{"id":265146,"date":"2025-11-06T08:18:11","date_gmt":"2025-11-06T08:18:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/265146\/"},"modified":"2025-11-06T08:18:11","modified_gmt":"2025-11-06T08:18:11","slug":"federal-budget-2025-foreigners-living-in-canada-will-get-permanent-residence-priority-immigration-minister-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/265146\/","title":{"rendered":"Federal budget 2025: Foreigners living in Canada will get permanent residence priority, Immigration Minister says"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Job seekers get assistance with resumes at an immigrant job fair in Vancouver. Tuesday’s budget shows the government freezing permanent residents at 380,000 a year for three years.DARRYL DYCK\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

Immigration Minister Lena Diab says her department will prioritize foreigners living in Canada for permanent residency over people applying to settle here from abroad, as she published more details of the number of immigrants who will be allowed to settle here over the next three years.<\/p>\n

Tuesday\u2019s budget set out plans to freeze the number of permanent residents at 380,000 a year for three years. <\/p>\n

But figures published by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada on Wednesday showed that an additional 148,000 permanent residents will be added to the official targets over the next two years through one-off initiatives.<\/p>\n

That includes about 115,000 refugees, who will be allowed to settle here permanently over the next two years on top of the annual targets the government has set. The government also plans to grant an additional 33,000 work-permit holders permanent residency in 2026 and 2027. <\/p>\n

In her introduction to the full immigration levels plan, published on Wednesday, Ms. Diab said her department will \u201cgive priority for permanent residence to temporary residents already living and settled in Canada, further reducing the number of new arrivals.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis in turn will help ease some of the pressure on our infrastructure and social services,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

This budget is a Trump survival plan. Here are the highlights<\/a><\/p>\n

About half of those granted permanent residence this year, according to official figures, are already living in Canada, with many holding work permits. <\/p>\n

On Tuesday the federal government announced a dramatic cut in the number of temporary residents \u2013 halving admissions of international students to Canada in the next three years, while stabilizing the number of permanent residents.<\/p>\n

Ms. Diab was unavailable for comment. Unusually, the annual levels plan was unveiled in the budget and is being spearheaded by Finance Minister Fran\u00e7ois-Philippe Champagne, rather than the Immigration Minister. <\/p>\n

Speaking to a business audience in Montreal on Wednesday, Mr. Champagne said some people have been in Canada for a long time \u201cand we should bring them on the path to permanent residency.\u201d <\/p>\n

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Immigration Minister Lena Diab during Question Period on Oct. 22, 2025. The annual levels plan was announced by the Finance Minister instead of Diab, in an unusual move.Adrian Wyld\/The Canadian Press<\/p>\n

\u201cYou\u2019re no longer really temporary if it\u2019s been four or five years and your little kids are now headed to high school. So we have to look at that in a constructive way,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Economist Henry Lotin, who specializes in immigration policy, said data show that permanent residents who have lived in Canada, for example working here or as students, tend to earn more after they get permanent residency than immigrants brought in from abroad.<\/p>\n

\u201cCrucially, Canadian resident PRs do not add to the strain on housing, health and social services, and infrastructure, as do new arrivals,\u201d said Mr. Lotin, a former federal economist and founder of Integrative Trade and Economics consultancy. <\/p>\n

Mr. Champagne added that Ottawa will prioritize the labour needs of non-urban regions through its temporary foreign worker program<\/a>. The budget document said the immigration levels plan will also \u201cconsider industries and sectors impacted by tariffs.\u201d <\/p>\n

Andrew Coyne: After all the hype, Carney\u2019s first budget fails to meet the moment<\/a><\/p>\n

The government is cutting the number of temporary foreign workers it aims to admit from 82,000 this year to 60,000 next year and 50,000 a year in 2027 and 2028. <\/p>\n

But targets for temporary foreign workers exclude seasonal workers who enter and leave Canada within the same year, such as fruit pickers and other low-wage employees working here for fewer than 270 days.<\/p>\n

Mr. Lotin said not including people who work here for a short time in official targets risks \u201cblurring the line between visitors visas and work visas of short duration.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone who obtains a visa should be counted,\u201d he said, stressing the need for accurate figures to plan for housing and social supports. <\/p>\n

Listen now: Key takeaways from the Carney government\u2019s first budget<\/a><\/p>\n

The immigration blueprint slashes the number of temporary residents \u2013 who include international students \u2013 Canada will admit to 385,000 next year from 673,650 in 2025. It cuts temporary resident numbers further to 370,000 a year in 2027 and 2028. <\/p>\n

The federal government has halved the number of international students<\/a> it plans to admit to Canada. It is also reducing its targets for refugees, including those sponsored privately to come here.<\/p>\n

However, Ottawa is increasing the number of people provinces can nominate for permanent residency from 55,000 this year to 91,500 next year to allow them to select people to fill regional gaps in labour. <\/p>\n

Refugee advocates welcomed the disclosure that 115,000 successful asylum applicants, in a waiting list to obtain permanent residence, will be allowed to settle here over the next two years in the stand-alone scheme. <\/p>\n

Campbell Clark: When the big day came, it wasn\u2019t quite as advertised<\/a><\/p>\n

Gauri Sreenivasan, co-executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees, said it was a \u201chugely overdue initiative.\u201d It will allow those refugees, after being granted permanent residence, to apply to bring in children and other immediate family members they have left in their home countries. <\/p>\n

She estimated that 150,000 successful asylum claimants, granted the status of a protected person who can remain here by Canada\u2019s immigration tribunal, are in a backlog waiting for permanent residence. <\/p>\n

NDP immigration critic Jenny Kwan said the government\u2019s plan \u201crepresents a disappointing retreat from Canada\u2019s historical role as a welcoming, progressive and inclusive country for immigrants, refugees, international students and temporary foreign workers.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said the decision to slash international student numbers, coming on top of previous reductions, will \u201cfurther devastate colleges and universities and the communities that rely on them, while causing job losses across the country.\u201d<\/p>\n

With a report from Nicolas Van Praet<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Job seekers get assistance with resumes at an immigrant job fair in Vancouver.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":265147,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,714,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-265146","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-politics","11":"tag-top-news","12":"tag-top-stories","13":"tag-topnews","14":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265146","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=265146"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/265146\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/265147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=265146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=265146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=265146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}