Tag Archives: Marc Miller

Tough Talk Needed on Border Issues

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Tough talk needed on border issues

“Lay low for 14 days and you’re in as an illegal”

  • National Post
  • 14 Nov 2024
  • JAMIE SARKONAK
With the threat of mass deportations from the U.S., and a policy in Canada that allows unauthorized residents to claim asylum should they lay low for 14 days, it’s only rational for would-be claimants to try, Jamie Sarkonak says.

Currently, as the rules stand, migrants from the United States can cross into Canada, wait two weeks, and become eligible to file a refugee claim here. The northern border sure must be looking like a home-free line, now that Donald Trump has been elected on a promise to carry out mass deportations of illegal migrants.

So, if there was ever a time Canada needed to send a very loud, very public, “no more Mr. Nice Guy” message to economically motivated asylum seekers — firm messaging backed up by policy changes to ward their numbers off — it’s right now.

The numbers are already too high. Last year, nearly 150,000 people staked refugee claims here, rendering us the fifth-largest destination for asylum seekers that year. Two years’ worth of asylum claims are inching their way through the immigration system, many of these from friendly not-at-war countries that have no business sending us thousands of refugees.

India, Nigeria, and Mexico are where the largest number of claims come from, but there are many others that shouldn’t be sending refugees our way. Each successful applicant — from friendly, at-peace countries — is a potential online advertisement for immigration services online; that is, potential inspiration for others looking to claim refugee status. Of course, many of these claimants aren’t actually in danger, as required by law, and are willing to travel home, prompting immigration consultants to make warnings against doing so.

With the threat of mass deportations from the U.S., and a policy in Canada that allows unauthorized residents to claim asylum should they lay low for 14 days, it’s only rational for would-be claimants to try. It could very well be a painful squeeze — the U.S. received 1.2 million asylum claims last year alone, and some fraction of that number can be expected to divert to the north come 2025.

The trek to Canada will be a rational one for many. To observers on the outside, we’re the country that welcomes everyone, hands out bags of free food, offers free care, has loads of jobs to fill along with land, oh so much land. We know this isn’t actually how Canada works, but they don’t.

Seriously. Extensive immigration influencer videos have advertised Canadian “free food” to those abroad, which have no doubt made this country a more attractive place to attempt asylum. Rent is often covered by the Canadian tax base as the wait for claim adjudication drags on — which ultimately puts low-income Canadians in competition with migrants for housing. Some also end up competing with homeless Canadians, taking up critical space in shelters from Vancouver to Toronto.

MANY OF THESE CLAIMANTS AREN’T ACTUALLY IN DANGER.

In health care, it’s a similar problem. These populations strain the health-care system: the Star reported last week that “Midwives and physicians in emergency departments said they’re seeing significantly more uninsured clients accessing care at later stages of a complicated pregnancy or an already developed cancer or AIDS.” The uninsured being, in part, migrants who are in Canada illegally. Bad deal for us, good deal for them.

Between rosy influencer advertising and borders-open messaging from our own Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, a lot more needs to be done to reverse the perception that Canada is a welcome home for economic “refugees.”

The incoming Trump administration has been strong out of the gate in turning around the perception of the United States as a bottomless bread basket of free amenities. Federal and state governments have rolled out unauthorized-friendly initiatives for a while now: feds have done their best to soften deportation rules, and some state governments have offered perks like pre-paid debit cards for migrants, as well as free rent. But Trump’s messaging has been clear that deportations are coming, and his border-enforcer-to-be, Tom Homan, is just as forceful: “You better start packing now, cause you’re going home,” Homan told a crowd earlier this year.

We haven’t been so firm. Visitor visa rules were tightened this week, but the home-free-in-twoweeks line remains in place.

Most of our country’s messaging includes tepid inward-facing assurances that everything is under control. The faceless blob that is the Canadian administrative state says there’s nothing to worry about: the RCMP learned from post-2016 migration which “provided us with the tools and insight necessary to address similar types of occurrences.” The Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) says, “we are ready to respond and adapt as needed.”

Homan, meanwhile, isn’t raving about our competency, stating in a recent TV interview that the northern border is an “extreme national security vulnerability” and that “tough conversations” are soon to be had with Canada.

