Sure.
Mr. Chairman, the table simply shows you the two main categories of family class: family class one, spouses and dependent children; and family class four, parents and grandparents.
It shows you that the planning range last year for family class one, spouses and children, was between 42,000 and 45,000. We actually estimate to have landed just under 44,000.
This year we are increasing--repeat, increasing--the planning range for spouses and children, the priority category, to between 45,500 and 48,000.
Now, in order to accommodate that increase in spouses and children, we've had to have a modest reduction in the lower-priority category under the act, which is category FC4, parents and grandparents. Last year the planning range was 15,000 to 18,000, and this year the planning range is 13,000 to 17,500.
So in terms of the total family class that we're projecting this year in our planning range, last year it was between 57,000 and 63,000, and this year it's between 58,500 and 65,500.
This chart gives you a perspective on the two different categories. Green represents spouses and children; blue represents parents and grandparents. What you can see here is that we always have many more spouses and children than parents and grandparents, and the numbers are about consistent.
You'll also notice that our planning range, if we come in midway between our planning range this year, will actually exceed the average over the past decade in terms of family class. Most importantly, it will be going up, as you can see, from 2010 to 2011.
There's another element here that I think a lot of people lose track of. While we bring in people through these two categories, in fact the majority of people who arrive in Canada in a given year, under the economic categories, are actually not primary economic immigrants who we assessed according to their human capital, under the federal skilled worker program, the Canadian experience class, provincial nominee,
and the Quebec Skilled Worker Program, but rather dependants, that is spouses and children of primary immigrants.
They are primary immigrants. Here you will see families as a percentage of total immigrant admissions. The green bar represents primary immigrants. These are typically heads of households, typically primary economic immigrants. In some cases it might be a successful asylum claimant who has family members attached to his application. The purple bars represent family members. As you can see, the ratio is about two to one. On average, 65% of immigrants coming to Canada are actually family members.
It is kind of extraordinary if you see it in proportion. You'll see that the numbers are pretty consistent over the past 17 years.
Here you will see the same thing expressed in terms of absolute numbers. Last year, 2010, was the largest number for intake of immigrants in 57 years, overall, at 281,000, of whom 180,000 were family members, either family class or arriving with the primary immigrants who represented 101,000. You can see that, in fact, last year was the largest intake for family members of our immigration system in 30 years.
Finally, you can see here family members immigrating to Canada by year. You will see again that in 2010 we have the largest number of family members coming to Canada—here it shows you since 1993, but in fact it is in the past 30 years. The point here is that there are a lot of immigration policy experts criticizing Canada, saying that we don't put enough weight on human capital, on potential workers, taxpayers, and some people say there is too much emphasis on family. When I hear some critics say that we are actually cutting and slashing the family class, instead of falling for that kind of demagoguery we need to actually look at the numbers and put all of this in perspective.
The second issue I'd like to briefly address, Mr. Chairman, relates to settlement funding. We believe it's important to invest in the success of newcomers, so they can realize their potential. That's why our government, when it came to office, cut the right of landing fee in half. That has saved nearly $2,000 for the average family of four with two children over the age of 18. It has saved more than $300 million for immigrant families since 2006.
In addition, when we came to office we decided to triple the federal investment in settlement services, and over the past five years that represents an incremental investment of $1.4 billion that were not being invested in things like free language classes and other settlement services.
We have to make sure that those funds are going to where the immigrants are. Immigrant patterns change. Settlement patterns change. In fact, what we see is, for example, fewer immigrants going to Ontario—Toronto in particular—and more going to the prairie provinces and the Atlantic provinces. We have developed, in consultation with the provinces, a new settlement funding allocation formula based on objective criteria to ensure that all newcomers across Canada benefit from similar levels of service.
This has meant reducing funding levels in three provinces while increasing them in seven provinces and the three territories. For example, we have seen funding for Ontario more than triple since 2005, from $111 million to $390 million, while at the same time, the number of newcomers choosing to live in Ontario has fallen by 24% from 141,000 to 106,000. That is more and more money for fewer and fewer immigrants. On the flip side, Saskatchewan has seen more than a tripling of the number of immigrants and the settlement funding increases have not been able to keep pace. What we have is a new formula that will seek to equalize things over the next couple of years. It will result in increased settlement funding for Newfoundland and Labrador, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, Yukon, Northwest Territories, and Nunavut, and Quebec will also have an increase under its own accord and the automatic escalator within it.
This new formula will equalize funding at about $3,000 per immigrant, whereas in Ontario immigrants are now receiving about $3,500 per immigrant, as opposed to say $2,900 per immigrant in Saskatchewan. That's just not fair. We need fairness in settlement funding. That's why we've made these changes.
Some would say, well, why not just increase the overall budget to equalize the funding rather than reallocating it away from the overfunded areas? There are three very simple reasons. First, we've already increased the settlement budget by 300%. Second, this funding increase has not been matched by uptake in the number of clients; I saw one estimate that says there's been an increase of about 31%, notwithstanding a funding increase of 300%. And third, that would be an unjustifiable expense of, I estimate, something in the range of an additional $50 million tax dollars annually. That's money that we quite frankly don't have, and that we certainly can't reallocate from within our department. It would mean cutting immigration levels by reprofiling money from our aid base, which deals with actual immigration processing.
Now, even within Ontario there have been changes in settlement patterns. There are fewer newcomers arriving in Toronto, with a lot more going to York region, for example. So Toronto will get a relatively modest reduction in funding and York will get a huge increase in settlement funding, in the range of 43%.
I would make one last point, Mr. Chairman. There's been some coverage about some of the settlement provider organizations with whom we will not be continuing our contribution agreements.
We did a request for proposals. We received hundreds of proposals. We assessed them. Our public servants assessed them objectively. We also looked at past performance and efficiency.
We looked at, as you can see on these maps.... On the left, just there, it shows the number of settlement provider organizations in Toronto proper in about 2005. Here, on the right, are the settlement provider organizations located in Toronto this year, after these reallocations are done. You can see, then, how much more coverage there is. And in point of fact, there is some duplication. We don't want to waste tax dollars with duplication, so there has to be some rationalization.
Having said that, of the approximately 250 organizations that we've been funding, over 80% will continue in Ontario to receive the contribution agreement as partners with us. About 37 we have not continued because they just didn't meet the objectives, but there will be 30 new settlement provider organizations with whom we partner. They represent innovation and new ideas, which we think is a positive thing.
