[URBAN NOTE] "Immigrant underclass in GTA fuels simmering frustrations"

[rfmcdonald]

One of the tags I'll be giving Debra Black's Toronto Star article will be "Three Torontos" since this article speaks about the ongoing ethnic--and, consequently, geographic--polarization of Toronto between a well-off largely white population and a less-well-off population of immigrant origin. This Is Not Good.

[S]ome experts worry the increasing creation of an immigrant underclass will brew trouble — sadly ironic in a region that for decades has taken pride in and built a reputation on its multiculturalism and acceptance of immigrants from around the world. By 2017, the GTA is forecast to become home to a predominantly non-European population.

A recent backlash over the Royal Bank of Canada’s move to replace Canadian workers with foreign workers, and a battle in Brampton over a townhouse development that erupted along cultural lines with accusations of shady “Indian politics,” reveal simmering tensions. And the Conservative Party’s recent attempt to crack down on abuses to the Temporary Foreign Worker Program has done little to appease critics.

“While immigrants and immigration is the heart and soul of the country, if you look at the main basis of inequality in Canada, along with gender, it’s based on race and immigrant status,” said Yogendra Shakya, senior research scientist at Access Alliance.

“Racialized immigrants are facing two to three times the rate of unemployment, higher representation in precarious, contract, on-call or temporary jobs. They are two to four times more likely to be underemployed and have more than double the rates of education level in terms of having post-secondary education.”

Shakya has witnessed the widening inequality and growing frustration at his agency’s clinics. New immigrants often can’t find work in their field and end up in temporary low-paying jobs, often through temp agencies. This precarious work has led to higher rates of poverty among immigrants across the GTA.

Further complicating the picture are temporary workers — often brought in under the temporary workers’ program or under international student visas — who choose to stay here after their visas expire and become part of the undocumented in the city. What’s more, new emerging communities, with perhaps 3,000 to 4,000 people in them, of immigrants from Nepal, Bhutan, Central Asia and parts of Africa such as Cameroon, are also beginning to emerge across the GTA.