Achi news desk-
OTTAWA –
For the first time, Canada will put a “soft cap” on the number of new temporary residents arriving in the country when it sets immigration levels in the fall, Immigration Minister Marc Miller announced Thursday.
The announcement is the latest in a series of steps Miller has taken in recent months to curb rampant population growth.
The federal government plans to reduce the number of temporary residents to five per cent of the population over the next three years, down from the current 6.2 per cent.
The first targets will be set in September.
Canada has seen a sharp increase in the number of temporary residents coming in each year, with Miller saying in the past that the country has become “addicted” to temporary workers.
“Changes are needed to make the system more efficient and more sustainable,” Miller told a news conference.
“There should be an honest conversation about what the increase in international migration means for Canada as we plan ahead,” he added.
Strong population growth in Canada has led to intense scrutiny of the country’s immigration policies and especially of temporary resident streams.
Canada’s population grew by more than 430,000 during the third quarter of 2023, marking the fastest pace of population growth in any quarter since 1957. Almost three-quarters of that growth was driven by non-permanent residents.
The number of temporary residents in Canada increased due to higher international student enrollments in post-secondary institutions as well as increased use of temporary worker programs.
The federal government temporarily relaxed foreign worker rules during the pandemic to help businesses fill jobs amid record vacancies.
Canada has also brought in significant numbers of migrants in response to humanitarian crises, including nearly 300,000 Ukrainians fleeing the Russian invasion.
Economists have raised concerns about the increase in migrant workers in recent years, warning that the federal programs discourage employers from innovating by offering cheap labor.
Miller already cut the number of new international student visas by more than a third earlier this year.
It also established a temporary cap to address housing pressures and problems in the student visa system that have allowed some bad actors to take advantage of high international student tuition while providing poor education.
Miller said he will convene a meeting of provincial, territorial and federal ministers in May to talk about how the levels should be set.
“States and territories know their unique labor needs and capacity and they need to take responsibility for the people they bring in too.”
Miller has also asked his department to review existing programs that bring in temporary workers to better align them with labor needs and weed out abuse in the system.
The government is also moving to reduce the number of workers entering Canada in some sectors from May 1.
Employment Minister Randy Boissonnault said that proportion will drop to 20 percent in businesses that currently have up to 30 percent of their workforce coming through the temporary foreign worker program.
The healthcare and construction sectors will be exempt from the change.
The government also requires employers to consider asylum seekers with valid work permits for open positions before they can apply for temporary foreign workers, Boissonnault said.
The Migrant Workers Alliance for Change said temporary migrants had been shunned because the affordability and housing crisis was distracting from corporate and government failure to ensure a decent quality of life.
“We call on the federal government to stop responding to racism by playing with caps and numbers and instead build a fair society with equal rights for all,” the group said in a statement on Thursday.
The group also reiterated a longstanding call to offer permanent status to undocumented residents, migrant workers, international students and refugees.
The announcement marks a change in the federal government’s policy on temporary foreign worker programs, said Mikal Skuterud, a professor of economics at the University of Waterloo.
“My sense is that this press conference was to send a message to people … that we are changing our tune a little bit on this. We’re moving in a different direction now the emphasis is on not growing this program but reducing it,’” said Skuterud.
The academic, who specializes in immigration policy, has long called for reforms to the temporary foreign worker programmes.
He said one way the federal government can curb things is by raising the price a business must pay to apply for a labor market impact assessment.
The federal government currently charges employers $1,000 per job applied for
“If you want to reduce the demand for these temporary foreign workers, that price needs to increase,” he said.
Last fall, Miller announced that he would level the number of new permanent residents to Canada in 2026 in response to a squeeze on housing and other services.
This report was first published by The Canadian Press on March 21, 2024.
This is a corrected story. An earlier version said the government planned to reduce the temporary resident population by five percent over the next three years.
Ad blocking test (Why?)
Source link
Related
