Gabriela Ontario Submissions to the Parliament

Gabriela Ontario Submissions to the Parliament

By GABRIELA-Ontario

GABRIELA Ontario is a Toronto-based feminist organization that addresses Filipino women’s issues, rights and welfare, advocating and campaigning for their issues in Canada as well as for their families in the Philippines.

Being part of GABRIELA Philippines, the largest feminist coalition in that country, composed of over a hundred women’s organizations, GABRIELA-Ontario also links Filipino women’s concerns in Canada to the issues of women in the Philippines.

GABRIELA Ontario’s women places the subject of Family Reunification as a central topic in the lives of Filipino women migrant workers, and is a problematic issue linked to both the entrenched exploitation of caregivers in Canada, and to the systematic exploitation of the majority of women in the Philippines.

GABRIELA Ontario’s Research Findings

GABRIELA’s research study (entitled The Gabriela Transitions Experiences Survey or GATES) that delved into the conditions which Filipino caregivers experience as they seek permanent residency had initial findings that were important confirmation of what many migrant workers’ advocates had known for decades. Initial findings from this nationwide research conducted by Ryerson University, York University and GABRIELA-Ontario, and participated in by 631 caregivers, which was released in June 2014, confirmed what many migrant workers’ organizations affiliated with GABRIELA have known from their advocacy and campaign work:

The causes of the increased time-period of family separation

Firstly, despite the Canadian government’s avowed commitment to Family Reunification, the various versions through the years of the federal program for foreign caregivers have only increased the suffering of prolonged separation of caregivers from their families, while working in service of the well-being and economic development of local families.

1a. Due to increased length of processing time of applications. Processing time for permanent residency is getting longer over time. On average, respondents waited about 19 months to receive permanent resident (PR) status, after completing all requirements. However, the processing time seems to be getting longer over the years. LCP immigrants who have been in Canada for more than 10 years waited an average of 15 months, while those who have been in Canada for just 3 to 5 years waited over 21 months.

1b. Due to difficulties during the sponsorship process, it takes a longer time for most caregivers to bring their children to Canada. Inability to pay fees and lack of savings was one source of difficulty. Other sources of difficulty included long waiting times and complicated paperwork.

Women with cases assisted by GABRIELA-Ontario

GABRIELA-Ontario has helped many caregivers whose desires to have their families with them in Canada have been seriously hampered because of human trafficking, or of deceitful employers who take advantage of the ignorance of many caregivers about regulations covering their work, or because of the outright cruelty of some employers whom falsely charge the women (of theft) because the women, whom they have deceived and who therefore, have no status, and want to leave their employ anyway. Unless they first win their cases, attain a work permit, and finally get permanent residency, they cannot hope to reunite with their families.

The vulnerability of these women is complicated by the fact that they have no papers, and because their work permits are tied to a single employer. They are further encumbered by the 4 year-in and 4-year out policy.

GABRIELA is also helping women who are denied permanent residency- and along with her, her whole Family is denied – because of a medically inadmissible family member. They may still have some hope in appealing on human and compassionate grounds, but this definitely increases the length of their separation from their families. Since legal suits are costly, they have to take on several jobs in order to afford the lawyer.

If it is possible for these women to speak before the committee, they would be enthusiastic to relate their stories to the committee.

Summary of Recommendations to resolve problems of caregivers around Family Reunification

As we give our recommendations, we urge the committee and the Canadian government to undertake reforms with compassion and with regard to the framework of experience of women migrant workers. For, in summary of our advocacy work and our researches with them, we find that the treatment of the foreign caregiver by the prevailing system of as commodity; as a worker whose work is racialized, demeaned and ghettoized; and therefore is treated as a worker who deserves no rights to protection in her workplace. The reform we would like to have in place in our immigration laws and regulations and, as well, in our labour laws, is a reform that recognizes and installs the humanity of the caregiver – that she is a person, not a commodity; the racialization of her work must be removed and no temporariness should be attached to it; and finally, that her rights should be protected in any workplace.

Recommendations regarding the government’s plan as outlined in Key Highlights 2017 Immigration Levels Plan:

1. Since it is the plan of government to welcome 300,000 immigrants in 2017, we recommend —-the caregivers total of 18,000 be expanded, and increased because there are more caregivers who would be eligible for permanent residency this coming year, and logically the following needs have to be considered:

a. Need to accommodate those who are already here as caregivers but whose applications are caught in the backlog;

b. Need to accommodate those 13,335 caregivers who, in the last full year of the Harper government (until November 30, 2014) when changes to the program were implemented, had their LMIAs approved (according to Employment and Social Development Canada at http.www.esdc.gc.ca), and accommodating this group alone already cuts down the total to 4,665 persons who can be given Permanent Residency;

c. Need to accommodate the 5500 caregivers from the two streams created by the Harper government

2. We also recommend that the 3,500 total for the Humanitarian & Compassionate and other cases be also be expanded in order to include the caregivers appealing through Humanitarian & Compassionate case

We also submit the following recommendations based on our researches and experience of advocacy for the women:

1. Remove current obstacles in the set of regulations affecting caregiver applications

2. Remove the 4-year-in-and-4-year-out policy.

3. Remove the caps to the different streams of TFWs (2750 for each of the two streams)

4. In particular, remove the creation of two streams in the new Caregiver Program, to which caps are applied.

In conclusion, we also reiterate the following recommendations which our affiliate organizations in Migrante Canada, made in its submission to the recent HUMA review of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program, which we find important for caregivers and other women migrant workers:

Move towards over-arching policy changes

• Restore the vigor of Canada’s commitment to the family reunification policy

i. Remove the restrictions that deprive principal applicants for permanent residency of that desired status because of the medical inadmissibility of one family member.

ii. Make standardized criteria across provinces regarding what makes workers eligible for permanent residency, including clarifying what the grounds are for “medical admissibility”.

• Strengthen the laws to benefit the caregivers’ and other temporary foreign workers’ safety and welfare by synchronizing the federal government and the provincial governments’ policies, rules and regulations relevant to these basic rights of workers.

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Reference:
Petronila Cleto
GATES Research Team
GABRIELA-Ontario
647-985-5969