Racism in Canada is like spice in a stew: add just enough and it blends unnoticed into every bite. Add too much and your guests lose their appetite.
The xenophobic messaging of fringe lobby group Immigration Watch is too spicy for most Canadians. The group’s website declares, among other things, that “there are cultural limits to the number of people any country can absorb.” It also directs people interested in research on the subject of immigration to read Immigration: The Destruction Of English Canada, by Doug Collins, the late BC journalist who denied the Holocaust and repeatedly vilified Jews.
But when talk turns to the Temporary Foreign Workers Program (TFWP), the group’s views may not seem so outlandish, even to the feds, who this week announced new restrictions on the program they have been expanding at the behest of their business friends since they took power in 2006. That was then. There’s the matter of getting re-elected in 2015 to think about now – and the fact that unemployment means Canadians are willing to fight perceived intruders over low-wage, precarious jobs.
It was revealed in April that some of Canada’s most popular retail and fast food outlets are indiscriminately using the TFW program to bring in cheap labour, presumably to fill jobs homegrown Canadians won’t do. This news spurred IW volunteers to organize a counter-protest against the supporters of migrant workers.
On Thursday, June 19, three of IW’s volunteers installed themselves at Spadina and Bloor, half a block from a rally by the Migrant Workers Alliance for Justice demanding equal rights for migrant workers in the TFW program.
“Why on earth are we bringing people here when there’s a youth unemployment rate of between 15 and 23 per cent?” asks Shawn, the most talkative of the three, none of whom are willing to give their last name.
Tony chimes in. He tells me he used to work as a pastry chef but has been unable to find a job after taking a year off to settle a divorce. “I was competing with all these issues, and I was born in this country, for crying out loud.”
These men claim the TFW program is a new form of slavery, which makes me wonder why they’re not joining with groups up the street demanding better working conditions for everyone.
But Shawn’s and Tony’s is a special disdain. They claim migrant workers’ advocates, only feet away handing out flyers that read “We need higher wages and decent working conditions for all,” are scheming with the government and corporations to keep wages low.
I ask the IW volunteers what should happen to the migrants who were promised good jobs and a pathway to citizenship before, in many cases, being exploited by Canadian recruiters and employers. “You let them live out their term, and then they should have to leave,” says Shawn. For IW, it’s clear that the plight of migrant workers is a springboard for a litany of unrelated resentments and gripes, things you just don’t say in polite Canadian conversation.
The group distributed flyers in Brampton recently that suggest the Sikh population there represents a threat to Canadian identity.
Immigration Watch’s wider views may have little chance of gaining ground outside of a small group. Unfortunately, though, many Canadians share its knee-jerk resentment of migrant workers. The government knows this and shapes its policies accordingly.
Employment Minister Jason Kenney garners praise for helping the federal Conservative party reach out to recent immigrants who are now citizens and voters.
But like Immigration Watch, he has shown little compassion for poor immigrant workers without status, most of whom have no legal pathway to citizenship, and many more who are routinely exploited by their employers.
According to Tzazna Miranda Leal, a spokesperson for the Migrant Workers Alliance for Change, “A lot of people are afraid to use their names and speak out because they know they can be deported at any moment. And we’ve seen that happen.”
When Kenney announced a moratorium on the TFW program in April, he was motivated not by the widely reported exploitation of migrant workers, but by a report by right-wing think tank the C.D. Howe Institute claiming that migrant workers are taking jobs from Canadians.
Kenney’s ministry, in fact, set up a “hotline” to encourage Canadians to explain how the TFW program has harmed them. The government expressed no concern for migrants who are denied health care after being injured at work, forced to live in substandard housing their employers control and cheated by consultants who charge them bogus fees in exchange for passage to Canada.
If you disparage racialized people openly, as Immigration Watch does, people will shake their heads and turn away. But it’s okay to create entire systems to abuse and neglect people of colour, and to pit them against white Canadians, who consider themselves entitled to opportunity.
Before the House recessed for the summer last week, Kenney announced that the government plans to “put Canadian workers first” by reforming the TFW program. Fewer workers will be allowed in, and under much tighter conditions.
Workers will still lack a pathway to citizenship under the new rules, so employers can continue to blackmail them with deportation threats.
But the government did promise to establish another hotline, presumably so migrants they continue to systematically neglect and exploit can call them for help.
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