Atlantic Canada can lose workers under Carney's immigration target, says restaurant group
Worker shortage could hurt businesses just as the tourism season starts, says Restaurants Canada
A restaurant industry group is sounding the alarm about how immigration cuts are affecting its members on P.E.I. and across Atlantic Canada.
Prime Minister Mark Carney, at his first press conference following the April 28 federal election, pledged to cap the total number of temporary workers and international students to less than five per cent of Canada's population by the end of 2027. Carney is sticking to the targets set by the Justin Trudeau government late last year.
P.E.I.'s immigration targets were already slashed earlier this year, with the federal government reducing the Island's 2025 allocation under both the Provincial Nominee Program and the Atlantic Immigration Program by half.
That would cut the number of newcomers the province can nominate for permanent residency in Canada by half, down to 1,025. That decision came after the province voluntarily reduced its own nominations last year, issuing just 1,590 out of its allocation of 2,050.
Janick Cormier, Restaurants Canada's vice-president for Atlantic Canada, said these cuts will significantly impact the food service industry in the region, especially as the busy tourism season begins.
"We've been tapping into foreign migrants to staff our restaurants across the Island, across Atlantic Canada frankly, to keep our doors open. So without access to foreign labour, or with an extremely reduced access in the case of P.E.I., we will have to make some difficult decisions," Cormier told CBC's Island Morning.
"I can see restaurants opening later, closing earlier, closing entirely for certain days of the week, for example, to... try to keep their doors open, but without staff, it's hard to keep the same amount of service that we're used to."
Demographic and pandemic effects
Cormier said restaurants in the Atlantic region depend on foreign labour for two main reasons.
The first is the impact of the pandemic, during which the industry saw a lot of instability due to repeated closures and capacity restrictions.
"The employees who were in the industry when the pandemic hit, a lot of them found employment elsewhere because they needed steady income," she said.
Then there's the region's demographic landscape.
"In Atlantic Canada, our population is older. It's smaller. There's a reason people refer to our communities as retirement communities, but the people who live here still want to have access to all the services they're used to," she said.
"To be able to have all of these services, we've been having to tap into foreign labour, bring people in to do these kinds of jobs, simply [because] our population is retiring and just no longer on the labour market."
'The human element'
Cormier said the immigration cuts not only impact the industry but also affect the workers who suddenly find their path to permanent residency is no longer available.
On P.E.I., both major immigration streams are essentially inaccessible to foreign workers in the restaurant industry.
This year, the province has limited applications to the Atlantic Immigration Program to workers in just three priority sectors — health care, construction and manufacturing. And for the Provincial Nominee Program, people working in the service sector may not receive an invitation to apply, according to the province's website.
Cormier said she's heard "heartbreaking" stories of immigrants working in the restaurant industry who, unable to find a permanent residency pathway, did not have their work permits renewed and have to leave Canada.
"We talk a lot about statistics and numbers, and you know, Carney talks about five per cent, but that five per cent represents human beings," she said.
"They came here thinking they're building their lives in this country, and the government just reverses course and they'd have to go back home. So it's pretty devastating, the human element to this."
With files from Island Morning