Out-of-Work Canadians: Workers and Oversight Problems

out-of-work canadians: Oversight problems with Canada's temporary foreign workers program have allowed lower-paid international workers to take jobs that could be filled by out-of-work Canadians, with some companies so overly dependent on the program that it could be having unintended economic consequences, according to CTV. Some applications for temporary foreign workers were approved even when employers failed to show they had made reasonable efforts to train existing employees or hire unemployed Canadians, including from under-represented groups, such as First Nations. RCMP supervisors and health services staff often failed to properly support members returning to work from mental health sick leave; one in five who sought mental health support from a health services office did not return to work or was discharged. Enforcement of controls on the program were sparsely applied, with few on-site inspections or face-to-face interviews with foreign workers themselves. Neither the Canada Border Services Agency nor Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada are sufficiently monitoring or evaluating the controls they have in place to mitigate the risk of corruption among agents and officials. Five federal organizations and departments -- the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, Global Affairs, Indigenous and Northern Affairs, Health Canada and Public Services and Procurement -- should be doing more to assess and mitigate the risk of fraud, and to ensure employees get mandatory training on values, ethics and conflict of interest. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.