Krista Schofer
Partner
Article
On April 14, 2021, the Canadian Immigration Minister announced that Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) is creating a new pathway for permanent residency (PR) for 90,000 essential workers, international graduates and French speakers who are currently in Canada.
Following are the three eligible streams:
To promote Canada's official languages and demonstrate the vitality of Francophone communities across Canada, French-language speakers outside Quebec will be eligible to apply through the streams, but will be exempt from the quotas.
Temporary foreign workers in select health care and other selected essential occupations will be required to meet the following criteria:
The occupations for temporary foreign workers are focused on a broad range of health-related occupations and essential occupations. Essential occupations include the following:
Further details on the policy can be found on the Government of Canada's website.
Candidates must meet the following criteria to be eligible under the international student stream:
Further details on the international student stream can be found here.
The new pathways is effective as of May 6, 2021 and will accept applications until the earlier of November 5, 2021 or the program quota is reached.
It is expected the new pathway to PR will result in approximately 400,000 new foreign nationals making Canada their permanent and promoting long-term economic growth in Canada.
This new pathway opens up eligibility for some candidates who might not have otherwise been eligible for PR status in Canada. For example, some of the essential occupations are below skill level B, which is the normal cut off for CEC applicants. The language requirement threshold is also lower than under Express Entry, so some candidates who may have been held back by low language test results may now have a potential path to PR status in Canada.
We anticipate further details about the new PR pathways to be released in the next few weeks prior to May 6, 2021. We also anticipate the quotas for the streams being reached quickly. As such, eligible candidates should take steps to complete their language test as soon as possible if they do not already have valid language test results for PR purposes. Candidates should also be prepared to submit their applications as soon as possible on or after May 6, 2021.
For any questions about temporary or permanent immigration options for Canada, including this new PR pathway, the Gowling WLG Immigration Group would be pleased to assist. Find out more about our Group.
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