First, allow me to introduce Accueil liaison pour arrivants, or ALPA. The mission of ALPA, which has been actively involved in immigration for 35 years, is to provide immigrants with integration, francization, employment assistance and regionalization services.
An average of 4,000 persons, in all immigration classes, make use of ALPA's services every year. As a front-line immigration and socio-professional integration organization, we are here to today to offer the committee our field observations of the immigration situation in Quebec as it pertains to the subject of your study on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the immigration system.
We should note from the outset that the current situation is exceptional, unprecedented in recent history. We are flying without instruments and doing all we can to minimize its impact on individuals, the human beings who are the focus of our presentation. We applaud this initiative, which is a special opportunity to inform Parliament about the situation of these people and to provide some perspective on the situation.
Today's application backlogs and processing delays stem from a structural problem that predates the COVID-19 pandemic. We had previously observed it, but the present situation has truly revealed and exacerbated the phenomenon. We have noted increased anxiety levels in applicants associated with administrative procedures and the uncertainty of not knowing whether they will receive an acknowledgement of receipt, for example, or whether their files are before the authorities who must review their applications. Applicants need an acknowledgement of receipt to gain continued access to Quebec's health insurance plan. Immigrants need reassurance in coping with these feelings of powerlessness.
Time is also a factor in the anxiety they experience. When documents expire, newcomers must refile applications, particularly for medical examinations. Depending on the size of family units, these costs may be increasingly costly for the individuals we assist. Consider the example of Ms. Belkacem—a pseudonym, of course—a social worker in Montreal whose Quebec acceptance certificate, a document valid for 24 months and required for permanent residency, has expired. As a result, if her permanent residency file is returned to her for additional information, for example, she may have to start immigration proceedings all over again and may even be forced to leave the country as she waits for a positive outcome.
We have also observed situations in which the documents of persons overseas were expiring, a situation that causes intense stress for those individuals. For example, it is hard for permanent residents whose permanent resident cards have expired to obtain permanent resident travel documents that allow them to return to Canada. A similar situation occurs for foreign students stuck in their home countries whose student permits have also expired. The same is true of those whose work permits have expired and may not be renewable or who have no way to find a new employer.
Anxiety as a result of administrative procedures may be exacerbated by situations of confinement, isolation or challenges associated with family reunification, which cause numerous family issues. Prolonged family separation—and we see this—often causes mental and physical health problems, a situation worsened where members awaiting family reunification are minor children whose only living parent is in Canada. We in fact see that many clients of ours who are protected persons have minor children who have remained in their countries. So we feel the situation has been complicated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
In short, extended processing delays worsen a situation that is already tough for many people. The danger is that they can cause major disappointment with the host country, discourage plans to migrate here and undermine Canada's international credibility, as Louise Arbour recently noted.
The processing of temporary resident visas of course has an impact on family reunification, but I would also say that delays raise language issues for international students, mainly those from francophone Africa. Delays affect and undermine the weight that French carries in Canada as a whole. We also know that the pandemic has affected student immersion in francization training. Isolation slows students' progress in learning about Quebec culture, the language barrier is thus eroded, and a language gap appears that will truly be hard to bridge.
There are issues regarding the next generation of workers trained by our educational institutions.
We also work in partnership with businesses. Those businesses say they find it difficult to anticipate the situation. Many recruit labour internationally and devote considerable time and energy to recruitment efforts, but they still don't know when…