'We have to stop thinking that these are people that are coming in to steal jobs from Quebecers'
Limiting employers’ access to the Temporary Foreign Worker (TFW) Program is proving to be a significant challenge for Quebec hotels ahead of the summer season, according to a new report.
Specifically, 91 per cent of hotels in the province are struggling to hire staff for the upcoming season, according to a survey from the Association hôtellerie du Québec (AHQ).
On average, these employers are short by three to 10 workers, reports CBC, citing the survey.
Véronyque Tremblay, chair and CEO of AHQ, attributes the trend to the federal government’s restrictions on access to the low-wage stream of the TFW Program.
Previously, the federal government suspended for six months the processing of Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) applications for the low-wage stream of the TFW Program in Montreal. Later, Ottawa started refusing to process said application in census metropolitan areas with an unemployment rate of 6% or higher across Canada.
As part of new rules introduced last September, employers are also restricted to hiring just 10 per cent of their workforce through the program’s low-wage stream.
This means AHQ members are letting go of foreign workers who are already in Canada, says Tremblay.
"They're heartbreaking goodbyes that are truly difficult, right when we need them," she says in the CBC report. "It's economic nonsense, it's operational nonsense, but it's also human nonsense."
Hotels trying to hire local workers
Tremblay says temporary foreign workers usually fill janitorial staff, overnight jobs and kitchen staff positions.
While they’ve tried raising salaries to make these jobs more appealing to locals, they’ve found limited success, she says.
"We have to stop thinking that these are people that are coming in to steal jobs from Quebecers. It's to the contrary, work that Quebecers don't want to do," Tremblay says in the CBC report.
Now, the AHQ CEO is calling on the federal government to allow employers to hire foreign workers who are already here.
However, a spokesperson for the cabinet of Quebec Immigration Minister Jean-François Roberge claims that "there are too many non-permanent residents in Quebec" and public services are stretched to the limit, according to CBC.
"Businesses must turn to automation and robotization. The arrival of foreign workers must be a solution of last resort," reads the statement, according to the report.
Karl Blackburn, president and CEO of the Conseil du patronat du Québec (CPQ) had previously criticized the federal government for limiting employers' access to the low-wage stream of the TFW Program.
“The CPQ recognizes the government’s efforts to address critical shortages in key sectors such as construction, agriculture, food processing, education and social services, which will be exempt from this freeze,” said Karl Blackburn, president and CEO of the CPQ.
“However, this decision is likely to create significant challenges for many businesses that rely on the TFWP to fill many vacancies due to the lack of local labour availability, particularly in services, retail, restaurants and manufacturing.”
Recently, the federal government temporarily banned 24 Canadian metropolitan areas from accessing the low-wage stream of the TFW Program, in accordance with the policy change that Ottawa announced in 2024.
