Q&A: CANADA’S LIVE-IN CAREGIVER PROGRAM
Q How much does Canada need foreign caregivers who work for their own families?
A Since 40 to 70 per cent of Filipino caregivers live with their own sponsoring families in Canada, Vancouver immigration lawyer Richard Kurland says it makes it hard to tell whether a family “is pulling a fast one” and the foreign domestic worker is properly trained or “performing their duties.”
Q Is the LCP a back-door family reunification program?
A Statistics Canada data shows in any given year Canada grants permanent residency to almost
as many dependents of live-in caregivers as to the domestic workers themselves. In 2011 Canada granted permanent residency to more than 11,000 caregivers and their children or spouses. In 2012 the figure was 9,000.
Q Can program be blamed for poor school and workplace performances?
A Numerous studies show the offspring of Filipino immigrants, especially boys, do not perform well in schools across Canada. Researchers place blame on the way Canada’s live-in caregiver program separates children from their mothers. “The average age
of separation is from five or six,” say researchers, “and the average age of reunification is 13 — both tricky ages.”
Q Do Filipino-Canadians rely on taxpayer support?
A Filipinos earn less than Canadians in general, according to a York University study, which says the LCP’s “two-step” approach to immigration has “led to poor economic outcomes for those entering through the program.” Those who come to Canada in conjunction with the LCP, says the study, end up on average receiving more taxpayer support than other Canadians.
Q Does the LCP subsidize affluent families?
A The media have run stories about well-off Canadian couples engaging in “nanny poaching.” Martin Collacott, a spokesman for the Centre for Immigration Policy Reform, says “the relatively small number of affluent Canadians who can afford to bring in live-in caregivers from overseas are being underwritten by taxpayers.”
Q Are live-in caregivers circumventing immigration screening?
A Most immigrants to Canada are admitted based on job skills or potential to invest. But live-in caregivers are babysitters, nannies and seniors helpers, which Immigration Canada ranks as low-skill. They are not eligible to get into Canada through regular immigration categories.
Q How does the LCP affect the Philippines?
A Filipinos who work abroad send home more than $23 billion a year in remittances. “It’s keeping the whole country afloat, even with all its corruption,” says UBC’s Prod Laquian, who arrived in Vancouver in the 1960s when there were fewer than 1,000 Filipinos in Canada.
Q Would an au pair program be more effective?
A An au pair program would offer temporary work to foreign nationals, but lead to better, more regulated working conditions that would lure caregivers from a wider range of countries, including, France, Spain and Ireland, says immigration lawyer Kurland. With better working conditions, Kurland believes more Canadians would choose to become live-in or live-out caregivers. “Wages would have to go up.”