The Candice Malcolm Show - It’s time for the government to put Canadians first

Candice Malan with True North talks about the impact of the travel ban and the devastating March jobs numbers, and why Justin Trudeau should create a national work program to support young people in the agricultural and food processing industries. She talks about how the government is paying young workers to stay at home and do nothing while also recruiting temporary foreign workers to work in essential jobs in Canada.

00:00:00.000 Hi, this is Candice Malcolm with True North. Today I want to talk about that recent economic

00:00:09.600 report and the jobs report that was released this week. I'm not going to sugarcoat it.

00:00:13.660 The numbers are bad. More than one million Canadians have lost their job in the month

00:00:18.020 of March, making March the worst month on record for job losses in the history of our

00:00:23.500 country. Even that, though, doesn't tell the full story of the suffering and misery happening

00:00:27.960 in Canada right now, 2.1 million people have seen the number of hours they work reduced

00:00:33.500 by more than 50 percent, and the number of hours worked in the entire economy has contracted

00:00:39.240 by 15 percent. So 5 million Canadians have already applied for the government's new

00:00:46.000 temporary income support program. That makes up about one in every four workers in the Canadian

00:00:52.160 economy. The tourism and hospitality industries have been hit particularly hard, and this

00:00:57.080 has had a disproportional impact on young workers and low-wage workers. A recent Agnes Reid poll

00:01:04.360 found that 45 percent of Canadians aged 18 to 24 have already been laid off or seen reduced

00:01:11.120 hours. So with so many people out of work, so many young people just desperate to get their

00:01:15.800 foot in the door, desperate to get some work experience, maybe pay off debt or save for their

00:01:20.440 future. It defies logic that the Canadian government is paying these young workers to stay at home and

00:01:26.080 do nothing, while also recruiting temporary foreign workers and seasonal agriculture workers to work

00:01:33.360 in essential jobs in Canada. So the Trudeau government finally announced that they were going to close the

00:01:39.920 Canadian borders on March 16th. This was well after Europe and other countries around the world took

00:01:46.000 similar initiatives to help stop the spread of the coronavirus. On March 20th, Canada expanded that ban to

00:01:53.040 American citizens to basically say only Canadians and permanent residents are allowed to enter the

00:01:58.240 country. But then on March 21st, the government quietly made an exemption for seasonal workers and

00:02:04.720 temporary foreign workers. According to CIC News, which is a newsletter run by Canadian immigration

00:02:10.960 lawyer David Cohen, following the travel ban, quote, industries that relied on temporary foreign workers

00:02:17.600 pressured the government to not disrupt the flow of essential labour to Canada, unquote. And so as a result,

00:02:24.240 exemptions were made for workers in occupations such as agriculture, agri-food, food processing, and trucking.

00:02:33.120 Canada typically welcomes 60,000 seasonal agriculture workers to Canada each year. These workers prep fields,

00:02:40.880 plant seeds, set up irrigation systems, fix farm equipment, prune and trim plants, and so on. And these

00:02:48.320 workers earn a pretty good salary, up to $15 an hour plus room and board. Well, spring is here and farmers

00:02:55.200 are desperate for help during planting season. But the global pandemic, the coronavirus pandemic, is harming

00:03:01.520 Canada's ability to get workers onto farms. Visa offices around the world have been closed, applications for these

00:03:08.640 jobs have dried up. And workers who do get to Canada must wait in self-quarantine for 14 days. And to make

00:03:16.240 matters worse, there was a coronavirus outbreak among temporary foreign workers living at a plant nursery

00:03:22.000 in Kelowna, BC. This has made many people worried about workers bringing the coronavirus disease into Canada,

00:03:28.880 which was the very reason why Canada implemented the travel ban in the first place. You know what?

00:03:35.200 Now is the time for Prime Minister Justin Schroeder to do something useful, to show some leadership,

00:03:40.320 and to create a national work program to match young Canadians with shortages in the labour market.

00:03:47.120 Instead of bringing in foreign workers, thousands of foreign workers to fill these jobs in our farms, 0.99

00:03:52.480 why not learn from our history and help put Canadians to work? During the Great Depression, the federal

00:03:58.720 government created a system of unemployment relief camps, where in exchange for housing, three meals a day,

00:04:04.960 medical care, clothing, and its very modest daily stipend, young men worked up to 44 hours a week,

00:04:11.360 clearing bush, building roads, planting trees, and working construction. The program was not without

00:04:17.360 its flaws, but it successfully employed 170,000 men and gave them a sense of purpose and responsibility

00:04:24.960 during a very difficult time. Justin Trudeau recently told Canadians that they can serve their country

00:04:30.720 by staying at home by staying at home and obeying strict isolation laws. He went so far as to compare

00:04:37.440 our duty to stay at home to the accomplishments of the courageous young soldiers who fought and won at

00:04:44.720 the Battle of Vimy Ridge 103 years ago. Trudeau should instead call on young Canadians to serve their country in

00:04:52.240 a more meaningful way by working to help protect food security in Canada. It would allow these young

00:04:59.200 workers to work hard, to give back, and to feel productive and useful during this incredible time

00:05:05.840 of crisis and great uncertainty.

The Candice Malcolm Show - April 10, 2020

It’s time for the government to put Canadians first

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