Border officer union cites staffing shortfalls as Trump proceeds with tariff threats

OTTAWA — The federal union that represents Canada’s front-line customs and immigration officers says it’s worried about staffing levels at the Canada Border Services Agency as the country responds to U.S. President Donald Trump’s tariff threats.

Trump’s executive order to implement 25 per cent tariffs on all Canadian products, with a lower 10 per cent levy on energy, are set to kick in Tuesday.

Despite Canada’s efforts to meet Trump’s demands to boost border security and launch a weeks-long diplomatic push by Canadian officials in Washington, Trump said Monday that the tariffs will take effect as planned.

Mark Weber, national president of the Customs and Immigration Union, said the agency is now short about 2,000 front-line officers.

Weber said the CBSA is short-staffed at some ports of entry and “desperately needs” another training centre.

“Currently, the CBSA only has the one training centre which can pump out under 600 new recruits a year, which is about what our attrition is,” he said. “With only that one training centre, it becomes really difficult to ever get your numbers up.”

The federal government website says the Canada Border Services Agency employs 17,226 public servants. Around 8,500 staff are front-line personnel.

In 2021, the CBSA had approximately 15,500 staff, including roughly 8,100 front-line employees. In 2012, the agency had around 13,000 employees and about 7,200 front-line officers.

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said earlier this month the federal government needs to hire at least 2,000 border agents. He also said the CBSA’s powers should be extended to cover the entire border, not just border crossings — something the union has requested.

The union also has raised concerns about budget cuts as part of the government’s efforts to refocus federal spending.

The CBSA says it saw a net decrease in its allotment of $48.5 million between 2024 and 2025, mostly due to that government spending review.

Weber said he hopes the “renewed focus” on the border will encourage the government to increase staffing. While he said he’s optimistic about the government’s new $1.3-billion border plan, he added it’s not clear how much of the money will go to staffing.

Weber said CBSA’s current staffing has affected officers’ ability to perform searches.

“Our staffing levels have gotten to a point where really we’re kind of depending on technologies, self-declaration, things like that to hopefully interdict,” he said. “I think we need to kind of get back into the business of actually interacting face-to-face with travellers and doing those searches and asking questions.”

The CBSA website says that in the 2024-25 fiscal year, which ends this month, the government made 36,225 seizures of goods such as drugs and firearms. Seizures from the last few months have not yet been included in the data.

The agency reports that 62,055 seizures were made in 2023-24, 51,376 in 2022-23, 52,349 in 2021-22 and 75,291 in 2020-21.

Rebecca Purdy, a spokesperson for the CBSA, said the agency “remains vigilant in the interdiction of illegal drugs, such as fentanyl and the chemical precursors used in the production of illegal synthetic drugs, to ensure these harmful substances remain off the streets and out of Canadian communities.”

Weber said having more staff at the border would help show that Canada is serious about border security and would also lead to more seizures.

“I’ve visited ports of entry where there’ll be four people working where they tell me five (or) six years ago there were 12 of them,” he said. “You’ve got a lineup of trucks or a lineup of cars with four people there. How much searching are you actually doing?

“Hopefully (we) get to a point where officers never have to make that tough decision, where they have to let potential interdictions go because, simply, they don’t have the resources to deal with it.”

— With files from Kelly Geraldine Malone

This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 3, 2025.

Catherine Morrison, The Canadian Press