44% of Canadians Want to End Temporary Foreign Worker Program, 30% Disagree: Poll

A worker is seen at a food court quick service restaurant in a mall in Montreal on Dec. 2, 2024. The Canadian Press/Christinne Muschi

Canadians are divided on whether Ottawa should eliminate its temporary foreign worker program, although the scales tip in favour of scrapping the program, a new survey suggests.

Forty-four percent of Canadians said they support a recent proposal by Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre to phase out the temporary foreign worker program (TFWP) while 30 percent are opposed to such a move, results of a survey released by Abacus Data on Sept. 8 indicated. An additional 18 percent of those polled said they were either neutral or undecided on the subject.

Younger Canadians and Prairie residents were more likely to support terminating the program, while older groups and Quebec residents were more likely to oppose its elimination.

Support for eliminating the TFWP stands at 50 percent among Canadians aged 30 to 44 and at 48 percent for those in the 18-to-29 age bracket, pointing to anxieties around wages, job opportunities, and affordability, Abacus Data CEO David Coletto noted in the report.

Support levels decrease among older Canadians, with just 37 percent of those 60 and older in favour of the proposal, suggesting heightened worries about workforce stability and economic disruption, the report said.

Regional divides are also evident, the survey indicated. Support stands at 54 percent in Alberta and 49 percent in Saskatchewan/Manitoba, with Ontario not far behind at 48 percent. The proposal garnered 43 percent support among B.C. residents, which was closely trailed by the Atlantic provinces at 42 percent.

Only 34 percent of Quebec’s residents support the program’s elimination, making it the province with the strongest opposition.

The data indicates a political divide as well. Sixty-one percent of Conservative voters support removal of the TFWP, which is in line with the views of the party leadership. Only 17 percent are opposed.

NDP support sits at 28 percent while just 19 percent of Bloc Québécois voters were in favour of eliminating the program.

Meanwhile, among Liberal voters the “fault lines deepen,” Coletto said in a Sept. 8 blog post. Liberal support for Poilievre’s suggestion stands at 37 percent while 39 percent are against it, a scenario he describes as “a big wedge right through the Liberal coalition.”

“For Prime Minister Mark Carney’s Liberals, this data injects a complex challenge into the electoral equation,” he said. “With their own supporters deeply split, Carney’s Liberals must navigate between addressing economic vulnerabilities and maintaining labour market stability. Any move risks alienating one half of their fractured base.”

Call for Change

Poilievre called on the federal government last week to permanently end the temporary foreign worker program, describing it as an “exploitative system” that has allowed corporations to bypass Canadian workers so they can pay less to newcomers.

Poilievre told reporters at a Sept. 3 press conference that nearly 75 percent of temporary foreign workers (TFWs) are coming into Canada for low-wage positions, “which means they compete with working class and young people that ultimately drive down wages and drive away jobs.”

TFWs are non-permanent residents with employment income in Canada who may hold permits for work, study, or other purposes, Statistics Canada explains.

The Conservative proposal suggests that no additional TFW permits should be issued to any new workers entering Canada until the program is “entirely eliminated,” with those jobs being redirected to Canada’s youth instead. Poilievre said a separate, standalone program should be created for “legitimately difficult-to-fill” agricultural labour.

Poilievre said that Canada’s young people are the first generation unable to afford a home and that they have the worst unemployment rates of any demographic since the 1990s, excluding the pandemic.

B.C. Premier David Eby expressed a similar stance during a Sept. 4 press conference, where he urged Ottawa to end the temporary foreign worker program, saying it is linked to “unacceptably high” levels of youth unemployment.

Government statistics pointed to high youth unemployment during the summer months with a 14.6 percent unemployment rate for Canadians aged 15 to 24 in July. That is 7.7 percentage points higher than the country’s overall unemployment rate of 6.9 percent that month, Statistics Canada reported.

Eby said youth unemployment is not the only issue, however, noting that it also impacts critical infrastructure, such as housing and schools, and strains social programs.

“The temporary foreign worker program is not working. It should be cancelled or significantly reformed,” Eby said. “We can’t have an immigration system that fills up our homeless shelters and our food banks. We can’t have an immigration system that outpaces our ability to build schools and housing.”

Carney told reporters last week that the government will be discussing the role of the program and how well it is operating. He said the Liberal government has already implemented policies to ensure the overall level of immigration declines, and noted that TFWs make up a small proportion of immigration.

The federal government in August and September 2024 announced its plans to reduce the number of TFWs from 6.8 percent of Canada’s population to 5 percent over the next three years. Its 2025-27 Immigration Levels Plan, released in October 2024, said Ottawa is reducing the share of temporary residents overall to 5 percent of the total population by the end of 2026.

Carney said businesses in Canada, particularly in Quebec, placed their ability to acquire TFWs as their second concern behind U.S. tariffs.

“So we can’t just erase this program,” he said. “But we can definitely improve it as a whole.”