Migrant worker programs are the only avenues left for many migrants and pathways to residency are getting cut. Calling for abolition of temporary worker programs without addressing the systemic shifts in canadian immigration policy is a de facto call to end immigration. Instead, call for full legal status and basic labor rights for migrant workers upon arrival.

We must denounce by any means necessary the institutions, corporations and governments that allow the exploitation of ALL people to take place, especially those who do not have ‘status’, those who are poor, and those who are of colour.
While the government insists that migrant workers are treated fairly, migrant workers have documented experiences of isolation, discrimination, fear, exploitation, and limited access to social services. The typical migrant worker experience includes earning less than minimum wage, dangerous working conditions, and working 10-12 hours per day- often seven days a week- without overtime pay, basic employment standards, or the right to unionize. Most importantly, their temporary status makes them vulnerable to abuse and exploitation, as any assertion of their rights leads not only to contract termination but also deportation. Therefore, access to citizenship is a tool of the labour market that fuels multi-million dollar industries.
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Reports of exploited foreign temps have grown as fast as the federal program. First in a series from the Tyee.
By Krystle Alarcon

http://thetyee.ca/News/2013/01/07/Canada-Migrant-Workers/
They hand you a soothing cup of Tim Hortons, pack frozen beef in factories, pick blueberries and apples on Abbotsford farms, serve fast-food meals and wipe tables, excavate mines and drill for oil in Western Canada, and raise your kids as if they were their own. Typically paid far less than Canadians, unprotected by labour laws, and disposed of when their contracts end, these migrant labourers have become ubiquitous while remaining all but invisible.
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Toronto, Kitchener, London, Vancouver, May 24, 2012 — Coordinated by Migrant Workers Alliance of Change, simultaneous actions outside MP offices took place in 4 cities today, with migrant workers, community members and trade unionists demanding the Conservative government reverse a policy that would permit employers to pay migrant workers 15% less. This discriminatory policy is an attack on migrant workers and on all working people. Actions will continue next week in Calgary and Edmonton, as momentum builds against the wage cut.

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By Janet Bagnall, edmontonjournal.com May 13, 2012

Barely two months after a British Columbia Supreme Court judge certified a $10-million class-action lawsuit on behalf of more than 70 temporary foreign workers alleging flagrant violations of pay and working conditions, the Conservative government told Canadian employers that they can start paying short-term foreign workers 15 per cent less than they pay Canadian workers. If the federal government felt any qualms about giving employers carte blanche to create a two-tier workforce, it wasn’t obvious. Its attitude: Canada is facing a labour shortage. This is a way to fix it.

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By: Sozan Savehilaghi April 30, 2012 · 4:42 pm Downtown East Newspaper

The current Conservative Government is well known for policies that devastate poor communities, immigrants, women, and aboriginal people. One of their latest, Bill C-31, which is called the Refugee Exclusion Act by migrant justice activists, will have a horrifying impact on refugees who seek asylum and safety in Canada. Grassroots organizations such as No One Is Illegal in Vancouver Coast Salish Territories, as well as Non-Government organizations such as Amnesty International, Canadian Council for Refugees, the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, and the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, have come out in denunciation of this bill. Bill C-31 is condemned internationally and is against Canada’s own Charter of Rights and Freedoms. It defies the UN Convention on the Rights of Refugees which Canada has signed on to.

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Toronto Star. Published On Sat Apr 28 2012

Temporary workers, such as those who work in Ontario’s farms, can now be paid 15 per cent less than the average wage. Temporary workers, such as those who work in Ontario’s farms, can now be paid 15 per cent less than the average wage. Temporary workers, such as those who work in Ontario’s farms, can now be paid 15 per cent less than the average wage. Immigration Minister Jason Kenney has always vehemently denied bringing cheap foreign labour into Canada. Employers had to pay foreign temporary workers “the prevailing wage,” he pointed out.

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guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 20 March 2012 17.58 GMT

Housemaid Alem Dechasa killed herself after street attack that sparked outrage over treatment of migrant workers in Lebanon Alem Dechasa was found dead in hospital, apparently hanged using strips from her bed sheets. Warning: video contains violence Link to this video Ethiopia is lobbying Lebanon to investigate fully the death of an Ethiopian housemaid who killed herself after being beaten on the street in Beirut. Video footage of Alem Dechasa being attacked outside the Ethiopian consulate in Beirut was broadcast on Lebanese television two weeks ago, causing outrage in the country about the mistreatment of the thousands of migrant workers in the country. In the video, Dechasa is seen being violently dragged along the street by a man and forced into a car. One man screams at her, “Get into the car” while another is seen helping to force Dechasa into the back of the vehicle.

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Rabble.ca By Tyler Shipley | February 10, 2012

As the Peruvian immigrant community in Kitchener-Waterloo — and families at home in Peru — mourn the loss of 11 of their own in a deadly highway crash in rural Ontario on February 6, at least one Toronto daily newspaper two days later prioritized instead the highway death a single girl (a white, 19-year-old aspiring model), pushing the 11 Peruvian lives to page eight. This is but a symptom of a larger problem that suggests that white/Canadian lives are more valuable than their non-white/non-Canadian counterparts.

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Toronto Star. Published On Thu Feb 09 2012

Sadly, it took a tragedy on the scale of the traffic accident in Hampstead, Ont., which claimed 11 lives, to bring some attention to the plight of migrant workers in Canada. There have been a number of stories this week outlining the massive scale of the migratory labour system that brought these workers from Peru, and the difficult conditions they face. But before the media moves on to other issues, or the story’s focus narrows to traffic safety regulations (important as these may be), it is essential that Canadians take a moment to consider what those numbers and conditions really mean — in other words, to wake up to the realities that tens of thousands of migrant workers face. Two broad areas of concern stand out.

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Community Supper and Discussion to Celebrate International Migrants Day

When: Monday Dec 19th
Where: GVBC, 1803 East 1st Avenue
Time: 6:00 – 8:00 pm
Organized by: Philippine Women’s Center, No One is Illegal, and Justicia for Migrant Workers

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December 18th has been designated as a Global Day of Action Against Racism, And for the Rights of Migrants, Refugees and Displaced People to commemorate and celebrate the struggles of migrant workers around the world (http://globalmigrantsaction.org/) Join us in Vancouver, Coast Salish Territories for a community supper and participatory discussion across communities to continue to organize, to resist and to build a strong and vibrant migrant justice movement to demand dignity, justice and status for all.

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