Quebec works privately on its immigration reception capacity

The government is working in the shadows to try to better understand and quantify its reception capacity. The economic community has not been able to agree on the factors to consider, according to two employer representatives, but a prototype dashboard has already been circulating for two years.

Documents obtained by The duty thanks to the Access to Information Act show the development of a tool called “Government Immigration Dashboard”. The first two editions were produced in 2022 and 2023, and it “was planned to do an annual update”, confirms the Ministry of Immigration, Francisation and Integration (MIFI). These pages detail 30 indicators measured between 2019 and 2022 by several administrative entities.

Nothing indicates in the documents consulted that reception capacity has been reached, as the Legault government has repeated in recent weeks. Several indicators instead demonstrate “an improvement in results”, it is written, but this vision “remains fragmentary”.

“This information cannot be used to draw conclusions on the reception capacity of Quebec,” the MIFI also writes to us.

However, these are several of the same elements that the government is now asking the scientific community to document in a call for research projects on reception capacity.

“Too vague” indicators

The dashboard was originally intended to allow the Commission of Labor Market Partners (CPMT) to continue its discussions on this disputed concept. “There were two years of debate to realize that it was sterile,” said Denis Hamel, vice-president of workforce development policies at the Conseil du patronat du Québec (CPQ).

The CPMT has in fact held several discussions on the subject, trying to come to an agreement on the different factors to take into account. “We had difficulty agreeing on which indicators to use and how to have up-to-date indicators,” explains Mr. Hamel.

“Some data was specific and difficult to find for it to be relevant,” underlines Véronique Proulx, president and CEO of Manufacturiers et exportateurs du Québec (MEQ). This is not because of “lack of collaboration”, she points out, but because certain indicators remained too vague. “Yes, we can use the vacancy rate [des logements], but is it detailed for the type of accommodation we are looking for? »

It was also the uncertainty over the use of such a dashboard that worried certain parties invited to the table. The CPMT is a body which includes members from unions, businesses and community organizations in the field of employability.

“When we talk about reception capacity, this is true for immigrants, but also for people who would like to change region. If we say tomorrow morning that Gaspésie has no reception capacity, are we saying to Quebecers “don’t move there”? » illustrates Mr. Hamel.

“The reception capacity is a false debate, it is something that we give ourselves and not something static,” adds the CPQ representative.

Keys

Several elements were redacted in the documents sent to the Duty, that the MIFI redirects to other participating ministries. However, neither the Ministry of Labor nor the CPMT provided us with documents, despite our requests for access to information, invoking exceptions to the Law.

It nevertheless emerges that more than 30% of permanent residents are absent from Quebec 10 years after their admission for two reference periods. We also see among the tables produced that refugees (category which includes accepted asylum seekers) are among those who settle the most outside the mainland region. The regionalization of immigration is one of the government’s priorities.

Quebec has asked Ottawa several times in recent years to respect its reception capacity. But until now, neither the ministry nor political staff had been able to provide studies or reports documenting it.

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