Canada's auditor general is criticizing the federal government for what he considers a lack of oversight over the way fish processing plants in the Atlantic provinces use the temporary foreign worker program.

In a report this week, Michael Ferguson said the federal government hasn't been doing enough to ensure temporary foreign workers approved for fish plants on the east coast are filling "real labour shortages."

The report says Ottawa "approved applications from employers of fish and seafood processing plants even when it was aware that unemployed Canadians who last worked in a fish and seafood processing plant may have been available" to work in the plants.

Fish plants rely on low-wage TFWs: AG

The report makes general recommendations to improve oversight of the temporary foreign worker program across Canada, but also included a specific review of 34 applications to the program from fish plants.

Lobster processing at Royal Star in Tignish, P.E.I. Manager Francis Morrissey says without access to temporary foreign workers the plant wouldn't have enough staff and would have to shut down. (CBC)

Ferguson said fish and seafood processors in the Atlantic provinces "came to rely heavily on low-wage temporary foreign workers" during years when there was no limit on how many temporary foreign workers a company could be approved for.

He went on to state Ottawa hasn't done the necessary research to determine whether use of temporary foreign workers across all industries has driven down wages for Canadians, or allowed businesses to rely on foreign workers rather than hire locally.

He said government needs to do more to make sure employers in all industries are using temporary foreign workers "only as a last resort."

AG overestimating unemployed?

Francis Morrissey, manager of Royal Star Foods in Tignish, P.E.I., said he believes the auditor general is "massively" overestimating the number of unemployed in the region by including active fish plant workers among those numbers.

"All our workers, including all our fisher's helpers aboard the boats, they all keep their EI claim open when they're working," he explained.

"They're not receiving EI, but their claim is open because they may work for 17-18 weeks, and they may get one week off because of weather or catch or something."

However, a spokesperson for the Office of the Auditor General said in an email to CBC that the report "explicitly states that our review of records of employment considered only workers who had been laid off."

Francoise Guyot quoted paragraph 56 of the report that says, "We examined almost 500 ROEs issued by these plants over a three-year period and found that just over 80 per cent of the Canadians they laid off had claimed EI at the same time as the plants were employing temporary foreign workers."

Morrissey said Royal Star has been approved for 60 temporary foreign workers this year, and is still waiting for about half of them to arrive.

All Industries Seafood Processing Temporary Foreign Worker Approvals, 2016 Newfoundland & Labrador 1741 0 Prince Edward Island 946 444 Nova Scotia 2461 157 New Brunswick 1472 773

(Source: Government of Canada)

Morrissey said the temporary foreign workers work alongside a force of 290 local employees that includes longtime workers over the age of 65 down to high school students working special shifts to accommodate their school calendars.

"We do everything we can to attract workers," Morrissey said. "We run ads year-round, we hire every able-bodied person that's got two legs and two arms that can work here. We actually have some people that are partly handicapped that we find jobs for them here."

Work not for everyone

He said industry wages have risen 25 per cent over the past two years, with wages at Royal Star now starting at $13/hour.

But he said the local labour supply is shrinking, and attempts by fish processors to bus in workers from bigger population centres like Charlottetown and Summerside haven't been successful.

Royal Star Foods manager Francis Morrissey says he thinks Ottawa is overestimating the number of unemployed people in his area. (CBC)

"Some people don't like working in a processing plant," Morrissey said. "Everybody is not geared to be able to stand a 12-hour shift standing on a cement floor."

Without the temporary foreign workers, he said his plant wouldn't be able to handle all the product that can arrive daily during peak season.

"We can't run this facility without enough workers. If we can't operate it efficiently, then the doors shut."

Cap exemption for fish plants extended

In his report Ferguson said measures to reduce the number of temporary foreign workers in the country have been successful overall. In 2016 fish processors lobbied for and were granted a one-year exemption to a cap on the number of positions for which companies can receive approval.

That cap was reinstated by the federal government for the 2017 season.