Foreign migrant workers are integral to Canada’s economic and social fabric. This became obvious when the pandemic threatened both Canadian food security and the lives of migrant workers, who put themselves on the line to help safeguard Canadians who are at a high risk of dying from COVID-19.

The vulnerability of workers was also laid bare when cramped working and living conditions exposed thousands of them to the virus, and Canada’s Temporary Foreign Worker Program failed to guarantee them access to health care and other benefits.

At the start of the pandemic, several federal departments and provincial ministries scrambled to respond with short-term solutions that did little to protect workers or contain COVID’s spread.
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