Poilievre’s call to end the TFWP is a divisive ploy against the working class and immigrant communities in Canada
Magkaisa Centre
Official Statement
October 18, 2025
Toronto, ON – During a news conference on September 3, 2025, Conservative Party Leader Pierre Poilievre called for the scrapping of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP), and blamed the program for driving down wages and taking jobs from Canadian youth. Although Poilievre is quick to clarify that the TFWP is to blame and not the workers under the program themselves, his “Canada First” rhetoric is closely parroting white nationalist ideology that promote closed-border policies to halt further immigration and target workers under the program for deportation once their visas expire. Through Poilievre’s exclusionary proposals to have “more people leaving than coming” in order to address issues in immigration, labour, housing and homelessness, food insecurity etc., Poilievre is in effect placing blame on immigrants and migrants for these issues instead of focusing on the failure of governments in meeting the needs of Canadian society. Poilievre is aiming to punish some of the most marginalized, oppressed and exploited sectors of Canadian society when it is the system of Capitalism and a market-driven government that is responsible for the crises that lead millions in Canada today to a life of insecurity and uncertainty. As progressive Filipino Canadians, we denounce Poilievre and the conservative government’s racist call to deport immigrant and migrant workers in Canada under the pretense of “putting Canadians first”, as well as similar sentiments made by other party leaders including NDP and Liberal parties. As progressives, we refuse to let those in power twist the narrative that the TFWP is in any way a neutral “free for all entry” program in Canada when this program allows for the trafficking, abuse, exploitative work conditions and slave-like wages that thousands experience daily. When we call for the scrapping of the TFWP, we aim to dismantle this exploitative labour program. We stand in solidarity with all workers, which means a demand for permanent legal status of newly arrived workers, for liveable wages for all, and the ability to obtain secure and meaningful employment for all.
The government scapegoating immigrants when they fail to solve or are unwilling to solve domestic issues is not new. Poilievre has no real criticism of the systemic root causes under capitalism and neoliberal policies. Genuine solutions will not come from targeting and dividing workers–Canadian or not. We have to look at the systemic causes deriving from a so-called immigration program that utilize exploitative labour policies and practices. It is a historic fact that the TFWP, a modern day indentured labour policy, lures individuals from impoverished communities from the Global South/Global Majority to alleviate economic and social shortfalls in Canada, i.e. childcare, elderly care, agriculture , manufacturing and construction work. Canada’s affordability problem stems from those in power who fight to keep private profit shares made from Canada’s housing development, food industry and healthcare industry within the wealthy class instead of nationalizing and redistributing the wealth for all in this country to lessen the wealth gap between the poorest and the richest in Canada.
Poilievre does not really want to get rid of the TFWP, as they still want to keep models like the Seasonal Agricultural Worker Program (a stream under the broader TFWP) that create and maintain jobs and precarious working conditions no citizen is willing to take on. Liberal and Conservative parties alike continue to benefit from temporary and disposable foreign workers’ labour and continue to bolster corporations and industries’ ability to keep hiring for cheap and maximize profits. This priority for temporary, low-wage and precarious immigration status for foreign workers is used to claw away workers’ rights and protections, benefits, stability and security, not just for workers under the TFWP but for all workers in Canada. This is the long-standing practice that Poilievre wants to heighten – putting capital first, not Canada.
Both Conservative and Liberal parties and their supporters’ sloganeering “Canada First”, “Canada Strong” and “Canada Proud” embolden white supremacists and far-right nationalist groups. The anti-immigrant rally on September 13, 2025 at Christie Pits Park, Toronto as a prime example, was organized by a racist group known as the Canada First Patriots. Though this group claims to oppose “the chains of corporate profiteering and elitist dominance”, their rally cries are for mass deportation, criminalization of immigrant and migrant workers and asylum seekers, and for “remigration”. Remigration historically stems from the European far-right proposal for ethnic-cleansing through mass deportation of non-white immigrants and their descendants back to their countries of ancestry. They came heavy with bigotry and hate but devoid of any criticism of the Canadian state’s policies that cap wages despite intensifying inflation, routinely participate in union busting, enhance the private sector’s control in healthcare, childcare, and education, and worsen the housing affordability crisis.
Under capitalism, workers bear the brunt of economic hardship: from rising living costs, unaffordable housing, and food insecurity, to a deteriorating and lacking healthcare system. Fascist sentiments and calls that our political leaders are more boldly invoking are not an alternative to the insecurities we face as a society, but a distraction from the onslaught of attacks on the working and underprivileged classes. Like many immigrant communities, Filipinos have been vital in propping up childcare, elderly care, healthcare, agriculture, manufacturing, service sector etc., contributing to Canada’s economy, industries and culture. As part of the working class in Canada, we continue to uphold the working class struggle by helping to build socialism and denounce all forms of facism and national chauvinism as distractions from the root causes of social and economic crises under capitalism. In the spirit of international solidarity, we call for the genuine settlement and integration of all immigrant/migrant workers and their full participation in all aspects of Canadian society.
Long live working-class solidarity!
Scrap the Temporary Foreign Worker Program!
Secure and meaningful employment for all!
No to hate, yes to immigrants!