withabix

This time it's CLAC mouthing off...

Canadians expose foreign worker 'mess' in oilsands - Edmonton - CBC News

I'm sorry but Canadian construction safety standards and practices are generally considerably lower than those in Europe. Even Italy/Spain/Portugal.

Canadian safety standards are quite good on things that will kill you slowly or affect you later in life (silica, asbestos etc), but are pretty poor in terms of things that will kill or maim you NOW.

I LOL'd at the little-known visa option called an "intra company transfer." comment. Little known to CLAC maybe. Maybe CLAC knows very little about anything....

Most of the comments to the story are the usual crap too....

Shirtback

"A foreign worker took a blowtorch to a propane tank to defrost it..."

Yeah. Right. A *Canadian* tried to show me that little trick. Science, & common sense dumbfounded him.

Bad journalism. Xenophobia.

Are there problems? Hell yes! Are they all the fault of temporary - gasp - foreign - workers? Meh.

S

ExKiwilass

Im glad they are going to investigate saipem.

ExKiwilass

Also, Albertan safely standards are arguably much better than those in bc. There aren't Canadian safety standards per se. I do not understand why this company would be hiring tfw over unemployed Canadians.

scrubbedexpat091

As long as there are Canadians struggling to find work, temporary foreign workers will not be well liked by the general public.

FlyingDutchman6666

Because an indentured servant works harder, asks fewer questions, when told to jump asks "how high" ?

sharkus

Little known. Oh that's amusing. I knew about it in 2003 when I used it to come over to work in our Toronto area office, and I worked for a very small company, so I'm sure that large oil companies sure as heck know about it.

As of why they would use it, umm, cheap and willing labor.

dishwashing

Exactly my thought although quality and journalism don't go together AFA I see.

It looks like a training and OH&S issue, why are they linking this to the TFW issue. If someone is not trained or is ignoring safety violations, manage it.

tweed_wearer

I do not understand the Canadian duality about immigrants. All this talk of attracting new talent and needing a workforce then imposing a Canadian experience barrier in the workplace and the scandal around tfws. Don't make me laugh, imagine if they had the position we had with every soul in a country as poor as Romania able to come, settle, apply for benefits and without the ability to throw them out afterwards if they don't work or commit an offence.

Siouxie

Isn't that why a lot of people want to move to Canada?

dishwashing

I think the UK benefits are much more generous, and hey everyone loves our POUND

scrubbedexpat091

Can't say for sure it's related to TFW restrictions, but good chance it is.

Since the tfw rules and restrictions have gone into effect, the local Tim's wages have been steadily increasing where before they always advertised min. wage, but now the starting wage is 11/hr, something tells me since they can't obtain tfw's like before, they have had to raise the wage to try and attract local workers.

scrubbedexpat133

Maybe if the locals turned up on time and actually worked when they got there, their own bosses might be a bit keener on hiring them?

Lychee

Reminds me of Kate Beaton's 5-part comic, "Ducks", about working at the oilsands in Fort McMurray.


A worthy read if you can spare 5 minutes: http://beatonna.tumblr.com/post/8199...alled-ducks-in

scrubbedexpat091

Whose to say locals wont? Can't fault people for not working for 10.25/hr when its not sufficient to even rent housing.

Does show companies were paying below market wages and using TFW's to be cheap, now that they can't use TFW's as easily, funny how wages are increasing.