Immigration Canada

Immigration to Canada drops by 25 per cent

Nicholas Keung Immigration Reporter

Canada let 25 per cent fewer immigrants into the country in the first quarter of this year compared to the same period in 2010, raising concerns the Conservative government is embarking on a bold plan to restrict the country’s immigration levels.
The number of permanent resident visas issued by Citizenship and Immigration Canada between January and March fell from 84,083 in 2010 to 63,224 this year, according to figures obtained by the Star.
The latest department numbers show a decline across the board, with visas for skilled workers down 28 per cent, family-sponsored relatives down 14 per cent, and refugees dropping by 25 per cent.
The significant drop in visas comes on the eve of public consultations Immigration Minister Jason Kenney is holding on the country’s immigration levels and classes of people that should be allowed in. The first meeting was held in Calgary last week, and another is scheduled in Toronto Wednesday.
“It’s a very sharp decline,” said Myer Siemiatycki, professor of politics and public administration at Ryerson University, referring to the visas granted. “It begs the question: What is going on here?
“Has the government decided on the outset that they want fewer admissions? Is the tap being closed tighter?”
In the months leading up to the May 2 federal election, the Conservatives touted 2010 as a banner year in immigration, welcoming 280,000 permanent residents, the highest in 50 years. In 2009, approximately 265,000 immigrants were granted permanent status.
Commenting on this year’s quarterly figures, immigration officials say it is unfair to use the 2010 numbers as a benchmark since it was a record year in granting permanent visas.
“The department is confident that irrespective of lower visas/authorizations issuance and admissions in the first quarter, it will meet its annual target of visas,” immigration spokesperson Nancy Caron wrote in an email to the Star.
Over the last 15 years, Canada’s annual immigration levels have remained around 250,000, about 0.8 per cent of the population.
The Conservative government has announced it intends slashing $4 billion in annual spending from the federal budget, raising fears of further cuts to the immigration system. More than $50 million was slashed this year in settlement services.
“The success (of immigration) is determined by the resources. This government has been cutting resources and a number of provinces have,” said New Democrat immigration critic Don Davies.
“In turn, it is going to put pressure on the number of immigrants we can appropriately absorb.”
Immigration lawyers say fewer permanent visas could mean bigger backlogs, especially for family sponsorships where there is no cap on applications like there is for skilled workers and investors.
“The real problem with backlogs are the parents . . . The math says people will die before seeing a visa,” said immigration lawyer and analyst Richard Kurland. “That is the major challenge to Canada’s immigration system today.”
Immigration lawyer Mario Bellissimo said he would not be surprised if the minister brings in a new law to cap family sponsorship applications. Since 2006, the number of visas for sponsored relatives and refugees has declined, while visas for workers have steadily increased.
“The (immigration) minister has the authority to decide who can come to Canada,” he said. “If we get more applications than we can process, we’re going to return them.”
Since 2008, the federal government has made numerous changes to its immigration program in an effort to eliminate backlogs and process applications in a more timely fashion. It counts on capping the number of immigration applications it accepts for processing.
A department backgrounder for the upcoming consultations, which are by invitation only, suggests while increasing immigration may be one way to solve the growing demand, “there are clearly a number of pressures that make trade-offs inevitable.”
With an aging population, “immigration levels will need to be raised to 350,000 annually to support Canada’s economic growth,” said Anne Golden, president and CEO of the Conference Board of Canada.
Ernst & Young business immigration lawyer Batia Stein said the biggest percentage drop in early 2011 comes in the federal skilled worker and Canada experience programs, which are designed to usher in immigrants most likely to succeed in the job market.
“If our goal is to attract global talent and combat our aging population, there’s some room there to do that,” she said.
Ryerson’s Siemiatycki said Canada has a capacity to take in as many as 450,000 immigrants a year by including the 200,000 temporary foreign workers that it lets in to fill labour market needs on a perennial basis.
According to the government’s consultation backgrounder, Canada would have to increase immigration to nearly 4 per cent of the population to stabilize its “old-age dependency ratio.”

