Even though hundreds of foreigners hired to work at a new underground coal mine could still lose those jobs, the company involved is planting more roots in Tumbler Ridge.
HD Mining plans to spend $ 15-million on housing for chinese workers, but the company’s Jody Shimkus says –eventually– those ‘temporary’ employees will be replaced by Canadians.
“Absolutely, and we have a training and transition plan that we’ve submitted with our labour market opinion application and that was a voluntary submission where we identified that we want to transfer this skill set to Canadians over a period of time.”
A federal court judge must still decide if 60 more foreigners slated to arrive next month will be allowed to stay.
Shimkus, speaking with CKNW’s Bill Good, says there are no plans to send the 17 Chinese workers already here home.
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