Meanwhile, Immigration Minister Marc Miller is nonchalant, telling the Globe and Mail: “We will always be acting in the national interest and those measures that we move to undertake, regardless of what decision is taken by the new administration, to make sure that our borders are secure, that people that are coming to Canada do so in a regular pathway, and the reality that not everyone is welcome here.”

Well, that sure sends a message. “Not everyone is welcome here.”

Each statement from Canadian officials has the same bland, inoffensive lack of substance that could only come from either a comms department trained to generate few words of meaning or an AI text generator. None are backed by the force of strong, loophole-closing policy change.

Miller’s job right now isn’t just to soothe Canadians with words as bland as beige walls. He has to dispel years of false impressions of Canadian life inspired by a multitude of enthusiastic foreign-language Youtube and Tiktok howto vlogs about immigration, with rhetoric and hard policy. Right now, he’s falling short.

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THE TRUDEAU GOV’T LIED: THEY PROMISED A REDUCTION IN FOREIGN STUDENTS THIS YEAR, BUT NUMBERS ARE UP AGAIN!

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Foreign student permits are already outpacing 2023’s record numbers

[Last year, as Canadians focused on the impossibly high cost of housing — ownership and rental — even mainline commentators started to suggest that there was a connection to the invasion-level immigration numbers as Justin Trudeau ferociously pursues his policy of replacing Canada’s European founding/settler people. Reluctantly, the Liberal government and Immigration Marc Miller promised to slightly reduce the numbers of foreign students. Empty promise! Another Liberal lie. Numbers this year are up yet again. It must be remembered that every foreign student needs accommodation — either rental or, less frequently, the purchase of a home, thus raising prices even higher. Oh, yes, despite promises of more new housing starts, in fact, housing starts are down from last year. A housing crisis. It’s immigration, stupid. — Paul Fromm]

IRCC numbers say Canada handed out 216,620 international study permits in the first five months of 2024

Author of the article:

Bryan Passifiume

Published Jul 22, 2024  •  Last updated 2 days ago  •  4 minute read

666 Comments

McGill University
McGill University is seen Friday, October 13, 2023 in Montreal. Photo by THE CANADIAN PRESS /Ryan Remiorz

Even as federal Liberal government is pledging to cap the number of international study permits, its own data show Canada is approving permits at a pace faster than last year, which saw a record number of approvals.

According to numbers curated online by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), Canada handed out 216,620 international study permits in the first five months of 2024.

Just 200,205 study permits were handed out during the same time period in 2023.

By the end of 2023, 682,420 study permits had been granted to foreign students.

Canada has been granting the vast majority of permits to India, with 278,335 going to students from that country in 2023, a number nearly five times more than to students from China, the second-highest country of origin, who were granted 58,230 permits in 2023.

Canada’s third-most popular source of international students in 2023 was Nigeria, with 37,575 permits handed out in 2023, followed by the Philippines with 33,830, and Nepal at 15,920.

During the first five months of 2024, Indian students were granted 91,510 permits, more than the 85,805 granted over the same period last year.

Chinese students received 21,240 permits in the first five months of this year, compared to 15,565 granted between January and May 2023.

Nigerians received 12,450 study permits by May 2024, up from 8,150 by May 2023.

For the Philippines, 10,140 permits were granted so far in 2024, up from 9,300 over the same period of time last year.

Applicants from Nepal received 4,655 study permits so far this year, compared to 3,575 between last January and May.

In January, Immigration Marc Miller announced he was putting an intake cap on international student permit applications that he expected to result in approximately 360,000 approved study permits, a decrease of 35 per cent from 2023. 

The federal government has been under pressure over rising numbers of temporary residents amid a housing shortage and ongoing affordability crisis. In 2023, Canada let in a record 800,000 additional non-permanent residents, such as temporary workers and foreign students, bringing to 2.6 million the number of non-permanent residents in the country as of Jan. 1, 2024, Statistics Canada reported.

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The issue came to a head last summer after reports of international students, unable to secure housing, were living rough on the streets and in homeless shelters — including a Conestoga College student from India found sleeping under a bridge in east-end Toronto.

