Important Announcement: IRCC Tightens Student Visa Quotas and Changes PGWP Regulations.
Today, September 18, 2024, Canada's Minister of Immigration, Marc Miller, announced significant changes to Canada's student visa and post-graduate work permit (PGWP) programs. Accordingly, the Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) will only issue 437,000 student visas in 2025. This figure represents a 10% reduction from the target of 485,000 new visas in 2024 and will remain stable for 2026.
Tightening student visa quotas:
- Reduced number of student visas: IRCC anticipates issuing fewer than 300,000 student visas in the next few years. This means that not everyone who wants to study in Canada will have the opportunity.
- Provincial Attestation Letter (PAL): Master's and doctoral students are no longer exempt from the PAL requirement. IRCC will allocate approximately 12% of its enrollment quota to this group of students due to the benefits they bring to the Canadian labor market.
- Objective: Minister Miller emphasized that Canada's immigration system needs to remain stable and sustainable.
Changes to PGWP requirements:
- Language requirements: For PGWP applicants, there will be new language proficiency requirements. Specifically, university graduates need to achieve Canadian Language Benchmark (CLB) 7 , and college graduates need to achieve CLB 5 when applying after November 1st.
- Reduced number of PGWPs: IRCC expects to issue 175,000 fewer post-graduation work permits over the next three years.
Restrictions on Spousal Open Work Permits:
- Work permits will only be granted to spouses of master's program students whose study period is at least 16 months. This is expected to reduce the number of work permits by 50,000 over the next three years.
- Aside from student programs, work permits for spouses will only be granted to individuals whose spouse is a Canadian citizen or permanent resident working in essential sectors.
Impact on the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP):
- Unemployment rate rises: The unemployment rate in Canada increased from 6.4% to 6.6% between April 2023 and August 2024. Approximately 1.5 million people are unemployed, an increase of 60,000 from the previous month.
- TFWP Restrictions: New measures aimed at reducing the number of temporary workers in Canada in the near future.
Other steps to reduce the number of temporary residents:
- The end of the COVID-era policy allows some visitors to apply for work permits from within Canada.
- Processing of Labour Market Impact Assessments (LMIAs) in the low-wage sector of TFWP for jobs in urban Canada with unemployment rates of 6% or higher has been temporarily suspended.
- Consider significant changes to the issuance of post-graduation work permits (PGWP) for international students, linking the issuance to educational programs that align with in-demand sectors in the Canadian economy.
Looking Towards the Future:
Minister Miller is also considering options to adjust the level of permanent residency immigration to Canada, with the goal of maintaining balance and stability in the immigration system.
Find Opportunities Through the Start-Up Visa Program:
Despite increasingly stringent restrictions on immigration and temporary work programs in Canada, the Start-Up Visa program continues to offer opportunities for innovative startups. However, the selection criteria are becoming stricter. Currently, there are still vacancies for applications for permanent residency (PR) under this program.
📅 Register for the workshop on September 21st, featuring lawyers and leading experts in the field of innovative startups, to gain a better understanding of the Start-Up Visa program and find a path to Canada for you and your family.
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