CIBC’s Launches Campaign In Different Languages To Reach New Immigrants

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TORONTO – CIBC has recently launched a new marketing campaign, which includes print, online, in-branch, out-of-home and TV ads, featuring advice, expertise and products that are relevant to the specific needs of newcomers to Canada.

The campaign includes unique elements that reach out to new Canadians with important cultural tips and financial advice, through advertising in Chinese grocery stores, South Asian movie theatres, and malls and community centres in select neighbourhoods.

For the first time ever the campaign will also include dedicated TV spots in Mandarin and Cantonese during Asian programming and in English during South Asian programming in order to demonstrate our commitment to reaching these audiences in a culturally relevant way. The commercials begin airing this week.

In addition to highly competitive products and services, CIBC continues to invest in new and expanded branches in high growth markets. These branches reflect the communities they serve, with many offering banking and advice in multiple languages. CIBC also offers telephone banking in English, French and Chinese languages.

CIBC’s Welcome to Canada website has a wide range of helpful information for new Canadians preparing to move to Canada and to help them get established once they are here.

The campaign will have high visibility in newcomer communities nationwide, with a special focus on the Greater Toronto Area, Vancouver Lower Mainland, Montreal, Calgary and Edmonton.

Long list of problems for foreign labour

Saint Joseph's College on the north campus of ...

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EDMONTON — Rossel Macapagal often works overtime in his housekeeping job at a downtown hotel.

That’s fine with him. He’s sending much of his salary to his wife and three children in the Philippines to give them a better life.

Macapagal, 30, is grateful for his chance to come to Edmonton as a temporary foreign worker, as are his two roommates from the Philippines. He would like to stay and bring his family to Canada.

As a temporary foreign worker, that’s unlikely. His two-year contract has been renewed until February next year. After that, his options are limited.

Macapagal is exactly the kind of worker Alberta Employment and Immigration Minister Thomas Lukaszuk has in mind when he talks of shifting to more immigration and fewer temporary foreign workers to solve the province’s labour shortage.

A skilled or unskilled foreign worker who already holds a permanent job is a good immigration prospect because “you know he’s needed,” Lukaszuk said.

“If it works out and the employer needs him, why not let him stay? Why ship him home and then bring in someone else to train?”

Macapagal has one possible option. He could qualify for landed immigrant status under the provincial nominee program. In fact, he has made a joint application with his employer.

“If successful, I could apply to bring my family,” he said, a prospect that brings a smile to his face.

But there’s a federally imposed ceiling of 5,000 applicants under this program for Alberta. Lukaszuk is pushing the Harper government to raise the cap.

The provincial nominee program allows employers to recruit specialized workers for jobs specific to Alberta. The job offer can also bring landed immigrant status with it. Or a worker already here — whose job is indeed permanent — can apply jointly with the employer for nominee status. Final approval rests with Ottawa.

Macapagal is hopeful. His hours are steady and his employer has been generous and helpful.

Though he had a job in the Philippines, Macapagal had known for years he would have to work overseas to earn enough to help his family get ahead. He worked for eight months in the Middle East, then a few years ago was accepted under the temporary work program for Edmonton.

Alberta will need an estimated 77,000 workers within the next decade, many of them long-term, Lukaszuk said.

Canada’s birth rate does not replace the population. That fact, combined with retiring baby boomers and a stronger economy, means Alberta needs more permanent workers, Lukaszuk said.

The temporary program is not a long-term solution.

Lukaszuk also has concerns about the negative social impact of short-term jobs.

The workers live in transient communities and don’t integrate into society. They send up to 80 per cent of their salary back home rather than spending it here, take up a lot of rental accommodation and are separated from their families for long periods.

“So your ask yourself, can we do things differently?” said Lukaszuk, himself an immigrant. “We can do better than that.”

Earlier this summer, Lukaszuk travelled to the Philippines on a volunteer project with friends from a Castle Downs community league and saw first-hand the difficulties faced by families left behind.

During those weeks, he met many people who had family members working in Canada.

“The divorce rate is high, people change when they are away, some start new relationships,” Lukaszuk said.

Though increasing immigration can be a sensitive topic, Lukaszuk is confident people would be open to the idea as long as they are reassured all Canadians are fully employed first, including underemployed groups like aboriginals, disabled people and women.

