Tim Hortons to dial back use of Temporary Foreign Worker program, aims to hire 10,000 locally
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Tim Hortons in First Edmonton Place on May 21, 2026. The restaurant chain is committing to hire up to 10,000 local workers as it expands the number of locations this year.Amanda Erickson/The Globe and Mail
Restaurant chain Tim Hortons is planning to dial back its use of Ottawa’s Temporary Foreign Worker program to staff restaurants and commit to hire up to 10,000 local workers as it embarks on a push to expand the number of Tims locations across the country this year.
The chain’s new approach to hiring is a stark reversal from its previous tenor. For years, Tim Hortons was one of the biggest proponents of the TFW program, a controversial immigration stream that expanded in popularity during the pandemic and came to symbolize some of the failings of the Trudeau-era immigration strategy.
Restaurant Brands International Inc., Tim Hortons’ parent company, is also pledging to stop lobbying the federal government to expand the TFW program, citing the high youth unemployment rate.
“We have not lobbied the government since last year and we won’t be lobbying them on TFWs any time soon given our commitment to hire locally everywhere possible,” said Duncan Fulton, chief corporate officer of Restaurant Brands. Mr. Fulton noted that wages for Tim Hortons’ workers are the same regardless of whether franchise owners hire a local or a foreign worker.
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“At the end of the day, our owners would prefer to hire locally almost 100 per cent of the time,” he said.
The Temporary Foreign Worker program, one of many immigration pathways into Canada, has been dogged by controversy for decades, largely owing to allegations of worker abuse by employers. It is heavily used by agricultural employers, and by retail and restaurant chains that cannot find local hires to staff their businesses.
The government determines if employers are eligible to hire foreign labour by evaluating Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) applications – documents that employers fill out to justify why they are unable to find local workers for the job.
For years, Tim Hortons was a key proponent of the TFW program and aggressively campaigned for Ottawa to expand the foreign worker hiring cap during the pandemic, when a labour shortage emerged owing to government-imposed lockdowns. The government of then-prime minister Justin Trudeau subsequently expanded the program in 2022, allowing employers to staff their businesses with up to 30 per cent foreign workers.
In 2024, in response to a souring public sentiment toward immigration, that cap was reduced to 10 per cent. But federal lobbying records indicate that Tim Hortons’ representatives continued to lobby Ottawa to expand the cap again through much of 2024 and 2025.
Indeed, the brand itself has come under much criticism from political representatives of all stripes for its use of the TFW program. Conservative Party immigration critic Michelle Rempel Garner said at a press conference in December, 2025, that the use of the program by restaurants like Tim Hortons “has removed entry-level job opportunities for youth.”
Federal NDP member of Parliament Don Davies told the CBC in an interview last year that if Tim Hortons’ owners cannot find workers, that means they are “ignoring market signals” and not paying a sufficient wage.
Currently, Tim’s locations employ approximately 4,000 temporary foreign workers, representing 3.6 per cent of all restaurant roles, according to the company. About 45 per cent of Tim Hortons workers are aged 15 to 24.
Mr. Fulton said that the impetus behind Tim Hortons’ new commitment to reduce its use of the TFW program and not push for a cap expansion was the high youth unemployment rate and the fact that franchise owners’ needs for temporary foreign workers was significantly reduced. The job market for Canadian youth has been dreary for years, with youth unemployment gradually rising from roughly 10 per cent in mid-2022 to more than 14 per cent last month.
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“The use of the TFW program amongst owners has gone down by 50 per cent from 2024. It was not the same as 2021, during the pandemic, where there was a real need for foreign labour,” Mr. Fulton said. He added that there was a common misconception among Canadians that Tim Hortons employs an excess of foreign labour because many of its employees are racially diverse. “Canada’s communities have become more diverse and so have our restaurants.”
Naira Saeed, Tim Hortons chief operating officer, said that the most challenging period for hiring was in 2021 and 2022, but since then, labour supply has not been a significant issue in suburban and urban markets.
“I can say that even at the height of the pandemic, when the TFW program cap was 30 per cent, we did not come close to reaching the cap. The vast majority of our workers are hired locally,” she noted.
Tim Hortons intends to continue participating in the TFW program, mostly because hiring challenges still exist in remote and rural locations, Ms. Saeed said.
Last week, Tim Hortons announced that it plans to build 80 new locations by the end of 2027, and to renovate 400 in that same period, representing a total investment of $130-million by Restaurant Brands and $270-million by its franchisees.
The hiring campaign, which aims to create 10,000 new jobs, will take place through numerous local job fairs across the country. Ms. Saeed added that the company is not targeting a certain demographic group per se, but rather, anyone who is legally entitled to work in Canada can apply.
With files from Susan Krashinsky Robertson
