Montreal? “Nooo!” », says Mariana Rodriguez. “ It’s very agitated. Prefiero Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu. [Montréal, c’est trop agité. Je préfère Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu.] »
What there is to know
Asylum seekers leave Montreal to settle in the regions.
This regionalization of care has repercussions on host communities.
The increase in the number of students seeking asylum is “exponential” at the Hautes-Rivières school service center.
More and more asylum seekers, like Mariana Rodriguez, are choosing to leave Montreal to settle in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, a town of 100,000 inhabitants, in Montérégie, where they find jobs and housing, has noted The Press.
This regionalization of care, however, has repercussions on the host communities, which have less experience of immigration and which, above all, do not have the reception structures to properly support these newcomers.
“We feel that there is a big movement happening among asylum seekers who arrived in the last two years and who were initially housed in Montreal,” testifies the director of the Quartier de l’emploi organization, in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Lyne Laplante.
“It’s because it’s super difficult to find accommodation in Montreal with the cost of housing,” she believes.
PHOTO MARTIN CHAMBERLAND, THE PRESS
The director of the Quartier de l’emploi organization, Lyne Laplante
As there are some who have settled in Saint-Jean, people talk to each other. We tell them to come to our region. So we have requests every week. We help them as best we can with local resources and we provide rapid job placement to meet labor needs.
Lyne Laplante, director of the Quartier de l’emploi organization
“But we also face a shortage of housing in our territory. It’s certain that all of this has an impact,” continues M.me The plant.
“It’s exploding in our region”
At the beginning of the 2000s, there were very few immigrants in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, recalls Mme The plant.
“They were Roger Tremblay, typically white, Quebecois. Today, we have many people with immigrant backgrounds. We have crossed 5000 to 6000 per 100,000 population. There are more and more of them with the arrival of temporary foreign workers. It’s exploding in our region. »
The Hautes-Rivières school service center (CSSDHR), which brings together 50 educational establishments and 22,000 students, must also deal with this new clientele.
“For us, the increase is exponential, in proportion,” says Marie-Claude Huberdeau, general director of the school service center.
Asylum seeker students, last year we had 28. Already this year we have 32. My school organization department anticipates an increase of 40% this year. So, we will definitely go to 40 asylum-seeking students.
Marie-Claude Huberdeau, general director of the Hautes-Rivières school service center
These students often speak neither French nor English, but their number is insufficient to justify the creation of reception classes. The Hautes-Rivières school service center opts instead for service points, the number of which increased from two to three recently.
“With us, the students are not full-time in francization,” explains M.me Huberdeau. They go to service points to benefit from francization services on an ad hoc basis, depending on their level of French learning. This is the model we chose because we do not have the critical mass to have a class of toddlers, a class of end of primary and secondary students. »
But beyond learning French, these are students who need to be supported, adds the director.
“Asylum seekers sometimes have a very difficult migratory journey,” she emphasizes. These students have seen and experienced things that can leave lasting consequences. Some arrive mortgaged and with significant delays in schooling. So, we must not only make them French, but offer them support services adapted to the child’s experience. »
Four months in the hotel
Mariana Rodriguez, 26, is one of these newcomers. She arrived in Quebec on January 22, via Roxham Road – now closed – with her partner, Geris Araque, 35 years old.
“Latino culture does not allow you to live a homosexual life,” she explains.
Both crossed the Americas to reach Canada, where they hope to obtain refugee status, passing through Ecuador, Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico and United States. On foot, by bus and hitchhiking. A journey that lasted a month.
If they decided to settle in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, it is because it is in this city that they were accommodated upon arriving in Quebec.
Hotels and accommodation sites were full to bursting at the start of the year in Montreal, as around a hundred migrants entered Quebec every day to seek asylum in the country. The federal government, at the request of Quebec, transported asylum seekers to Ontario, notably to Niagara Falls, but it also rented rooms in Quebec hotels in the region.
Mariana and Geris were hosted at the Quality Inn in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu for four months. In this hotel, they met Jairo Henriquez, another asylum seeker from Venezuela, who arrived in Quebec on November 25, 2022 via Roxham Road.
$20 and $23 per hour
All three lived in Montreal, after their stay at the Quality Inn, but returned to Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, where they began their French courses after a few months of waiting.
In a smaller town, asylum seekers can also nest more easily.
“For them, who do not speak French or English, it was difficult to find work,” explains Mody Alegria, advisor to the Employment District. “So they decided to come back here. »
PHOTO MARTIN CHAMBERLAND, THE PRESS
Employment District Advisor Mody Alegria
Jairo Henriquez, 47, was an industrial mechanic in his country. In Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, he works as a machinist for the company Acier Sélect, at $23 an hour.
“I like the tranquility of Saint-Jean,” he says.
Geris Araque was a physiotherapist in a military hospital in Venezuela. And Mariana Rodriguez was studying accounting. Both work on the production line of the company Barrette Structural, which has a factory in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu. They get $20 an hour.
“They are in food jobs, to allow them to settle in well, while waiting for their asylum application to be heard and accepted, until they become recognized refugees and can apply for permanent residence,” explains Lyne Laplante, director of the Employment District. But it can take two years before their asylum request is heard. So, in the meantime, they will work. »
Up to two years of waiting
The Employment District, in Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, helps asylum seekers find a job, even if they are not entitled to public services, and therefore even if the organization does not receive financial support to care for them. Since the adoption of a decree in 1996, asylum seekers are not eligible for subsidized childcare and employability measures. “Everything we offer them in terms of services, apart from help finding accommodation, is on our hands,” explains the director of Quartier de l’emploi, Lyne Laplante. “These people, while waiting to have a response to their asylum request, it can take two years,” she said. If we leave them on social assistance, they will starve and that will encourage undeclared work. We say to ourselves that it is better to help them find a job quickly, a food job, in local companies. »
Learn more
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- 57%
- At 1er January, Quebec welcomed 57% of asylum seekers present in Canada.
source: Ministry of Immigration, Francisation and Integration