“I think Albertans will support this. That’s the way this province was built.

“We didn’t give people land, have them break the soil and pick the rocks and send them home.”

Terry Andriuk, at the Mennonite Centre for Newcomers, agreed with the minister that the current program brings a new set of problems.

She runs support services for temporary workers in partnership with Catholic Social Services.

Most workers who come to her office are afraid to complain or talk publicly, fearful their employers might object, she said. Their issues vary — employers who pay less than a contract stated, or don’t pay at all, or workers who get injured on the job. Or they get laid off and may lose housing.

On her desk are vouchers for the food bank, information about language classes and brochures on unemployment insurance. More than 1,200 workers seek help each year.

Andriuk, whose office also helps employers with paperwork to renew contracts, would be happy to see a shift to more immigration mostly, to give the workers opportunity in Canada.

Yessy Byl, a lawyer and advocate for temporary foreign workers, said more immigration would be welcome.

The longer the temporary work program remains, the more it establishes a second tier of workers in society, similar to the guest workers in Europe that make up a permanent underclass, she said.

“The attitude is they are expendable.”

Also, no one knows how many temporary foreign workers have gone underground since the downturn hit two years ago, she added.

When they lost their contract jobs, many looked for anything here “because there are no jobs for them back home,” Byl said.

But that leaves them vulnerable to exploitation — employers lower wages and provide no benefits. They also live without health care and other services, she added.

Canadian Border Services says it deports 250 to 300 people from Edmonton a month, but that number includes criminals (about 10 per cent), failed refugee claimants, illegal immigrants, student visa violators and “overstays” — workers who stay beyond their contract.

“For the most part, people do leave when they are supposed to,” said spokeswoman Lisa White, adding the agency does not keep track of how many foreign workers leave when their contracts expire.

Byl said the federal government recently added a stiff language requirement to some trades people applying for permanent residency.

If fluency in French or English had been required in the past, many people here today would not have been accepted, she said.

Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour, said the foreign worker program was expanded in the early 2000s to meet short-term demand. It was supposed to be a program of last resort for employers facing a temporary labour shortage.

But it is becoming a permanent solution for big employers and multinational corporations, who want to bring in a lower paid workforce on big projects, including the oilsands. But that’s not good for Canadians or the economy, he said.

“Canada is a resource-based economy and one way Canadians benefit is by getting jobs on these projects.

“Instead, we’ve turned large swaths of the economy into a remittance economy.”

“On this program, I’m cheering for the minister,” McGowan added.

“This (temporary) program is fatally flawed and we should bring people in as immigrants.”

spratt@edmontonjournal.com

Oh Canada

photo by Mark Kim. As a current student here, ...

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By Salena Zito, Town Hall.

BUCKHORN, Ontario – Candy Penny and her husband have owned their novelty shop here just long enough to not know what it was like when American tourists flooded this small Peterborough County town in Canada’s “cottage country.”

“I understand that, before the recession, every other license plate in town was from a different (American) state,” said Penny, a Michigan native who moved here when she married a Canadian.

“Between that and the spike of gas prices in 2008 and again this summer, and the required passports to cross the border, our main business is Canadian.”

Her shop is in a century-old wooden church. It is artfully arranged with birdhouses, beach towels, candles, charming retro signs of the Kawartha Lakes, and moose- and deer-antler cottage décor. “And it is pretty good business, at that,” she said.

That is because, unlike its Yankee neighbor, Canada has a robust economy.

Buckhorn is bustling. The parking lot of the provincial liquor store was so full that cars spilled onto both sides of the narrow two-lane road; the Foodland’s lot also was full, forcing shoppers to create spots along a slope down to Buckhorn Lake.

Teddy’s Antiques shop overflowed, and the Olde Icehouse bar’s outdoor seating had a long wait for lunch.

As America’s woeful economy and high unemployment reflect its increasingly pessimistic outlook, things look better up here.

Canada’s economy is doing better for several reasons, says Matthew Lebo, political science professor at Stony Brook University in New York.

It has “a well-regulated banking system, which prevented banks from taking excessive risks with depositors’ money and from borrowing based on assets of dubious value,” he explained. So it had no need for a public bail-out of private companies that took bad risks.

