LMIA Explained: How to Get a Labour Market Impact Assessment

Alisha Khan
[Published 11 Jul, 2022 | 05:53 PM]
About Author - 4 min read
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If no Canadian citizen or permanent resident is prepared, willing, or qualified to fill a particular post in Canada, the business is permitted to engage a foreign worker according to Canada LMIA procedure. Employers must interview individuals who are Canadian citizens or permanent residents and advertise the position for at least four weeks in order to receive an LMIA. The company may be permitted to recruit a foreign worker only after showing that the interviewees did not meet the requirements of the job description. Before starting employment in Canada, the worker must next submit an application for a work permit that is endorsed by the LMIA.

Applications for LMIAs are comprehensive and necessitate extensive documentation and statistical tabulation. Examples include a breakdown in numbers of the number of Canadians who applied for the post, the quantity of job offers given, and the quantity of unqualified candidates. Employers are required to explain in writing why any Canadian who was rejected for a position was unqualified for it. Work permit streams that are LMIA-exempt fall within the International Mobility Program, though not all work permit kinds do.

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High Wage Workers

In order to demonstrate that they are taking steps to gradually lessen their dependency on temporary foreign workers, employers looking to hire high-wage workers must submit transition plans with their LMIA applications. Employers can demonstrate this by hiring Canadian apprentices or providing evidence of investment in skill training. As an alternative, firms can show how they are helping their highly skilled temporary foreign workers immigrate permanently to Canada. The employer will have to provide an update on the status of the transition plan they submitted if they are selected for an inspection or if they request to renew their LMIA.

The transition plans are created to make sure that firms who are looking for foreign labor are accomplishing the goals of the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP). This means that companies are only employing the TFWP as a very last resort to fill temporary labour shortages when there are no qualified Canadians available, guaranteeing that Canadians get the first crack at open positions.

Low Wage Workers

Transition plans are not required to be submitted with a Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) application from employers looking to hire low-wage workers. But they have to adhere to a distinct set of rules. The Canadian government has instituted a limitation to restrict the number of low-wage temporary foreign employees that a company can hire in order to guarantee that Canadians are always given preference for open positions under the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP). Additionally, processing of the LMIA may be denied for some low-wage jobs. The percentage of low-wage temporary foreign workers who may work for an employer who has 10 or more employees may not exceed 20% of their total workforce.

The most recent findings from the Labour Force Survey are used by the TFWP to calculate the unemployment rates across Canada. Employers can file Labour Market Impact Assessments (LMIAs) for low-wage/lower-skilled employment in the Accommodation and Food Services sector and the Retail Trade sector in regions that meet certain rates. In economic regions with an unemployment rate of 6% or above, LMIA applications for these sectors won't be processed.

What are the employer's advertising requirements?

Employers must pay a processing fee of $1,000 CDN for each request for a labour market impact assessment if they want to hire a temporary foreign worker in Canada. Unless the business can demonstrate that another language is otherwise required for the employment, only English and French may be listed as language requirements in LMIAs and job vacancy advertisements.

Additionally, before submitting an application for an LMIA, firms must post all open positions across the Canadian labour market for at least four weeks. To that end, companies must demonstrate that they have employed at least two additional recruitment strategies in addition to placing an ad on the Canada Job Bank. Employers must concentrate their advertising efforts on underrepresented Canadian demographics, such as First Nations people or those with impairments. Employers must certify that they are aware of the prohibition against terminating or reducing the hours of Canadian employees who hold the same position(s) as the temporary foreign worker(s) employed by the company.

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