Too many companies in Alberta are allowed to pay temporary foreign workers below the prevailing wage, threatening good middle class jobs, says the Alberta Federation of Labour.
AFL president GIl McGowan says Premier Jim Prentice is listening to only CEOs and now workers. He’s worried about a one sided message when Prentice meets with Prime Minister Stephen Harper.
“He needs to get out of the boardrooms in downtown Calgary and get to places like Edmonton and Fort McMurray where the front line work is being done,” McGowan told a news conference. “Once he’s here he needs to talk to ordinary working people and not just bosses.”
The documents show that in 2013, there were over 2,500 businesses in Canada whose workforces were almost a third TFWs, mostly in Alberta Over 1,100 had workforces that were more than 50 per cent TFWs. “They showed that this practice is not restricted to low wage fast food outlets. It’s also happening in normally high wage sectors of the economy like oil sands related construction.”
Delegates from the Alberta Urban Municipalities Association passed a resolution Friday calling for a return of the TFW program.
Agencies/Canadajournal
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