FEDERAL NDP Leader Don Davies on Friday urged Industry Minister Melanie Joly to stop Ericsson Canada’s plan to outsource Canadian jobs to India.

Davies said in a statement: “Today, over 100 employees at telecommunications company Ericsson are scheduled to lose their jobs when the company outsources their work to India. These are highly-skilled positions, whose employees were in the process of gaining union representation.

“Canadians expect their government to fight for them, but we have seen this government fight against workers time and time again. This trend needs to end now, as this move not only hurts our economy, it also threatens our national security.

“By offshoring these positions, we are exposing our digital sovereignty and data privacy to unneeded risks. The work these employees do connects Canadians, and by removing the work from Canadian hands, we are opening the door for nefarious actors to intercept and manipulate sensitive data.

“Workers should be free to organize and fight for better work conditions without fear of seeing their jobs shipped off to foreign countries, New Democrats are calling on Industry Minister Mélanie Joly to protect these jobs and defend Canada.”