OTTAWA—Justin Trudeau is describing the Conservative government’s embattled temporary foreign worker program as “one of the most anti-Alberta federal policies we’ve seen in decades.”

The Liberal leader made the remarks this week in Fort McMurray while campaigning in advance of Monday’s byelection in the heart of oilsands country with candidate Kyle Harrietha.

The comment invites comparisons to Pierre Trudeau’s national energy program, a policy still reviled by Albertans 34 years after it sought to distribute the province’s oil wealth to poorer parts of the country.

In the past, Trudeau has taken pains to distance himself from his father’s energy policies.

In Fort McMurray on Wednesday, he accused the Tories of mishandling the temporary foreign workers file for so long that “they’re now putting in caps that are going to hurt people in Fort McMurray,” a community with low unemployment and a booming economy.

“Bringing in blanket changes the way they have has even got some of the local Conservatives very, very uncomfortable with the way the government has mishandled this file,” he added.

The Conservatives mocked Trudeau’s comments, saying he advocated a moratorium on the entire low-skilled temporary foreign worker stream earlier this year in the House of Commons.

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Alexandra Fortier, spokeswoman for Employment Minister Jason Kenney, said wages in the food services sector in Alberta have not kept pace with other industries.

In Alberta, which has the highest number of temporary foreign workers in the country, median wages have gone up by 31 per cent since 2006 and inflation by 14 per cent, Fortier said in an email.

“However, in the food services sector, a leading user of the temporary foreign worker program, wages have only increased by eight per cent since 2006,” she said.

“These numbers clearly show that the temporary foreign worker program is no longer being used as it was intended to be used — as a last and limited resort to allow employers to bring foreign workers to Canada on a temporary basis to fill jobs for which qualified Canadians are not available.”

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The new changes include a limit on the number of foreign workers that large- and medium-sized companies are permitted to hire, stiffer penalties for companies found to be violating the new rules and on-site audits and inspections to guard against abuse.

Nonetheless, Conservatives are raising alarm bells about last week’s overhaul unveiled by Kenney and Immigration Minister Chris Alexander.

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