According to information released by the federal government, “a new program is being worked on that would speed up the process” for newcomers to become permanent residents in Canada.
Sean Fraser, the country’s Immigration Minister, added that they are “also looking to create a permanent pathway for temporary residents.”
From that portfolio, they seek to create a program that would allow those in Canada with temporary permits to become permanent residents “at a faster rate.”
The immigration minister is working to a tight deadline of just 120 days to confirm and announce the details of the new program.
It is worth mentioning that last April, the government increased the cost of becoming a permanent resident, which means that those who apply now have to shell out more money for the fees associated with their application.
These fees increase every two years to adjust for inflation.
The increase applies to all classes of applications, including economy, permit holder, family and humanitarian classes.
Canadian Parliament Remarks
From parliament the government must develop and publish publicly within 120 days of the adoption of this motion.
“Have a comprehensive plan to expand the flow of economic immigration to enable workers of all skill levels to meet the full range of labor needs and pathways to permanent residence for temporary foreign workers.”
The above must include, according to the letter, international students with significant work experience in Canada in sectors with persistent labor shortages.
Said plan must incorporate the following elements:
- Amend eligibility criteria under economic immigration programs to give more weight to work experience in Canada and expand eligible occupational categories and work experience at various skill levels.
- Examine the evidence and data collected from recent programs such as Temporary Resident to Permanent Resident, Atlantic Immigration Program (AIP), Rural and Northern Immigration Program (RNIP), and Agrifood Pilot and Provincial Nomination Process (PNP).
- Incorporate data on labor market and skills shortages to align policy on immigrant selection with persistent labor gaps.
- Evaluate ways to increase the geographic distribution of immigration and encourage retention of immigrants in smaller communities, as well as increase Francophone immigration outside of Quebec.
- Identify mechanisms to ensure flexibility in immigration selection tools to react more quickly to changes in labor market needs and regional economic priorities.
- Specifically consider essential occupations and sectors that are underrepresented in current economic immigration programs, such as health care, caregivers, agriculture, manufacturing, service industry, commerce, and transportation.
Beneficiaries in previous programs
– Sponsored –
An earlier program called “temporary resident to permanent resident,” or TR to PR, was in place last year for eight months after Covid-19 lockdowns closed the border to new arrivals to prevent the spread of the virus.
It gave 90,000 essential workers, frontline health care workers and international students like Kushdeep Singh an expedited path to permanent status.
Singh arrived in 2019 to study business administration at Norquest College in Edmonton.
The temporary TR to PR program was announced just as he was preparing to write his final exams.
expert
For Rupa Banerjee, a research professor from Canada who focuses on immigration issues at the Metropolitan University of Toronto, she added that continuing to accelerate the permanent resident status of some people is good policy.
“Focusing on people who are already in the country, it was an essential move at the time, when we had border closures and a lot of the pandemic restrictions.”
The data
The federal government has set a goal of accepting 432,000 newcomers this year alone.
Fraser said her department is ahead of schedule, despite the pandemic and the unexpected pressures of working to resettle thousands of people fleeing conflict in both Afghanistan and Ukraine.
Canada signed the Declaration on Migration and Protection of the President of the United States, Joe Biden, published at the Summit of the Americas.
The goal of the agreement is to provide safer and legal entry for the thousands fleeing gang warfare, corruption and poverty in Central and South America.
Under that agreement, Canada will continue to accept at least 50,000 seasonal farm workers.
A confirmed goal with Canadian employers, and will increase the resettlement of refugees from the Americas by receiving up to 4,000 people by 2028.
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