Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Nov. 18th, 2024

[Prof. Herb Emery]

I'm going to focus my response from the perspective of the Atlantic region, which I think has a different context from the cap, which was addressing more of an Ontario-centred problem with the massive growth particularly in colleges.

Atlantic Canada has had increasing dependence on international students, but not at the same rate as the rest of the country. In New Brunswick in particular, it's only been the last couple of years that we've seen what I would even call large growth, but it's not particularly large compared to what you see in some cities in Ontario. As a consequence, the challenge with the cap is that the first mover, Ontario, has done a lot of this expansion in a way that it seems like it's had some pretty negative consequences. The cap, in a sense, makes sense for Ontario, maybe for the large cities, but it is hamstringing the opportunities for other regions like Atlantic Canada to test the waters to see are the students more effective for staying.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Thank you, Professor Emery. I'm going to interrupt you.

Do you think a one-size-fits-all policy for all of Canada is the right approach then?

[Prof. Herb Emery]

Of course not, but it's the one that has often been used for a number of things, including climate policy. It shouldn't be a surprise that we get a one-size-fits-all policy because that's what sells across Canada, but it doesn't work for the Atlantic region.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Professor Emery, do you think this is going to harm Atlantic Canada and its university and college systems?

[Prof. Herb Emery]

I think it will put a lot of strain on the university and college systems in terms of the labour market. It's not clear to me what the bottom line impact will be because we also depend on in- and out-migration, which could include international students from other regions.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Professor Emery, do you know if any of the governments, the universities or colleges were consulted before these changes were introduced?

[Prof. Herb Emery]

I'm not privy to those kinds of conversations, so it wouldn't be fair for me to speculate on what role they might have had.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

My next questions are for Professor Worswick.

I was going to ask about the absorptive capacity which you spoke about. Do you have suggestions on how that would be calculated?

[Prof. Christopher Worswick]

I actually submitted a grant application on Friday.

What we'd like to do is use the surge of the population we've seen over the last seven years to try to estimate it empirically. I think there are things you could do without going to that much trouble. For example, people have compared growth in the housing stock to the growth in the population. If you see that housing is not growing proportionally with the population, that would be a sign that this could be an issue.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

You mentioned at the end of your opening statement the case of fraudulent applications at the Immigration and Refugee Board. There are also other instances of fraudulent activity. We learned at the last meeting of this committee that up to 10,000 fake acceptance letters or fraudulent acceptance letters were identified by IRCC. This was big business. They said that it was only in one year. This is only after they had introduced this two-step or another layer of security on it.

Do you have any other concerns that all these changes introduced have led to more chaos in the immigration system and especially in the processing of applications?

[Prof. Christopher Worswick]

When you change policy and programs too often, there's going to be confusion and uncertainty, but I think there was an issue of just the volume of people coming into the country. Cutting back on the volume coming in is probably going to help, but that isn't really my area of expertise.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Going back to absorptive capacity, you mentioned in your opening statement that a lot of individuals are seeing their work permits or their study permits expire. They don't have an opportunity for renewal, so they're choosing—and this is being reported in the news—to make an application to the Immigration and Refugee Board.

Does that speak to anything else, like more chaos? Will we see that keep growing, and will there be even more questions as to the absorptive capacity of Canada? People will be waiting years before they'll know whether they'll get permanent status in Canada. There's all the uncertainty related to that and the types of survival jobs they'll have to take on in the meantime.

[Prof. Christopher Worswick]

Ideally you would want an international student system and temporary foreign worker system where the people coming in realize that they're here temporarily and they would leave if they're not eligible for permanent residency. I think what you're saying is true, that there obviously are processing limitations.

One could consider extending the work permits, I think, temporarily.

Again, this isn't really my area of expertise, but it strikes me that we are in a moment of tremendous expansion of our international mobility programs and we're now trying to ratchet them back down. I would not be averse to saying that maybe we extend these permits for a year or two.

Beyond that, I think either the immigration system should be able to process all these applications or people should be leaving if they no longer have a legal right to stay in Canada.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Kmiec.

I will go now to MP Ali for six minutes.

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton Centre, ON]

Thank you, Chair, and thank you to the witnesses for being here today.

My question is for Mr. Worswick.

As you know, last month our government introduced a reduction in permanent resident numbers and published population targets for temporary migrants for the first time. In a Globe and Mail news article you recently wrote, you described these changes as a “sensible response to the evolving immigration and macroeconomic situation in Canada.”

Could you elaborate for this committee on your views on these recent changes, as well as changes made earlier this year to Canada's international student program?

Could you also expand on what your recommendations would be for the federal government to consider, to ensure integrity in the system?

[Prof. Christopher Worswick]

The first parts are easier for me.

We've not had limits on a lot of temporary migration pathways in the past. I think that's proven to have been a mistake. I think we should always have targets and limits because of this concern about absorptive capacity.

I would admit it's a notion that immigration economists have been talking about for decades, but it's not that well defined. To get at Professor Emery's point, there might be a different absorptive capacity in Halifax than there is in Toronto. It could well be a regional thing, especially if it's rents that we're concerned about.

I've been very critical of the government allowing the situation to expand to the point where, in July 2024, 7.27% of the population were temporary migrants. I mean, to put it in perspective, the foreign-born population of the United States is 14%. We have the equivalent, per capita, of half of the immigrant population of any age and any vintage of the U.S. that are now temporary residents of Canada.

I was responding to the changes in policy. They made sense. I think this is the direction we have to go. It's an unfortunate circumstance, but that's the situation.

Again, on the integrity of the system, I'm an economist. I'm not a public administration expert, so maybe I'll stop there and answer other questions.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Thank you, Mr. Worswick.

I'll go to the honourable member.

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton Centre, ON]

I represent the riding of Brampton Centre. I had a chance to visit a protest encampment of international students. Professor Emery was talking about different provinces, like Ontario. There's a migration of students from one province to another province. For example, they come into one province and then they move to a different institute, and they transfer to a different province.

Do you think the provinces have a role to play to balance it out by not approving those camps, satellites or mergers in the different areas?

[Prof. Christopher Worswick]

Are you referring to the satellite campuses?

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton Centre, ON]

Yes.

[Prof. Christopher Worswick]

It's a good question.

I don't tend to blame the institutions. I don't think universities and colleges have staff members who are trained as economists necessarily to be able to think about this. Definitely, the federal government has a responsibility. I think the provincial governments have some responsibility. I think this went off the rails. It's either or both, depending on how you think about it.

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton Centre, ON]

You have described our government's recently announced immigration levels plan as a “return to the previous levels of immigration to Canada.”

From your perspective, how might this shift and the recent shift to the international student program contribute to the integrity of Canada's immigration system?

[Prof. Christopher Worswick]

These changes were needed on the immigration front, the temporary foreign worker front and the international student front.

The international student was probably the most problematic sector in the sense that it had grown the most, so I think the targets are.... Our challenge right now is we have a stock of temporary residents in Canada that's very large. I watched the Prime Minister's video. I guess it was released on the weekend or maybe late last week. They were relating it to the long-run trend of the population and trying to get back. That's not a bad way to think about it. It's to say we're way off trend, so how do we get back to it?

One way is to let the temporary resident visas expire. The people who aren't eligible for permanent residency go home or on to somewhere else, and then we get back to a sustainable system. That all makes sense to me.

[Shafqat Ali, Liberal, Brampton Centre, ON]

I'll pass that on.

In your article that I just quoted, it also says “reduce the pressure on our housing and healthcare sectors”. Do you want to elaborate a bit more based on your expertise on that?

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

You have 15 seconds, Professor Worswick.