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When Ontario’s Bill 149 took effect on Jan. 1, making it illegal for employers to require Canadian experience in job postings, it wasn’t the first attempt to stop organizations from weeding out foreign applicants. And critics of the legislation worry it won’t be the last.
The bill, also known as Ontario’s Working for Workers Four Act, updates the Employment Standards Act to include new rules on pay transparency, using artificial intelligence and requirements for unsuccessful candidate follow-up.
It also outlaws “any requirements related to Canadian experience,” acknowledging the barriers newcomers face when seeking to join the Canadian workforce – some of which are perpetuated by employer requirements for prior domestic work experience.
The common candidate-screening question, was already in direct violation of Ontario’s Human Rights Code, which banned “the Canadian experience barrier” in 2013.
“It’s a catch-22, where you need Canadian experience to get Canadian experience,” says Caren Colaco, a PhD candidate at the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto.
As the bill was being debated in 2024, Ms. Colaco, along with her research partners, interviewed 60 recruiters and 113 immigrant job applicants about why they thought that question was included in job postings.
“On the one hand, [immigrant job seekers] thought it was just technical knowledge, like if you were a doctor in India, you needed to be trained to Canadian standards, so it was considered a certification issue,” she says. “When we talked to recruiters, they essentially said they look at Canadian work experience for professionalism and etiquette – it had nothing to do with tasks or skills and more about social norms.”
Ms. Colaco says job seekers often thought requiring Canadian work experience was not only legal but something employers felt was necessary for performing the necessary duties. Recruiters, however, admitted that the question was used to screen out candidates who they feared couldn’t keep up with office small talk, cultural nuances and industry jargon.
Despite being outlawed in 2013, many employers continued to ask about Canadian work experience, either because they were unaware of the change or because there was typically little recourse for violating the restriction. For the employer to face consequences, a candidate who was the subject of discrimination based on their lack of Canadian work experience would need to have a firm grasp of the legal standard, collect evidence and file a human rights complaint.
“How many newcomers are going to do that? Not many” says Rupa Banerjee, Canada research chair in economic inclusion, employment and entrepreneurship of Canada’s Immigrants.
In the years that followed, research suggests newcomers were more likely than Canadian citizens to be unemployed, overqualified and underpaid.
“Until fairly recently, immigrants faced about 20 to 30 per cent earnings disadvantage, depending on how you define it, and that’s gotten better since 2015 because more newcomers come here as students first,” says Dr. Banerjee, who is also a professor of human resource management and organizational behaviour at Toronto Metropolitan University. “Historically, having years of foreign work experience on your resume didn’t add any value and some studies found that it actually had a negative impact on an immigrant’s ability to find Canadian employment.”
While some jobs may benefit from or even require an understanding of Canadian standards, regulations or norms, Dr. Banerjee says the Canadian experience requirement has long been used to screen out otherwise qualified candidates.
“It was a palatable way of essentially asking for a person who other Canadians will feel comfortable working with,” she says. “In that sense, it became a proxy for foreignness.”
As with the amendment to Ontario’s Human Rights Code more than a decade ago, Dr. Banerjee says Bill 149 is well-intentioned but unlikely to make a significant impact because employers still have many ways to screen out foreign applicants based on their name, where they went to school or by researching the location of former employers. She also notes that the bill only outlaws the question on job postings, not during interviews.
Creating more lasting change requires addressing root causes, Dr. Banerjee says, such as perceived business risk, unconscious bias and, in some cases, overt xenophobia.
“It will take a lot of time, education and effort to try and change the culture of Canadian workplaces,” she says.