International students were identified as a particular strain on housing and rent affordability in cities across Canada — especially in Ontario, the destination of choice for most foreign scholars.

One food bank in Brampton announced late last year that it was so overrun with international students seeking food, it was no longer allowing them access to their services.

In a statement earlier this year, Miller said the national cap is based on the number of permits expiring in 2024.

Taking into consideration the 20 per cent of students who apply for extensions, Miller put 2024’s target at 606,000 study permit applications, and 364,000 approvals.

“Given the changes to the international student program have not yet seen the traditionally busiest season for study permit processing — summer and early fall — it may be too early to fully assess the data and analyze the impacts, including the intake cap on study permit applications,” IRCC spokesperson Rémi Larivière told the National Post.

Larivière said many factors influence how many new international students will arrive in Canada this fall, including provinces not using their full allocations, changes in approval rates and in-year adjustments.

“As education is a provincial and territorial responsibility, IRCC consulted governments at the provincial and territorial level frequently as the allocations were established,” Larivière said.

“IRCC distributed the adjusted number of study permit applications based on the population share, 2023 volumes and approval rates of each province and territory.”

Conservative immigration critic Tom Kmiec blamed the last nine years of the Trudeau government for the problem of too many temporary residents for the system to handle.

“It is so bad that the current Liberal immigration minister himself said the broken system is ‘out of control’. The previous immigration minister admitted that the system is a ‘complete mess’. Even Trudeau acknowledged their shared failure, calling the system ‘broken,’” he said.

“The Liberal government first allowed corrupt consultants and phoney educational institutions to bring students here under false pretences. Then they promised to fix the mess and bring it under control only to see things become worse amid a growing housing crisis of their making.”

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Canada’s Housing Crisis — It’s Immigration, Stupid!

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Canada’s Housing Crisis — It’s Immigration, Stupid!
National Post (August 11, 2023) below lays out all the figures. The cause of Canada’s horrific housing crisis and the lack of affordability is not some deep mystery. It’s Trudeau’s invasion level immigration intake, now approaching half a million a year — that’s a city almost the size of Hamilton, Ontario (537,000) EVERY year. But that’s not all. Almost another half million foreign bodies — international students and temporary (often not so temporary) foreign workers need rental housing. Yet, Trudeau pal, Marc Miller, the new Immigration Minister shows no sign of reducing the numbers, even in face of the housing shortage. The Bible (Proverbs 26:11) notes: “As a dog returneth to his vomit, so the fool returns to his folly.”  CIC News (August 9. 2023) reported: ” “I don’t see a world in which we lower [immigration targets], the need is too great … whether we revise them upwards or not is something that I have to look at but certainly, I don’t think [we will] lower them.” According to Miller, immigration is not the reason that Canada is facing housing supply challenges across the country. Therefore, Miller takes issue with the fact that immigrants are often blamed for taking away homes from Canadians and causing housing inflation”. Ontario Premier Ford, in the midst of a scandal for selling off portions of the Province’s Green Space for housing, pleaded that Ontario will grow by adding the size of two Torontos — roughly 5.4-million people — in the next decade, almost all immigrants. Yet, foolish Ford does not blame the federal government’s immigration policies — Paul Fromm

Foreign student surge adds to housing crisis

  • National Post
  • 11 Aug 2023
  • Bryan Passifiume

PETER J THOMPSON / NATIONAL POST FILESFor many international students, coming to Canada means fighting a tight entry-level rental market.

Record numbers of international students coming to Canada is making the already inflated cost of housing worse, said Steve Pomeroy, a policy research consultant and senior research fellow at Carleton University’s centre for urban research.

The biggest strain on Canada’s housing market, he said, isn’t only the rising rate of permanent residents, with more than 400,000 permanent residents in 2022, and the Liberal government determined to hit 500,000 a year in the next couple of years. Those coming here seeking temporary residence, either temporary foreign workers or international students, are fuelling rental price increases.

“Temporary foreign workers and students are going to be renters, as opposed to owners,” he said.

Average rents nationally jumped more than 10 per cent last year and are expected to rise again this year, although rents in hotter markets, such as Toronto and Vancouver, are up significantly more.

