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Say it ain’t so…! When it comes to retailers, it doesn’t get any more Canadian than Canadian Tire. “Canadian” is in the company’s name, after all…

And yet, it turns out the Toronto-based corporation is now hiring foreigners to work at its stores as opposed to Canadian citizens.

Not only that, but one west-end Toronto franchisee was actually caught red-handed violating the rules of the Temporary Foreign Worker program!

Rebel News reporter Alex Dhaliwal recently chronicled the odd case of Canadian Tire owner, Ezhil Natarajan. He was recently fined more than $100,000 by the federal government for violating the Temporary Foreign Worker program rules. Natarajan is also under provincial investigation for alleged exploitation of foreign workers.

Here's the skinny: Employment and Social Development Canada found Natarajan violated the TFW program rules by not matching pay or working conditions to job offers as well as assigning workers to different roles than hired.

Last year, 13 foreign workers at the Canadian Tire store located at 175 Vetiver Dr. resigned or were fired by Natarajan, alleging wage reductions and unhired job assignments.

Federal data indicates that Natarajan’s store was approved to hire 34 Temporary Foreign Workers from 2022-2024.

But why? Especially given the high national youth unemployment rate in Canada. It should also be noted that the overall unemployment rate in Canada is currently a jaw-dropping 7.1%.

Yet it has become fashionable for certain corporations (we’re looking at you, “Singh Hortons”) to hire noncitizens. Indeed, temporary foreign workers now comprise about 1% of the entire national workforce!

Sorry, but this does not compute. If Canadian citizens can’t find jobs, why is Ottawa importing noncitizens to work here?

And it should also be noted that many foreign workers did not have a great experience working for Natarajan.

Rowell Pailan, a former employee of Natarajan, says his wages were cut from $20 an hour to $16.55 per hour after he was demoted from supervisor to shelf stocker. Isn’t that called “bait and switch” in the retail world?

Rebel News thought it would be prudent to get Natarajan’s side of the story. We also wanted to find out what Canadian Tire’s corporate had to say.

As per usual, emails to Canadian Tire’s media relations department went unacknowledged.

We also reached out to Natarajan’s store by phone and left a detailed message. Our call went unreturned.

So it was that the other day that we decided to pay a house call to the store. Alas, we were about as welcome as skunks to a garden party. Several staffers demanded we vacate the premises, and we did.

But the irony is perverse, isn’t it? Canadian Tire wraps itself in the Canadian flag. Its slogan is “Canada’s Store.” And this is no sad-sack corporation. Canadian Tire’s revenue for 2024 was more than $16 billion.

Such a shame that “Canada’s Store”, based in Canada, is more than happy to sell merchandise to Canadians. But it doesn’t seem to be all that enthused about hiring Canadians…

There oughta be a law…