Canada is further reducing the number of study permits granted to foreign students and tightening eligibility for work permits in a bid to reduce the number of temporary residents in the country, the government said on Wednesday.
The announcement comes as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government, which is trailing in opinion polls and facing defeat in a major byelection this week, seeks to reduce the number of temporary residents — including international students and foreign workers — in the country.
The issue has become one of the most contentious in Canadian politics, as there is a federal election due before October 2025.
The changes announced on Wednesday will reduce the number of international study permits issued in 2025 to 437,000. According to immigration department data, Canada will approve 509,390 permits in 2023 and 175,920 in the first seven months of 2024.
These changes will also limit work permit eligibility for spouses of some students and temporary foreign workers.
Faced with a surge in the number of refugee claimants in Canada, the government said Wednesday it plans to review measures to strengthen visa integrity and “review visa decision-making so that our highly trained officers have the right tools to detect fraud and reduce the number of non-genuine visitors.”
“The reality is that not everyone who wants to come to Canada will be able to — just as not everyone who wants to stay in Canada will be able to,” Immigration Minister Marc Miller said in a statement.
The government has already pledged to reduce the number of temporary residents to 5% of the total population. In April it was 6.8%.
Migrants have been blamed for social problems including a lack of affordable housing and rising costs of living, while post-pandemic inflation slowed to the Bank of Canada’s 2% annual target in August.
Immigration advocates and some economists argue that the link between immigrants and economic malaise is an oversimplification, and that vulnerable newcomers cannot be blamed for complex economic problems.
Polls have shown that a large majority of the public believes Canada is bringing in too many immigrants, and anti-immigrant rhetoric and attacks have increased in Canada, once known for its welcoming attitude toward newcomers.
However, after several years of increasing the number of temporary residents in Canada, its federal government wants to scale back.
In January, the government imposed a two-year limit on international students, which would roughly halve their acceptances this year.
Earlier this month, the government rolled back a 2022 extension for the temporary foreign worker program. In some areas, it reduced the maximum share of any employer’s workforce that could be made up of low-wage, temporary foreign workers. It also eliminated low-wage temporary foreign workers in some areas, especially in communities with high unemployment rates.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)