Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Feb. 23rd, 2026

[Nino Melikidze]

I will not lie: I have not seen a lot of applicants for the rural community programs, because we deal with more general programs like express entry, and if we're talking about provincial nominee programs, we're talking about the biggest streams.

That being said, I don't know about renewals exactly, but when it comes to work permits in general, we have seen the processing times go up significantly since 2024. If processing took a couple of months before, we're looking at six-plus months of processing time with certain work permits right now. There have definitely been longer processing times and ongoing delays in that category.

Study permits also have been delayed. I know, for example, that you can't even apply for the start-up visa open work permit. People who did apply before have had their applications cancelled, or it is taking so long to process that it's close to impossible to get it.

From that point of view, I can speak to it. However, in terms of the exact question that you asked, unfortunately, I do not have the data, but I can look it up for you afterward if you like.

[Alexis Deschênes, Bloc, Gaspésie—Les Îles-de-la-Madeleine—Listuguj, QC]

Now let's talk about francophone immigration.

You're not the only one to have mentioned it. In fact, again this morning, we saw an article where Evan Green, an immigration lawyer, somewhat reiterates your idea that benchmarks for francophone immigration would ultimately be bad public policy.

You claim that the government decided to increase francophone immigration thresholds for political reasons. In fact, it's quite simply to prevent the French language from disappearing outside Quebec. I spent a year in Saskatchewan, and I can tell you that assimilation is rampant there.

That said, there's this increasing narrative that says that imposing a language criterion would rig the immigration system.

Can you explain that? I need to understand how having a francophone immigration requirement is bad public policy.

[Nino Melikidze]

I do not think it's a bad public policy to have levels for francophone immigration. I just think it's being implemented incredibly incorrectly, in a way that's actually hurting Quebec, first and foremost. If you look up the government's initial data regarding francophone immigration—I can find the ATIP for this—over 80% of immigrants who come in under the federal francophone programs end up coming to Quebec, at the end of the day, because there is a lack of employment opportunities outside Quebec for purely French speakers.

That being said, it's not a problem if they go to francophone communities, which is what I recommended in my brief. They should go to specific francophone communities outside Quebec. However, because they're coming in through express entry, they go anywhere in the country—it does not matter. Look at the level of qualification these applicants have. They're generally quite low-skilled, which is why I argued that, regarding the point difference. They don't have the bilingual component, so they're not fluent enough in English to pick up an English-speaking job. You then have a flood of lower-skilled immigrants whose primary skill—what they got selected for—is French. They come to Canada, look for employment opportunities outside francophone communities, primarily, and are unable to settle successfully.

We're recommending tying francophone immigration numbers to francophone communities in order to help facilitate their settlement and help them get employment opportunities, so they don't end up going to Quebec at the end of the day. That's where they're more likely to find employment when they've tried all those resources in other places.

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dzerowicz]

You have one minute left, Mr. Deschênes.

[Alexis Deschênes, Bloc, Gaspésie—Les Îles-de-la-Madeleine—Listuguj, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Ms. Melikidze, how do we realize your proposal to tie immigrants to francophone communities?

How can we achieve that result?

[Nino Melikidze]

The francophone community immigration pilot can be done in two ways.

One, we simply need to be more realistic about our francophone targets. Right now, it's more like a blind idea: “We want this best-case scenario, so we're just going to force it on everyone without thinking through the consequences.”

Two, once we have more realistic numbers, we put them all into the francophone community immigration pilot and direct all these francophone immigrants at a higher number. I think the cap for that program is 5,000 people now. Make it 15,000 or 20,000, and direct those francophone migrants to communities where they can be absorbed and settled successfully.

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dzerowicz]

Thank you, Mr. Deschênes and Ms. Melikidze.

Now we move to our second round. We have about 15 minutes left. We're going to start with Mr. Ho for five minutes, then Mr. Zuberi for five minutes.

Next, Mr. Deschênes will have the floor for two and a half minutes. Then, there will be only three minutes left.

I'm going to give one and a half minutes to Mr. Redekopp and one and a half minutes to Ms. Zahid.

Mr. Ho, you have five minutes.

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

My questions are for Ms. Melikidze.

What year was Immitracker founded?

[Nino Melikidze]

It was in 2022.

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

Since that time, or even before then, what kinds of trends have you noticed in the immigration system?

[Nino Melikidze]

I was part of express entry back in 2018-19. When I first came to Canada and went through this program, it was one of the most incredible things I've ever seen in my life. I genuinely could not believe there was a country doing immigration correctly. I remember telling all of my friends, “This is incredible. They actually understand how to prioritize and rank skilled candidates, and give them potential opportunities to integrate into the economy.”

