Canada’s Liberal government is giving Service Canada search and seizure powers to protect “the most vulnerable workers.”
The government department, best known for administrating Canada’s employment insurance program, is currently in the news for asking its employees to avoid any use of non-gender inclusive language like “mother” or “father.” It is also responsible for procuring and monitoring temporary foreign workers — most of whom work at Canadian farms because the jobs don’t appeal to locals.
The policy was funded in the federal budget last month and promoted as means of ensuring that temporary foreign workers are not being mistreated. “We are committed to ensuring the protection of the most vulnerable workers,” the email begins.
But the details were only explained in a Feb. 14 email from Service Canada to affected users of the temporary foreign worker program. The email was obtained by The Daily Caller.
The email warns that a Service Canada inspection can occur for a variety of reasons but farmers might be “chosen through random selection.”
Once Service Canada agents have arrived on-scene, they are allowed to enter the premises without a court-authorized warrant, and “use any copying equipment that is on the premises to make copies of documents…to take photographs and/or video or make audio recordings…examine anything on the premises…to use any computer or other electronic device on the premises [and] to examine any relevant document(s) stored on the device…”
The agents are also allowed to bring “a third party” to the inspection, which is not defined in the email.
Farmers found “non-compliant as a result of an inspection” could find themselves facing fines “up to a maximum of $1 million over one year” or “a ban of one, two, five or ten years” from using the program.
Liberal Employment Minister Patty Hajdu said Thursday that the policy is legal.
“It is legal. They [Service Canada agents] have the authority to do it. They [the farmers] have a choice. They can choose to use the temporary foreign worker program or not,” Hajdu told iPolitics.