Immigrants may Go through a Lot of Trouble When They Come to Canada: Not even the Minimum Wage.

     Many Canadians and Americans often think that immigrants from other countries come to North America and abuse the system, doing all sorts of illegal things. This is a very common belief among North Americans. However, some employers use the vulnerability of an immigrant’s situation to take advantage. Indeed. I heard about two cases that just broke my heart. The first case is about a young man from Palestine who studied Psychology in Edmonton, Canada and things went well with him. When he finished his studies, he got a work permit to work with a company. Unfortunately, the first job did not go well and he had to leave the company with two of his colleagues. The three of them decided to start a business and invested specific money in the project. The Palestinian man did not have any money so he took 20 thousand dollars from his two credit cards and gave it to the one who came up with the idea. The business partner said that the amount is not significant compared to what the two others put in the project; still, he accepted the amount. The Palestinian man waited for more than one year without any pay while he was doing the job for his business partner. He invested a lot of energy and time to put the project into place even though he was struggling financially. Unfortunately, the young man never received his money back because his business partner never gave him proof that he took this amount from him; meanwhile Immigration and Canada refused the permanent residency of the Palestinian man because he changed his job. He had to stick to the same job to get his residency.
The business partner is still promising the Palestinian man to give him back his money, but the Palestinian man had to go back to his country to work and pay his debt because the interest is getting higher and higher. What can be done in this situation? I really do not know. A counselor from the Church wanted to help the Palestinian man to get his money back and talked to the business partner on the phone. He, through, the Palestinian man, threatened her (if she did not mind her own business). The Palestinian man, instead of getting his permanent residency, he went back to his country 20 thousand dollars in debt because he followed the laws of Immigration and Canada and did not ask for cash (immigrants who do not have a work permit do not have the right to get paid).
His business partner has peace of mind because the Palestinian man left the country; the counselor said that she cannot help the Palestinian man anymore because he left Canada. While the Palestinian young man is working day and night to pay his credit card debt, his former business partner is profiting from his money. I do not think that the business partner had planned to steal from the Palestinian man, but the course of circumstances led to this situation. The Palestinian man wanted to find a solution for his situation in Canada, that’s why he made a very quick decision and invest money in a business he does not know a lot about.
I think Immigration and Canada is making things difficult for immigrants who are willing to work hard and make a difference in this country. The procedure of Labor Market Opinion might be protecting the Canadian labor but at the same time it is helping greedy businessmen to get free labor. Another lady had to go through Labor Market Opinion as well and she said that her employer asked her to volunteer until she gets her work permit. She volunteered for 3 months, but one week before she gets her work permit and started finally getting a salary, her employer realized that there is no advantage in keeping her anymore, especially that Labor Market Opinion is asking for the minimum wage of 14 dollars an hour. The employer did not sign her final paper and she had to leave the company and went to a different employer she thought she could trust but he did the same tactic as the former employer. This lady said that she had to put money from her own pocket to go to work every day with all the expenses she already had. She was afraid to ask for cash because it is against the laws of Immigration and Canada and the two employers were delighted to know that it is illegal to give any money to someone who does not have the right to work in Canada. The laws if immigration served their purpose in making more money. Even though she was volunteering, the lady said, the two employers were very demanding and tried to make her work as much as she could stand. Who cares? They don’t have to pay for extra hours either and she could not say no because she wanted her papers to go through. I asked why she didn’t wait until she got her work permit, but the answer was that the two employers needed her right away and it was the only way to assure her position; otherwise they would have looked for someone else. Both the Palestinian man and this lady for North Africa said almost the same thing: “apart from losing a huge amount of money, what is harder is the feeling of being exploited and cheated upon by insensitive greedy businessmen. Not even the minimum wages as in the industrial era of the 18th century. At least employers in these days paid their workers the minimum wages to let them survive”.
The least we can do for immigrants who experienced the same dilemma is to reveal the truth until justice is done. Employers like these should not get away with this in a country that respects human rights. And if their conscience is not bothering them, mine is bothering me for not doing something about it.

Lilia Warunky