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Canada may admit hundreds of temporary workers

Ajit Jain
India Abroad Correspondent in Toronto

Canada is considering a proposal to admit hundreds of temporary workers under fast-tracked overhaul of federal immigration rules, said a front-page Toronto Star report on Wednesday.

The new rules are reportedly in the process of being re-written to address the acute shortage of skilled workers in the country.

Two sectors that are of particular concern in which shortages are growing at an alarming rate are: technology and construction.

"The potential is quite dramatic and I think it's a very important opportunity to address genuine labour market shortages and bring people we need quickly," Citizenship and Immigration Minister Elinor Caplan was quoted as saying.

She was in New Delhi in March as the head of a parliamentary delegation studying functioning of the Canadian immigration posts and discussing with her officials how to expeditiously process visa applications.

Once a labour shortage in a particular field is identified by the private sector, the immigration department would quickly admit workers into the country to fill that shortage. It would be a pilot project to start with.

Caplan reportedly indicated that she was already in touch with a number of sectors experiencing labour shortages.

"In the Greater Toronto Area, the development of Pearson Airport has created a shortage of construction workers and labourers," she was quoted as saying.

Terminal 1 of the airport that has been under expansion for several months has hundreds of workers working. It is a major project worth millions of dollars. Otherwise, too, there is a boom in the housing sector that has increased the needs for construction workers.

"Employees are telling us we have to get people more quickly," she was quoted as saying.

Instead of selecting independent immigrants according to their occupations, the immigration system will recruit people with flexible skills and use the temporary worker stream to meet urgent needs.

The proposed new program "should bring people in a matter of a few weeks, not months," Caplan said.

She, however, did not indicate how many workers who would be admitted under this 'fast-track' system. "It's open-ended and that's why I think it's tough to put a number on it," she reportedly said.

Caplan has asked professional regulatory bodies and provincial governments to look into sectors which require stringent qualification criteria for foreign-trained professionals. These include medicine, engineering, architecture, etc.

The proposed new rules seek to allow not only doctors or engineers into Canada, but enable them to integrate with the profession quickly. This would be good news for professionals in many developing countries, especially India which is a major source of technical and skilled workers for Canada.

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