Tim Hortons said it will hire 10,000 locals in Canada after facing years of opposition over its reliance on foreign workers.

After years of relying on the temporary foreign worker program, which earned Tim Hortons the nickname ‘Lion Hortons’, the restaurant chain announced on Monday that it has decided to reduce its foreign hiring and hire 10,000 local workers as the chain now expands across the country. Duncan Fulton, chief corporate officer of Restaurant Brands, parent company of Tim Hortons, said, “We have not lobbied the government since last year and given our commitment to hiring locally wherever possible, we will not be lobbying them on TFW any time soon.”Fulton said there was no question of cheap labor because wages are the same for everyone but “at the end of the day, our bosses would prefer to hire locally almost 100 percent of the time”.A spokesperson for the National Post was quoted as saying, “Our restaurant owners have always been committed to local hiring. We think one of the biggest misconceptions about Tim Hortons is how the TFW program has been used. Less than 4% of team members were hired through the TFW program.”“Our local hiring campaign is targeting anyone who wants to work at a Tim Hortons who is resident in Canada and has permission to work in Canada – our restaurant owners do not discriminate in their hiring, so that can be Canadian students, international students, any member of the community,” the spokesperson said.The restaurant said its reliance on foreign workers began during the pandemic when there was a labor shortage. “Usage of the TFW program among owners is down 50 percent by 2024. It wasn’t like 2021, during the pandemic, where there was a real need for foreign labor,” Fulton said. He said there is a common misconception among Canadians that Tim Hortons overemploys foreign workers because many of their employees are racially diverse. “Canadian communities have become more diverse and so have our restaurants.”