The restaurant business has weathered its fair share of troubles since the pandemic and labour shortages continues to be a main point of concern for the province’s hospitality industry.
“Restaurants are struggling with both input costs going up and of course the affordability crunch that the customers are feeling themselves,” said Mona Pinder, executive director of the Alberta Hospitality Association.
Which makes a new piece of legislation tabled in the Alberta legislature this week feel like another challenge for an already strained industry that relies on people from all walks of life to operate.
Bill 26, or the Immigration Oversight Act, would target employers who want to take advantage of foreign workers.
The bill would mean the creation of a public registry, and require employers and immigration consultation to be licensed.
Joseph Schow, Alberta’s immigration minister, said the bill is about protecting workers who come to the province to earn a living and to accurately address the needs of the current labour market.
“It is clear that in some instances, we have become over-reliant on temporary foreign workers,” Schow said at a news conference Wednesday.
He said the current system favours hiring foreign nationals for some jobs, bypassing young Canadians.
“As a result, some of the jobs that usually would’ve gone to Albertans as entry-level positions are now going to temporary workers.”
Schow said the legislation is about Alberta taking more control over immigration to fill jobs where needed and is “absolutely not” about restricting the number of temporary foreign workers coming to the province.
According to provincial statistics there are 271,024 non-permanent residents in Alberta. About 60 per cent of those hold work permits and six per cent hold work and study permits as of Jan. 1.
Those numbers have all decreased compared with the same time last year. The number of non-permanent residents fell by almost 26,000.
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National advocacy group Restaurants Canada said in Alberta, foodservice is a $16-billion industry that employs 155,000 people, including 63,000 youth, who represent more than 40 per cent of workers.
Pinder said restaurants in some rural areas do not have the workforce to run at full capacity, especially with youth workers.
Restaurants Canada agreed, noting youths often have limited schedule availability due to school and other commitments and are concentrated in urban areas close to higher education institutions.
“You can’t operate a kitchen without a trained chef or maintain a 24/7 rest stop if no one is willing to work overnight,” Kelly Higginson, president and CEO of Restaurants Canada, said in a statement.
Restaurants Canada said temporary foreign workers make up three per cent of the foodservice workforce but are critical, particularly for skilled roles like chefs and cooks, for overnight shifts and in rural regions where there are not enough workers.
This is why businesses look to temporary foreign workers, even though that process can be expensive, Pinder said, adding Alberta’s bill duplicates rules already in place at the federal level.
“Alberta is kind of known for looking at red tape reduction,” Pinder said.
“This doesn’t really feel like reducing red tape.”
While the process will effectively duplicate the work already being done by Ottawa, Schow said it’s necessary to prioritize and address Alberta’s unique labour market needs, particularly in agriculture and manufacturing.
Government officials said the plan is to publish the registry of employers who are approved to hire foreign workers. The bill will also establish a licensing system for immigration consultants and foreign worker recruiters to crack down on those who take advantage of vulnerable newcomers.
A new system for complaints and enforcement will be handled by Schow’s ministry. It aims to target those who charge money for job offers, misrepresent employment conditions, take illegal pay deductions or keep workers’ documents like passports.
Government officials said the regulatory framework proposed Wednesday is similar to existing legislation in Saskatchewan and British Columbia but will allow for different investigative powers.
Penalties will include fines, suspensions and bans from recruiting or hiring foreign nationals.
The legislation sets maximum fines of up to $1 million for individuals or $1.5 million for corporations. In severe cases, courts can imprison someone who violates the rules for up to a year.
Moshe Lander, an economist with Concordia University, says it is hard to gauge how the new measures would impact the economy, since the province is continuing to develop the bill’s regulations.
“If we’re going to have an economic analysis of what are the benefits and costs and what does this mean, and try and come up with a dollar amount, it’s almost impossible to do when we can’t model what we can’t see,” Lander said.
Cracking down on fraudulent activity and ensuring the protection of workers is important in maintaining the integrity of the TFW program, Restaurants Canada noted.
It and the Alberta Hospitality Association hope to see the provincial government instead scale up programs that have already seen success, like the Alberta Youth Employment Incentive.
The bill is currently tabled before the legislature. Schow said if passed, implementation could be seen as early as 2027.
With files from The Canadian Press
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