Data released earlier this year by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) show 807,750 international students with valid student visas studying at Canadian post-secondary institutions as of the end of 2022.

At 30 per cent higher than the 617,315 students in 2021, it’s now at the highest level it’s ever been.

With the exception of 2020, where numbers were impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic, Canada’s complement of international students historically saw between six to nine per cent growth annually.

Pomeroy said universities are driving the numbers as a way to generate more revenue, because they can charge international students much higher tuitions.

“In Ontario, university tuition fees are frozen, grants are frozen, but the only variable that universities have to generate new revenues is international students, so they naturally go and chase those,” he said.

More visiting students, he said, create inordinate demand at the very bottom of the rental market, where there’s already a tight market for low-income workers, fixed-income seniors and those who rely on social assistance.

Benjie Rustia, an official with an international immigration and study agency located near the Philippine capital of Manila, said his international-student clients know that coming here means fighting

fighting a tight entry level rental market.

“They are well informed by their relatives or friends in Canada,” he told the National Post.

“Making informed decisions is the basic aspect for the process for international students, and are based on thorough research and understanding.”

Late last month, news of an international student from India found living under an east Toronto bridge brought attention to the problem, and highlighted concerns from advocates that Canada’s affordability crisis is rendering increasing numbers of foreign students homeless.

Most international students coming to Canada flock to Ontario, which in 2022 saw more than 411,000 foreign students enrolled in the province’s post-secondary institutions.

British Columbia ranked second with 164,000 students last year, followed by Quebec with 93,000, Alberta with 43,000 and Manitoba with 22,000.

While India’s 319,130 international students rank as Canada’s biggest cohort, followed by China with 100,075, the Philippines is seeing big bumps in the number of their students coming here.

Canada issued 25,295 study permits to Filipino students to study here in 2022, a 76 per cent increase from the 14,355 visas issued to students from that country in 2021.

As of June 2023, 11,400 permits were issued to students from the Philippines.

Rustia said his clients typically search for schools that offer on-campus residence living or look for schools near where they can stay with friends and relatives already in the area.

News reports on Wednesday described long wait-lists for on-campus housing at Calgary universities, with 740 students waiting for housing at the University of Calgary, and the city’s Mount Royal University establishing a waiting list for their 950 dorm rooms for the first time in the school’s history.

Solving this problem, Pomeroy said, could be done by striking partnerships between schools, governments and developers.

“If the government was smart, it would say ‘OK, we’re causing the problem by giving out these visas to international students, how can we solve this problem,’” he said.

“Let’s work with the universities, let’s work with the private developers for some incentives and stimulus.”

He suggested using existing programs, such as the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation’s rental construction financing initiative — which provides low-cost loans to encourage rental apartment projects — to encourage student-centred rental construction to keep the pressure off local residential rental markets.

A statement to the National Post from Universities Canada, a post-secondary institution lobby group, agreed the federal government should be doing more to address the issue.

“Solving the housing crisis will require collaboration among all levels of government, and universities remain willing partners in these efforts,” wrote interim president Philip Landon.

Canada’s universities, he wrote, are doing more to approve and build more on-campus housing, as well as provide resources to help students access off-campus living space, as well as developing “innovative housing models” to relieve local rental market pressures.

Emails to Immigration Minister Marc Miller went unacknowledged.

Tom Kmiec, the Conservative party’s immigration and citizenship critic, said that the current government’s housing and immigration policies are leaving newcomers on the streets.

“More homes were being built in 1972 when Canada’s population was half of what it is today,” he said in a statement.

“The Liberal government has failed to deliver on their housing promises and failed to come anywhere close to building the number of houses we need, leaving Canada short millions of homes and Canadians struggling to afford a place to live.”

a tight entry level rental market.

“They are well informed by their relatives or friends in Canada,” he told the National Post.

“Making informed decisions is the basic aspect for the process for international students, and are based on thorough research and understanding.”

Late last month, news of an international student from India found living under an east Toronto bridge brought attention to the problem, and highlighted concerns from advocates that Canada’s affordability crisis is rendering increasing numbers of foreign students homeless.

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