Lebo said Canada’s diverse population and influx of educated, entrepreneurial immigrants over the last 30 years has led to a constant supply of innovation and new businesses.

It also did not have a housing bubble, says former Federal Reserve governor Larry Lindsey, “So, therefore, no crash.”

Canada’s housing sector has been a continuous bright spot, taking the country out of recession swiftly; the U.S. housing market remains abysmal, contributing to a faltering economy and no job growth.

“They are also just booming with everything that surrounds the energy industry,” said Lindsey.

According to Lebo, “Canada is really 13 economies, mostly energy resource-based except for the Windsor-Quebec corridor, where heavy industry and … financial and business sectors are concentrated.”

And here’s a blow: More cars are made in Ontario than in Michigan, he said.

Let foreign workers stay, Alberta urges

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Settlement through immigration will help ease labour shortage, minister argues

BY SHEILA PRATT, EDMONTON JOURNAL JULY 17, 2011

With another boom just around the corner, it's time to shift away from reliance on temporary foreign workers and concentrate on immigration, says Thomas Lukaszuk, Alberta's minister of immigration and employment.

Lukaszuk is ready to push the federal government to allow more immigrants from among the 30,000 temporary workers now in the province, offering them a chance to settle with their families.

Employers facing labour shortages would also be happy because they could keep workers they have spent the last few years training, he said. Lukaszuk's first priority is to make sure Canadians in underemployed groups, such as First Nations and the disabled, are "fully engaged" in the workforce. "But at the end of the day, even if we naively think we will get 100-percent employment in those groups, we will still be short of workers," he said.

Last year, Lukaszuk ordered a review of the temporary working program by parliamentary assistant Teresa Woo Paw. Her report assessing the effectiveness of the program will be released in a month. The Calgary MLA spent a year hearing from employers and other interested parties on the issue.

Lukaszuk said he's ready to "raise the volume" on this issue with the federal government.

He hopes to garner support from his provincial counterparts in preparation for a ministers' meeting this fall.

"The federal government took in 280,000 new immigrants this year, the highest number ever, and that's great," he said.

"But that record intake didn't make a dent in the 360,000 temporary workers in the country."

Since that number has been steady in recent years, it's clear the demand for workers isn't just short-term, he said.

At the height of the boom in 2006, Alberta had more than 60,000 temporary foreign workers -the highest per capita of any province. Many worked on oilsands projects, but a lot of them left when the economic downturn hit in December 2008.

Recent federal government legislation has made the temporary foreign worker program less attractive Lukaszuk said.

Under the new rules, temporary foreign workers can spend a maximum of four years in Canada, and then must leave for four years before reapplying for another fouryear term.

Previously, a permit issued for two years was renewable several times if the employer could prove the worker was needed.

The new four-year rule means welltrained workers will leave Alberta to go to other industrialized countries, not back home to the Philippines or Ukraine, Lukaszuk said.

Alberta got a wake-up call a few weeks ago when Australian mining companies came to Edmonton to recruit all kinds of workers, including engineers and skilled tradesmen.

Australian employers are offering immigration status to anyone who takes a job. That's a big advantage over Canada and Alberta, Lukaszuk said.

"When I go to Germany to recruit welders, I can tell them they can only come for four years," he said. The only way to currently offer permanent residency to temporary foreign workers is under the provincial nominee program.

Larry Staples of the Alberta Construction Association said his industry will need more immigrants and temporary foreign workers to meet demand for planned oilsands projects.

At the height of the boom in 2006, the construction industry brought in about 7,000 skilled tradesmen, "but these days, that's down to almost zero," Staples said. People from overseas and Eastern Canada left the province in droves, he said.

"Now we're looking at ramping up again. We need to turn up the burner on immigration for the skills we need and make sure they come to Alberta and don't stay in Toronto or Montreal.

"We need to get more skilled immigration to the province."

Gil McGowan, president of the Alberta Federation of Labour, said he was pleased Lukaszuk wants to move away for temporary foreign workers.

But he said it's not clear the federal government will listen.

spratt@edmontonjournal.com

Immigration Canada

Immigration to Canada drops by 25 per cent