The province is looking to help employers meet their workforce needs.
Alberta is lifting restrictions on the hiring of new temporary foreign workers. All pending applications, including those submitted prior to are subject to this change. Prior to the change, the Alberta government had a “refusal to process” list containing occupations for which employers could not submit applications to the Canadian government to hire temporary foreign workers in the province. The Canadian government operates the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP) and was refusing to process TFWP applications for these occupations on the advice of the Alberta government. These were occupations that, according to the Alberta government, had labour surpluses. Alberta was seeking to encourage employers to hire unemployed Albertans for these occupations instead.