If we really need the new imported Chinese miners, who know how to do horizontal mining, then let the companies that need them pay them the same pay and benefits displaced Canadian miners would have received.
If the mining companies want to exploit the new miners for their own profit by paying them cheap wages, then let the miners stay at home.
We need to remember how Canada built our railroads on the backs of cheap labour imported from China and also remember that we did not treat them fairly or humanely.
We did not allow them to bring their families over to Canada. If we really need these miners, then let them immigrate here and become part of our country and not be some disposable peons that we send home when they are worn out.
This is no different from Canadian companies that use cheap labour in China and India to sweat-shop manufacture goods for us in Canada and reap huge profits from the sweat.
Canada can do better by treating our foreign workers, both here and abroad, better and fairly.
Jorgen Hansen,
Kelowna