Labour Market Impact Assessment is an essential condition for Canadian employers if they seek to recruit foreign national workers.
Canadian employers compulsorily provide an LMIA, a document to hire temporary foreign workers under the Temporary Foreign Worker Program. The TFWP is a gateway for foreign nationals to gain employment to confront the labor shortage challenges. However, this program is a quick way to accomplish the mission of bridging the existing gap in the Canadian labor market. Employers in Canada resort to this program to temporarily recruit employees from foreign countries, mainly when there is a lack of appropriate and eligible Canadians to fill the job vacancies. Therefore, Canadian employers need to demonstrate that their act of hiring a foreign worker will in no way impact the country negatively. On the contrary, they will have to ensure that the foreign worker they’re about to hire will positively or probably neutrally impact the Canadian labor market.
Most importantly, Canada must work on maintaining a solid group of the naturalized labor force. As a result, LMIAs will prove beneficial in accomplishing the goal of reducing the labor market gap significantly.
Labour Market Impact Assessment and its chief points
The Labour Market Impact Assessment procedure involves a few essential factors that play a significant role.
Therefore, Canadian employers must provide the following as part of the LMIA procedure:
- That no capable and eligible Canadian candidate has been overlooked to hire a foreign worker.
- The recruited foreign national will receive the employee salary and benefits meeting the provincial and federal guidelines.
- They must also demonstrate their efforts in searching for the right Canadian candidate or a permanent residency holder before they decide to recruit a foreign worker.
LMIAs are not as easy to get as they might initially appear. Simply put, Canadian employers cannot proceed to apply for an LMIA right after having a vacant job position. Before they apply for an LMIA, they must ensure to advertise the job position on public platforms for at least four weeks. Apart from this, he must use at least three different methods of promoting the job position. Among the three job recruitment methods, Canada Job Bank is a mandatory one.
Labour Market Impact Assessment- the variation in the process
The variation in the LMIA process revolves around the foreign worker the Canadian employer might be seeking to hire. The variation is the classification of the foreign worker as a low-wage worker or a high-wage worker. The transition plan involved in these two classifications is one requirement that determines the status of these workers.
LMIA requirement for High-wage employees
Suppose a Canadian employer looks forward to hiring a high-wage employee from a foreign country; he must provide a transition plan. A high-wage employee indicates that he will receive the wage according to the average provincial or territorial salary standard.
The requirement for a transition plan is an initiative by the Canadian government to reduce its dependency on foreign workers. Moreover, this plan also ensures that the employers in Canada align perfectly with the goals and objectives of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program. Apart from this, the Canadian government gives priority to Canadian citizens and permanent residents. Therefore, the transition plans are only used to ensure TFWPs is used in a restricted manner without overreaching their capacity. They must be the last alternative for Canadian employers to fill vacant positions.
Low-wage employees- LMIA process
Contrarily, there is no requirement for a transition plan for low-wage workers who will receive lower wages per the average provincial or territorial standard. Instead of a transition plan, the Canadian government has provided a chance to employ only a limited number of TFWP workers. This is an effort on behalf of the government to prohibit Canadian employers from exploiting the Temporary Foreign Worker Program. Suppose a company has ten or more employees; the percentage of low-wage workers in that company accounts for no more than 20 percent. Overall, all occupations involving low-wage employees don’t become eligible for the LMIA process.
However, employers will have to fulfill the following conditions (excluding the transition plan) to recruit workers working at low wages:
- Round-trip payment for the worker’s transportation.
- Availability of less expensive housing.
- Providing finances for their health insurance until they gain eligibility for provincial healthcare.
- Ensure that the TFWP worker is registered with the workplace safety board of the province or territory.
- Having a contract between the employer and employee.
