Canadians want the federal government to implement even deeper cuts to immigration, beyond the 20 percent reduction implemented this year, in-house research from the immigration department suggests.
“Over half of surveyed Canadians, 54 percent, say they feel there are too many immigrants coming into Canada,” said a department report, which was drawn from a poll of 2,500 Canadians.
While the federal government plans to reduce the number of permanent residents from 500,000 to 395,000 in 2025, the majority of respondents to the survey, 52 percent, said that number was still too high, according to the report, which was first obtained by Blacklock’s Reporter.
Forty percent of respondents said “housing concerns” was their primary reason for saying immigration numbers remain too high. Another 25 percent cited “jobs and the economy,” 22 percent said “competition for social supports,” 11 percent said “pressure on healthcare,” and 9 percent cited “concerns about culture.”
The report found that respondents from the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Ontario were most likely to say too many immigrants are entering Canada. Sixty-one percent of Albertans said so, followed by 59 percent in Saskatchewan, 58 percent in Ontario, 56 percent in British Columbia, 53 percent in both Manitoba and Prince Edward Island, 52 percent in Nova Scotia, 44 percent in Québec, 41 percent in New Brunswick, and 39 percent in Newfoundland and Labrador.
Additionally, 41 percent of Canadians said their cities or towns are receiving too many immigrants, while 39 percent said the number was appropriate, and 11 percent said there are too few immigrants.
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Twenty-nine percent of those polled said there were too many refugees entering Canada from abroad, 38 percent said it was the right amount, and 17 percent there were too few being brought in.
The federal government announced last October it would reduce the number of permanent residents admitted into Canada over the next three years, with the targets falling from 500,000 new permanent residents in each of the next two years to 395,000 in 2025 and 380,000 in 2026. The number would drop further in 2027 to 365,000.
Immigration Minister Marc Miller also announced in January 2024 a two-year intake cap on the number of international student permit applications, bringing the number down from the approximately 560,000 student visas issued in 2023 to roughly 360,000 approved study permits for 2024. A total of 200,000 fewer international students were let into Canada this fall compared to last year, according to the immigration department.
Canada’s population increased from 38 million in July 2020 to an estimated 41.6 million as of Feb. 20. According to a July 2024 Statistics Canada report, 96 percent of the population growth in the second quarter of 2024 was due to immigration.
