{"id":127642,"date":"2017-10-31T02:11:57","date_gmt":"2017-10-31T06:11:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/?p=127642"},"modified":"2017-10-31T02:11:57","modified_gmt":"2017-10-31T06:11:57","slug":"numbers-of-newcomers-in-2018-not-only-question-for-immigration-plan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/2017\/10\/31\/numbers-of-newcomers-in-2018-not-only-question-for-immigration-plan\/","title":{"rendered":"Numbers of newcomers in 2018 not only question for immigration plan"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"FILE:<\/a>
FILE: Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen offered no details Monday. (Photo<\/a>: Ahmed Hussen\/Twitter<\/a>)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

OTTAWA \u2014 A possible clue to how the federal Liberal government will arrive at its annual\u00a0immigration\u00a0targets for 2018, to be unveiled Wednesday, can be found in a similar provincial plan unveiled just last week.<\/p>\n

Quebec \u2014 which sets its own\u00a0immigration\u00a0targets in connection with the federal government \u2014 is aiming to bring in some 51,000 people, a target that is unchanged from 2017.<\/p>\n

That has observers saying they expect the federal numbers for next year to remain largely in line with the 2017 goal of 300,000 newcomers, though a slight bump is likely.<\/p>\n

Immigration\u00a0Minister Ahmed Hussen offered no details Monday.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe main priority will be to focus very strongly on the real need of employers, and many sectors of the economy, saying we need\u00a0immigration,\u201d Hussen said before question period.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need skilled immigrants to not only come and fill certain jobs, but also create more jobs for everyone else, and prosperity for all of us.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2016, the government’s economic advisory council recommended boosting levels to 450,000 over the next five years to address an aging workforce and declining birth rate, both of which are leaving major gaps in Canada’s labour market.<\/p>\n

But that bumps up against practical considerations, said Kareem El-Assal, a senior researcher with the Conference Board of Canada.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt would require a significant increase in federal government expenditures to hire visa officers to send them overseas and whatnot, and the question is where will the money come from.\u201d<\/p>\n

The same holds true of a call for the government to set\u00a0immigration\u00a0targets for a wider window, not just annually. At the last federal-provincial meetings of ministers responsible for\u00a0immigration, all emerged united on the need for a multi-year approach. Many eyes are on whether Hussen follows through.<\/p>\n

Being able to plot out\u00a0immigration\u00a0over a longer period of time would lend additional certainty for everyone from employers to refugee settlement agencies, who are among those calling for a three-year planning document.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe challenges and opportunities that\u00a0immigration\u00a0provides to this country necessitate a much broader public consultation than one focused on annual levels planning,\u201d said the Canadian Immigrant Settlement Sector Alliance in its briefing note to Hussen on the\u00a0immigration\u00a0plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe strongly believe that we should be moving beyond annual level plans to multi-year\u00a0immigration\u00a0level plans.\u201d<\/p>\n

Hussen wouldn’t say Monday whether that’s his plan.<\/p>\n

When the issue was raised with focus groups earlier this year, some respondents said they felt a multi-year approach would give immigrants false hope that if their application wasn’t accepted one year, it might be the next.<\/p>\n

And backlogs are already plaguing many parts of Canada’s\u00a0immigration\u00a0system.<\/p>\n

For example, the 2017 levels plan called for about 15,000 people to be admitted under the in-Canada asylum system. So far this year, there have been upwards of 35,000 claims filed in Canada, thanks to a surge in asylum seekers at the border \u2014 10,000 of those claims are still pending before the\u00a0Immigration\u00a0and Refugee Board.<\/p>\n

Hussen said Monday that space will be created within the levels plan to address backlogs, but at the same time he also suggested refugee levels will be maintained.<\/p>\n

That’s sure to be a disappointment to the United Nations, which is also watching the plan closely to see whether Canada increases spaces for resettled refugees. The UN had hoped to see Canada take the lead at a time when the politics in other countries \u2014 most notably the U.S. \u2014 have led to refugee programs being scaled back.<\/p>\n

But domestic politics is at play as well, said Jack Jedwab, the executive vice-president of the Association for Canadian Studies.<\/p>\n

While the same socio-cultural concerns about\u00a0immigration\u00a0that dominate political debate around the globe don’t seem to be as much in play in Canada, they still underpin the\u00a0immigration\u00a0debate here to an extent, he said, so the government will only go far.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think they feel that there is still come concern out there about a significant increase and they want to be sensitive to that.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

OTTAWA \u2014 A possible clue to how the federal Liberal government will arrive at its annual\u00a0immigration\u00a0targets for 2018, to be …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":33,"featured_media":121830,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[23994,30566,23331],"class_list":["post-127642","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-immigration","tag-23994","tag-immigration-plan","tag-newcomers","mauthors-stephanie-levitz","mauthors-the-canadian-press"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/33"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=127642"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/127642\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/121830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=127642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=127642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/canadianinquirer.net\/v1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=127642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}