Toronto Star quotes Garcia on foreign temporary workers

Toronto Star quotes Garcia on foreign temporary workers

TORONTO – The Philippine Reporter editor Hermie Garcia  was quoted in the Toronto Star story “Immigrant groups have high hopes for minister,” published Saturday, Nov. 1, 2008.

Garcia was among five media and community leaders who were quoted in the paper’s main section article about the recent appointment of Jason Kenney as immigration minister by the Stephen Harper government.

Toronto Star quoted Garcia, as follows: “What we are concerned with is the policy of the federal government under Harper of taking in a big number of temporary foreign workers… In a lot of cases, these workers work under wages that are very much below the common standard in Canada.  Their working conditions and living conditions are very substandard too.  This is a shabby way of treating foreign workers.”

Garcia was further quoted in the same article, “If Jason Kenney would like to have an impact on the immigrant population, he should be able to make real significant changes” for temporary foreign workers.

The Toronto Star article, authored by Lesley Ciarula Taylor and Nicholas Keung, cited Kenney’s previous role as secretary of state for multiculturalism as one where he “was omnipresent at ethnocultural events and instrumental in redressing Canada’s historical wrongs to various minority groups…”

The authors noted that there was some optimism that Kenney “will address their concerns over what they see as a dramatic shift in immigration policies that increasingly view newcomers as an economic unit, wanted for nothing more than their job skills.”

The article had specifically noted that Kenney “is a familiar face to Canada’s growing Filipino community,” having graced community events, among them, the Mabuhay Festival where he had shared the stage with live-in-caregiver Juana Tejada. Tejada was first denied to apply for permanent residency after her two years of live-in service only because she had cancer, but that decision was overturned by Canada Immigration after a strong protest from the Filipino and other communities.

Others  quoted in the same article were Victor Wong, executive director of the Chinese Canadian National Council; Thomas Saras, president of the National Ethnic Press and Media Council of Canada; Sima Sahar Zerehi, an organizer of the grassroots campaign against the immigration changes; and Janet Dench of the Canadian Council for Refugees.