Citizenship and Immigration committee  There are definitely many in existence. I think when we looked at the announcement last week around the additional 2,000 NOC C spaces under the provincial nominee programs, that was one of the key mandate letter deliverables in terms of increasing those pathways to permanent residence.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  It was 50,000 who transitioned in 2017 from having whatever status they had as a temporary worker to being a permanent resident.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Looking at the multiple pathways that a temporary worker has to staying permanently, when we look at the number of workers who transitioned to permanent residency in 2017, it was 50,000.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  There's been a rise. I don't have the historical data. We'd be happy to provide it.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  To come back to the 21,000, it's not an allotment; it's just the volume that we've seen since the program was introduced in June 2017. Under the banner of global skills strategy, 21,200 work permits have been approved since June 2017.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  It's one of the tools in the tool box. I think when we talk about temporary and permanent, the global skills strategy.... One of the reasons the GSS was put in place was to create the conditions for companies to access the top talent they need when they need it, hence the pillars of the global skills strategy: two-week processing for certain workers and dedicated service for firms and employers to attract that investment and that business to Canada

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I don't yet, no.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I'm happy to. A lot of the detail will be announced at a later date. In terms of the new pilots that will be introduced later this year, one thing that we heard about and the lesson that we're trying to learn with these programs—based on a lot of the input and the consultations that we've done with stakeholders and caregivers over the last year—is the pre-vetting.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  The medical exam.... I don't have that for you right now. We do intend to have language and education—everything but the work experience—assessed before they even come to Canada to create the clarity that once the caregiver is here and they've done their two years of work experience in the professions that are being considered for the pilots, then they're eligible for permanent residence.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  It's assumed in the pre-vetting. The application forms and all of the information will be made public later this year. I think, in terms of the actual nitty-gritty, it's something that we'd be happy to come back to the committee about. We'll be engaging with caregivers and stakeholders later this year in terms of the specifics of what that program will look like, but the—

Citizenship and Immigration committee  It will be later this year.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  The best advice the department has provided to the caregiver community is to apply once. “Do not apply twice” has been the advice. If a caregiver qualifies for the existing pilots, right now those haven't reached their caps, and they are being processed in six months. For the interim pathway that was announced and that is now accepting applications, that application period will be longer; it will be 12 months.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Maybe that's more for the immigration side of the house. The short answer is that where we're managing volumes on the temporary side with the annual levels plan, it's setting out what the priorities are per category of immigration. Not to be trite about it, but it's a bit of a numbers game of who and what priorities exist.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  When I look at 2017, 50,000 former temporary foreign workers transitioned to permanent residents. That's the highest number ever, in terms of those transitions. If you look at the suite of programming that exists—from different work permit programs to the Atlantic immigration pilot, and the proposed rural and northern immigration pilot—how do we try to create those conditions to be able to either retain workers who are already there, or attract workers into communities where there's a labour shortage?

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Sure. On the first part, the announcement was made last week of the introduction of 2,000 new spaces under the provincial nominee programs. We've distributed these to all the provincial nominee programs, to give a bit more space to transition temporary foreign workers—folks who are there, whom we require in the labour force—and retain them as permanent residents.