Canada Expanding Pathways to Permanent Residency for Temporary Foreign Workers and International Students
If you are a temporary foreign worker or international student, your journey to permanent residency in Canada might get a bit easier.
Last week, Minister of Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship Canada, Sean Fraser, spoke about the government’s goal to create and expand paths for those working and studying in Canada who want to gain Permanent Residency.
The government’s goal is to strengthen the link between job markets and immigration programs, so that Canada can support a wide variety of talent across all industries, including health, hospitality, transportation, crafts and resources, information technology, and engineering.
They will use a 5 pillar approach to achieve this goal.
Pillar 1: Leverage Increased Immigration Levels
Canada’s 2022-2024 Immigration Levels Plan sets new targets
to welcome new permanent residents:
· 431,645 in 2022
· 447,055 in 2023
· 451,000 in 2024
Pillar 2: Reform Express Entry and increase flexibility in immigration selection tools
These legislative changes increase flexibility in the Express Entry system, and pave the way for the top-ranked applicants to apply for permanent residence.
Pillar 3: Enhance Permanent Economic Immigration Programs and Pilots
Several existing programs and processes will be reviewed, expanded, or prolonged, including:
· Foreign Qualification Recognition Process
· the Agri-Food Pilot
· Federal High-Skilled Programs
· Home Child Care Provider and
· Home Support Worker
· Transitions of International Students
Pillar 4: Support Communities in Attracting and Retaining Newcomers, including through
Francophone Immigration
The IRCC is currently working on the development of a new Municipal Nominee Program as they continue to work with on innovative pathways to permanent residency, including facilitating greater flexibility through the existing Provincial Nominee Program.
They also continue to explore ways to leverage existing temporary residence streams to promote Francophone immigration, in particular to support Official Language Minority Communities outside of Quebec.
Pillar 5: Build Operational Capacity
The Government of Canada has committed $827.3M to optimize business processes, renew technologies, and simplify policies and programs. Through this investment, IRCC aims to deliver new client services digitally, enhance program responsiveness, and facilitate application processing.
Additional funding of $85M was announced to help return to processing service standards in various programs by year-end. Moreover, IRCC is increasing processing capacity and reducing backlogs by hiring up to 1,250 new employees by the end of Fall 2022.
These investments will also support temporary residents who have or are planning to apply for permanent residency. In addition, to support efforts to reduce processing backlogs, the Minister will exempt permanent and temporary residence applicants who are already in Canada and meet certain criteria from the immigration medical examination requirement.
---
You can view the full 39-page government report here.
While we all wait for these new programs and processes to come into effect, make sure you are ready for your permanent residency application by improving your English language skills, taking your IELTS Test, and learning about the Permanent Residency application process.
Don’t hesitate to connect with the staff at MOSAIC for help on your journey to permanent residency. We are here to help!