François Legault’s government has said several times in recent months that there are too many temporary immigrants in Quebec and that their numbers need to be reduced. But what jobs do temporary immigrants hold? Meetings and analysis of the latest data.
“If you’ve ordered on Uber in the last few years, you may have come across me, or my compatriots,” he says first over the phone. Sachin, who preferred to keep his real identity secret so as not to jeopardize his employment situation, delivered meals to homes through this platform during his college studies in computer science in Quebec.
Having arrived from India in September 2021, he has had temporary status for almost three years. When we meet him in a rather bare apartment in Côte-des-Neiges, where he lives with his wife, who also has a temporary work permit, he admits to feeling frustrated at still being in this non-permanent box: “It’s not my choice, it’s the system, and it’s harder every month,” he says straight away.
After graduation, he got a post-graduate work permit, but he didn’t get a job in his field. He currently works as a clerk in a grocery store at night: “I just stock shelves, it has nothing to do with my skills, but it’s a need nonetheless.”
To see, on the same subject
Work is the biggest gateway
Of all temporary immigrants, those present on a work permit make up 42% of the total, according to the most recent estimates from Statistics Canada. The majority of asylum seekers (119,000) also hold a work permit, as do a large proportion of international students (52,000), who can combine their studies with part-time employment.
But those who are fundamentally temporary workers are under the control of two programs: the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP) and the International Mobility Program (IMP).
Thus, Sachin is among the 41,500 former foreign students who obtained a permit after their studies in Quebec in 2023, the most important component of the PMI.
In total, 107,615 people obtained or renewed their PMI work permit for the same year, in extremely varied sections. We are talking here in particular about working holiday or young professional programs, university exchanges and transfers within a multinational.
It is the PMI that is particularly targeted by Prime Minister François Legault, who asked Ottawa to reduce the number of participating temporary immigrants by 50%. The PMI is mainly a federal responsibility, which does not fail to irritate Mr. Legault, and the detailed data is incomplete, the destination province being unknown for some permit holders.
Then, the majority of trades and professions are not specified. Once in the country, these people are in fact free to apply for jobs, regardless of the field. These details were only indicated for about 15,000 temporary workers who were in Quebec thanks to the PMI last year. Here again, the picture is very heterogeneous.
The oldest program
The other route, the PTET, presents very precise data, right down to the address of the company looking to hire.
This is because the 58,695 PTET permits that came into effect in 2023 in Quebec have a specific job title and employer. Historically, holders were mainly in agriculture, but since last year, they have been more numerous in other fields, and account for 60% of the total.
One of the growing areas is the early childhood sector, for which Quebec reimburses part of the costs of recruiting abroad.
Nawel Omani was hired by a daycare while she was visiting her sister in Monunal. Her return to her home country of Algeria had been compromised by the pandemic, so she started looking for work.
An employee in the communications sector there, she had already trained in early childhood with the idea of reorienting herself. Her wish came true here, through the PTET: “It’s true that the work, physically speaking, is difficult, but we receive so much love from the children and the gratitude of the parents. It’s priceless.”
She fell in love with Montreal and hopes to stay there permanently. “Since I’m more French-speaking, settling in Quebec would be ideal.”
Other positions most in demand through the TFWP include food processing, cooking and counter service (in fast food, for example). In addition, there are welders, material handlers, mechanics, programmers, truck drivers, housekeepers and graphic designers. In total, 385 occupations are listed in the TFWP compilation. Duty, and more than 12,000 companies.
Government participation
Quebec itself uses this program in the health network, and more than the other provinces, according to a compilation by CBC. Nurses, nursing assistants, beneficiary attendants, health sciences technologists or technicians, pharmacists in CIUSSSs or support staff: all these positions are experiencing a sharp increase in recruitment.
The University of Montreal Hospital Center is a major employer in this area. Laurence Ameline, a French nurse who arrived in 2021, explains that she was spoiled for choice in her “destination” during recruitment in Paris: “I was shown a map and asked to choose the place where I wanted to work.”
The duty recently reported its permit renewal woes, an error that Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) acknowledged and corrected shortly after publication.
Thirst to be permanent
Like this nurse, all the temporary immigrants encountered by The duty are just waiting to become permanent. But the possibilities are not the same for everyone.
Sachin, who currently works in a grocery store, doesn’t speak French well enough to qualify for permanent residency. “The biggest problem is that the rules keep changing,” he says. With a job in his field and a stable path to permanent immigration, he would be much more motivated to learn the language, he explains. In the meantime, the waiting lists are long and the stipend “doesn’t [lui] “It doesn’t pay the bills,” he says.
If he completed all of the government’s French language courses, he would also have to pass a French language test designed and administered entirely in France to demonstrate his language proficiency.
As for Nawel Omani, she is hopeful of qualifying, even if she finds that “the laws change all the time.” “We don’t have much visibility in time to plan ahead.” With her sister and nieces settled here, a place to live, a job and a budding network, she considers her integration to be already well advanced. “Whether there is this notion of temporary worker or permanent resident, we have to see people as people,” she sighs.