{"id":126588,"date":"2025-09-07T12:56:08","date_gmt":"2025-09-07T12:56:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/126588\/"},"modified":"2025-09-07T12:56:08","modified_gmt":"2025-09-07T12:56:08","slug":"owners-of-wendys-a-sushi-shop-and-tahinis-on-ending-temporary-foreign-worker-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/126588\/","title":{"rendered":"Owners of Wendy’s, a sushi shop and Tahini’s on ending temporary foreign worker program"},"content":{"rendered":"

Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre is pushing to scrap the temporary foreign worker\u00a0program, but some business owners in the London area say ending the program outright is not the answer.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Canadian businesses in some sectors are currently eligible to hire foreign workers, if they can show that no Canadian citizen or permanent resident is willing or able to do the job.<\/p>\n

The program peaked last year at around 190,000 work permit holders, but just over 33,000\u00a0new temporary foreign workers have arrived since January, after the federal government put new restrictions on the program.<\/p>\n

Poilievre\u00a0called\u00a0on Ottawa\u00a0this week to axe the program entirely, saying the labour market is flooded with cheap labour that makes it harder for young Canadians to find work. He also proposed creating a new program specifically for agricultural businesses facing a shortage of workers, despite Canada already running a separate immigration stream for farm workers.<\/p>\n

“I agree with Mr. Poilievre. We should not be ever putting somebody into a job where a Canadian youth could be getting it,” Joe Preston, the mayor of St. Thomas and former Conservative Member of Parliament, said.\u00a0 “But I’m not sure that we can be absolute on something like TFWs.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"St.“I agree with Mr. Poilievre, we should not be ever putting somebody into a job where a Canadian youth could be getting it,” Joe Preston said.\u00a0 “But I’m not sure that we can be absolute on something like TFWs.” (City of St. Thomas website)<\/p>\n

Preston owns a Wendy’s franchise, and is currently in the process of opening two more. He said he’s\u00a0never hired a worker through the program, instead he finds ways to retain his current employees.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Sometimes it means offering wages that are slightly higher, offering benefits and other things to make you more of the employer of choice,” he said.<\/p>\n

Preston admits, in his role as mayor,\u00a0that he’s seen how the temporary foreign worker program has its place in some sectors. He said he would still like to see companies training Canadians to do the\u00a0jobs to fill the need.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Some restaurants more dependent on foreign labour<\/p>\n

While farm and greenhouse workers are the most common jobs for foreign workers in the program, fast food chains and restaurants are\u00a0a major source of demand<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Right now, the restaurant industry is dominated by a lot of foreign workers,” Omar Hamam, CEO of the London-based chain\u00a0Tahini’s, said.<\/p>\n

Tahini’s, like many fast-food businesses, hires\u00a0foreign labour, Hamam explained, and he believes restaurants would struggle without them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"OmarOmar Hamam is the owner of Tahini’s, a London-based shawarma chain. (Kate Dubinski\/CBC)<\/p>\n

The same sentiment was expressed by business owners running specialized restaurants where\u00a0filling jobs with domestic labour can be especially tricky.<\/p>\n

Sushi chefs, for example, are few and far between in Canada, according to Di Shao, owner of Sushi Galore. Shao often hires local workers for front-of-house jobs, like serving, but the kitchen staff who prepare the sushi are\u00a0often hired through the temporary foreign workers program.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Shao\u00a0said he’s even hired and trained local workers for these jobs when there were applicants, but they tended to give up and quit after the first few weeks.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Afternoon DriveShould Canada scrap the temporary foreign workers program?<\/p>\n

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has proposed an end to the temporary foreign workers program. St. Thomas Mayor Joe Preston shares what role he thinks the program should and shouldn’t play in the current labour landscape.<\/p>\n

“They know it’s not an easy job, it’s very tiring,” he said. “They would rather go be a server and make extra money from tips than work in the kitchen.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Increasing wages to attract workers is not an option either, he said, explaining that between minimum wage increases, rising food costs and other operating expenses, restaurants are struggling.<\/p>\n

“Even though people feel like it’s not enough because the price of everything is going up, honestly, for small businesses, it’s been kind of maxed.”\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre is pushing to scrap the temporary foreign worker\u00a0program, but some business owners in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":126589,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-126588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126588\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/126589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}