’s going to vote for that?
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So, what is that prediction again? Stepping up immigration since the pandemic has over supplied low- and medium-skilled occupations, leaving many young workers and recent immigrants struggling to find employment, while high-skilled occupations continue to go unfilled.
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In the coming months, I predict we’ll see greater demand for low- and medium-skilled occupations again, while high-skill occupations continue to struggle to find workers.
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The opportunity for job developers will be in marketing clients to employers who’ve become accustomed to hiring TFWs and who’ve historically been dissatisfied with local employees.
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For those of you who work in a Census Metropolitan Area where the unemployment rate is higher than six per cent, the government will no longer process new labour market impact assessments (the paperwork needed to hire temporary foreign workers) for low-wage positions in the area.
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By the way, in case your curious which CMA’s have an unemployment rate of six per cent or higher. According to the September 2024 Labour Force Survey, it’s nearly all of them. The only exceptions are: Halifax, Nova Scotia; Quebec City and Saguenay, Quebec; Greater Sudbury and Thunder Bay, Ontario; and Brandon, Manitoba.
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Since these employers will now be prevented from hiring Temporary Foreign Workers, these employers will be far more motivated towards hiring local workers.
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So, how do you find employers who typically hire TFWs? As part of the vetting process, to demonstrate there is a shortage of local workers, the Canada Job Bank has a specific section dedicated to hiring TFWs which we’ve linked below. This will allow you to search job opportunities for nearly every community in Canada and see employers who are claiming they can’t hire locally.
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When pitching local candidates to employers who are typically hiring TFWs, keep in mind the issues that most often concern local employers. Assure them your candidates have the skills or training required, that they are hard working and reliable. This is also a great opportunity to help build these aspects into our job development training for clients who are looking for employment. It’s critical that clients be able to communicate this for themselves.
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While I believe that TFWs fulfill an important role in our job market, it should not be to the exclusion of hiring local workers. Employers have a responsibility to hire young workers and mentor them and to hire recent immigrants and acclimate them to the Canadian job market. Rapid expansions in the number of TFWs has made it easier for employers to bypass local workers for the consistency and predictability of TFWs.
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While these new changes to our immigration policy might be going too far, we can also see it as an opportunity for a job market that is too skewed to TFWs and a chance for local employers to refocus on training and mentoring our next generation of workers.
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We’ll be discussing the impact of immigration changes at our #MotivatingMondays meeting of the Canadian Job Development Network, Monday Oct. 28th at 8:30am Pacific; 9:30am Mountain; 10:30am Central; 11:30am Eastern; 12:30pm Atlantic and at 1pm in Newfoundland.
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On the morning of Monday October 28th, 'Click this Link' to join the session LIVE.
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