Major changes announced in IRCC’s 2025-2026 Departmental Plan

By Caroline Minks, Derek Shank, CIC News

Canada’s federal government has also mandated that provinces issue 75% of their PNP nominations to candidates already present in Canada. (Pexels Photo)

Canada’s immigration department will establish a new pathway to permanent residence (PR) and will work toward launching a new work permit stream, according to its 2025-2026 Departmental Plan.

The Plan, published on 20 June, 2025, says that Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) will

• Launch a new permanent pathway to PR by making the Economic Mobility Pathways Pilot permanent, by the end of 2025;
• Move forward with creating a new foreign labour stream and type of work permit for the agriculture and fish processing sector;
• Establish a framework for updating the field of study requirements for post-graduation work permits (PGWPs);
• Change eligibility requirements for spousal open work permits (SOWPs) issued to spouses of foreign workers and international students;
• Implement new free trade agreements (FTAs) with Indonesia and Ecuador;
• Work on negotiating additional FTA work permits with the accession candidates to the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans Pacific Partnership, and with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations;
• Proceed throughout 2025-2026 with rolling out a new online account for all IRCC clients;
• Complete the operationalization of the Welcoming Francophone Communities Initiative (WFCs) over 2025-2026; and
• Explore a new potential pathway to PR for refugee students.

Further, IRCC mentioned that they were testing a new algorithm, GeoMatch, for helping Express Entry candidates choose where to settle. This new initiative is a collaboration with Stanford University.

The Plan also re-affirmed many of IRCC’s existing commitments and policy statements, including

• Prioritizing permanent residency healthcare workers, trades workers, education workers, and French speakers under Express Entry’s category-based selection;
• Prioritizing temporary residents already in Canada for PR admissions, with an aim of at least 40% of PR admissions coming from temporary residents (TRs) already in Canada;
• Working with provinces and territories to expand the temporary public policy allowing Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) candidates to obtain special work permits while pursuing PR through the PNP;
• Speeding up processing of family sponsorship applications for family members living outside Canada;
• Issuing a total of 80,000 – 84-000 Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA)-based work permits annually under the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP), down from 184,000 in 2023;
• Reducing temporary resident levels to 5% of Canada’s population;
• Limiting annual permanent resident admissions to no more than 1% of Canada’s population;
• Maintaining the intake cap for study permit applications;
• Increasing the proportion of admitted French-speaking PRs settling outside Quebec to 8.5%; and
• Improving integration of new PRs into the Canadian economy and society through increased funding of settlement services; and
• Expanding online passport renewal.

For its aspirational targets across both temporary and permanent resident applications, IRCC aims to process at least 80% of each application type within its service standards, and aims for at least a 90% client satisfaction rate.

As a results indicator, IRCC aims that at the end of each fiscal year, at least 65% of Canadians will support current immigration levels. In 2023-2024, this figure was 50%—down from 67% in 2021-2022.

IRCC also aims, at the end of each calendar year, for visitors and international students to account for monetary contributions of at least $36 billion to Canada’s economy.

Earlier policy direction

Over the course of 2024, the Canadian federal government undertook a systematic initiative to reduce immigration levels in response to increased pressure on Canada’s infrastructure—particularly housing and social services.

This involved numerous changes, including capping study permit applications for processing, limiting eligibility for PGWPs and SOWPs, and imposing a moratorium on the processing of low-wage LMIAs in census metropolitan areas with an unemployment rate of 6% or higher.