According to Phil Jost, a senior executive and physician recruiter with CanAm Physician Recruitment Inc., recent changes by Customs and Immigration Canada and Service Canada to policies governing the Temporary Foreign Worker (TFW) program may be contributing to unintended and detrimental recruitment outcomes of much needed #physician resources to hospitals, medical clinics and rural health regions across Canada.
When first announced by the government, the changes to the #TFW program were to be directed at preventing the activities of unscrupulous recruiters and Canadian employers from abusing the TFW Program by bringing in large numbers of unskilled temporary foreign workers to work in low skilled resource based industries, such as forestry, agriculture, fish processing, etc. – and displacing qualified unemployed Canadian workers.
To correct this problem the federal government brought in sweeping changes to the TFW program that effectively, and abruptly, stemmed the flow of both low-skilled and high-skilled foreign workers into Canada. According to sources in the immigration law industry, applications for TFWs dropped within weeks by a whopping 74%!
Unfortunately, since these government changes also included high-skilled workers, the flow of needed foreign physicians into Canada has also been seriously compromised. Consequently, communities across Canada must now wait much longer for the arrival of needed physician specialists, including Family Practitioners, Anaesthetists, Obstetrics/Gynecologists, Pediatricians, Surgeons, Emergency Physicians, Oncologists, to name a few….
The recruitment staff of hospitals, medical clinics and rural health regions quickly became overwhelmed when faced with a 300% increase in application fees, large unexpected immigration legal fees, onerous increases in paper work, and a very high applicant rejection rate by apparent over-zealous Service Canada agents.
The inability by #healthcare provider organizations to cope with these arduous government changes has severely taxed their existing in-house recruitment resources, thus compromising their ability to attract Canadian and/or foreign medical graduates. Consequently, employers are forced to cope with increased closures of rural Emergency Departments, delayed elective and urgent surgeries, expectant mothers forced travel greater distances to referral hospitals to obtain maternity care, and cancer patients waiting longer for much needed diagnosis and treatment.
Subsequently, CanAm is experiencing a marked increase in new clients, and increasing demand from our existing clients desperate for solutions to bring some semblance of stability to their community’s physician resources. In response, CanAm is redoubling the efforts of our physician recruitment professionals and certified immigration affiliates to help our Clients to recruit available Canadian physicians, and if necessary, navigate the increased complexities of the revamped government TFW program to expedite the recruitment of foreign physicians.
For hospitals, medical clinics and provincial health regions that have not had to recruit foreign trained physicians since the recent sweeping government changes, a summary of the changes is as follows:
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Government Policy Changes to the Temporary Foreign Worker Program |
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| 1 | Employers must now post at least 3 mainstream Physician Job Ads |
| – 1 ad on the Service Canada online Job Bank or a Service Canada approved provincial website, and the ad must be renewed monthly until the MD vacancy is filled. | |
| – The other 2 ads must be on media resources ‘acceptable’ to Service Canada, and at the employer’s expense | |
| – All ads must run continuously, and unchanged for at least 30 days before an application can be started for a Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA), (formerly known as a Labour Market Opinion (LMO)), which is required for approval to apply to the TFW program to hire a physician. | |
| – All ads must contain a strict minimum list of prescribed job information details. | |
| – Failure to meet the above criteria can lead to rejection of the TFW application. | |
| 2 | Employers can then apply for the LMIA and pay the fee of $1000 (formerly $250) |
| – Due to the increased complexity of the new LMIA, and increased incidence of application rejection, the employer is now compelled to hire the services of a certified immigration specialist at industry costs of up to $4500 per application. | |
| – The LMIA also requires the inclusion a Transition Plan outlining the applicant’s plans to minimize their dependency on foreign physicians in the future. | |
| – Depending on status of Service Canada’s the processing system, approval time can range from 2 weeks to 2 months. | |
| 3 | Upon successful completion of the above 2 requirements, the foreign physician is finally approved to apply to Customs and Immigration Canada for approval of a Work Permit in the employer’s place of business. Depending on the foreign physician’s visa status and the efficiency of their certified immigration professional, approval of the Work Permit can range from a few weeks, to several months. |
In summary, we are predicting that without immediate mitigating government policy changes, other countless hospitals, rural health regions, and both urban and rural medical clinics will soon experience physician recruitment hardship. In many cases, the delivery of safe and continuous delivery of critically needed physician services will erode to unprecedented levels.
Readers of this Blog are encouraged to respond with their stories related to this topic…
By Phil Jost, Vice President and Regional Manager, CanAm Physician Recruiting Inc. – phil@canamrecruiting.ca