After 2020, the immigration system became haphazard. This happened for three reasons.

First, there were a lot of one-time measures introduced as a result of COVID to make up for the labour shortages that were going on.

Second, the immigration numbers were increased very blindly. If you look at the immigration levels plans, they kept going higher and higher every year.

Third, there was a lot of ignorance of the fraud going on. We all knew it was happening. I'm very sure people on this committee heard quite a bit about it when it started. They didn't really stop it until it started to become such a big problem that they had to radically overcorrect and stop a lot of programs in their tracks.

The biggest trend I noticed is the ballooning of numbers without thinking about the consequences, and turning a blind eye to a lot of fraud.

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

In recent years, what trends have you observed regarding STEM applicants in the express entry system?

[Nino Melikidze]

As I mentioned to Mr. Davies earlier, the first thing is the pausing of STEM draws. It is a huge blow for a country that has universities like McGill, Mila, U of T and Waterloo. Why are we not giving people who have studied engineering, science and AI a dedicated pathway to stay and integrate into our economy further?

Second, they're going through the general Canadian experience class program, where the bar to meet those scores is incredibly high. The average score for last year, 529, is a very high score. You can have a master's degree and three years of work experience, and you'd still not be reaching that score. That's probably one of the biggest things, frankly.

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

Yes. That's unfortunate. We're seeing that basically the Liberals have effectively abandoned the STEM category and have instead added categories like insurance agents and brokers at a time when we have a productivity crisis and investment is fleeing.

Actually, these are not talking points of mine. These are talking points taken from the costly Liberal budget, that we are in a productivity crisis, and they seem to be moving in the opposite direction.

We saw the Liberals mismanage Canada's immigration system by pretty much flooding Canada with low-skilled temporary workers. Let's talk about high-paid, high-skilled workers. Are you seeing people in high-skilled fields paying taxes, contributing to our system, already living in Canada, wanting to become Canadian and wanting to earn their citizenship? Are you seeing them being blocked from permanent residency because of the mismanagement? Name some examples, if you could.

[Nino Melikidze]

Absolutely. I personally know so many people like that in Toronto. I've known them over the years. They're graduates of good universities who have finally seen the Canadian experience class points drop a little bit now. That was within a month of the expiration of their post-graduation work permits. These were people who were counting the days until their work permits were going to expire. Then they would probably have to pack up and go home, because they were not getting selected in Canadian experience class.

Again, I'm not even talking college grads. I'm talking university grads with two to three years of work experience in high-demand jobs. They already have jobs. They've been paying taxes every single year. They basically had no opportunity to stay, up until these last couple of draws.

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

What kinds of jobs? Could you give me an example, please?

[Nino Melikidze]

They were jobs related to UI/UX—

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

Engineers.

[Nino Melikidze]

—and marketing, along with engineering and software engineering. I mentioned a civil engineer earlier. There was a variety, yes, but all had jobs here.

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

We're seeing that the Liberals broke the immigration system, and we're also seeing massive, unprecedented stress on the health care system. We have a shortage of nurses and doctors. Six million Canadians are without a family doctor. Can you tell me a little bit about how the Liberals mismanaged the immigration system in the health care field specifically?

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dzerowicz]

You have 20 seconds, please.

[Nino Melikidze]

In short, I believe the health care category was brought in too late. I believe it is not being prioritized correctly within. I'm happy to talk to you about those factors after this as well.

More importantly, the numbers for the health care category were too low. As I mentioned in my speech, they got fewer than a third of the francophone spots last year. There were only 14,500 invitations sent out to health care candidates in 2025.

[Vincent Ho, Conservative, Richmond Hill South, ON]

For my last question, how would you—

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dzerowicz]

The time is up. Thank you, Mr. Ho, and thank you, Ms. Melikidze.

If there's anything you feel you haven't finished, or you remember it afterwards, feel free to write to the committee. It's formally accepted and it is part of our study. Thank you so much.

Now we have five minutes for Mr. Zuberi.

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here today.

I'll start with you, Ms. Elfil. Thank you for your testimony and for speaking about the very difficult situation that's going on in Sudan. As you mentioned, it is the largest humanitarian crisis in the world right now, and one that we are seized with.

You spoke a lot about what's happening specifically within the program that you and others from the community in Canada are concerned about. I want to ask more broadly, when it comes to Canada's immigration process, how do you think it can be improved for the most vulnerable populations that are impacted by armed conflict around the world? It would apply to Sudan but also other regions. Do you have suggestions on that? How can we improve our immigration process?