Minister pledges modifications to temporary visas, assuring the absence of ‘extreme measures.’

Immigration Minister Marc Miller intends to adjust the influx of temporary visitors to Canada, ensuring the program’s sustainability, though specific government measures under consideration remain undisclosed.

After unveiling the immigration targets for permanent residents on Wednesday, Miller mentioned that the approach would likely vary across various categories of work and study permits.

In the context of the agricultural sector, the minister emphasized the necessity for the government to respond more “cohesively and comprehensively” to address the issue of frequent exploitation of temporary foreign worker status.

“People that can’t switch jobs if they are abused or have unsafe work conditions, the fact that they are threatened with return to their country if they don’t perform well, those are all real threats,” Miller said at an event in Toronto.

“There is a whole ecosystem there that we need to address comprehensively.”

Over the past three years, the Liberals’ historically high immigration targets for permanent residents have come under heightened scrutiny, particularly in light of Canada’s housing shortage.

While the government doesn’t establish similar targets for governing temporary resident visas for those coming to work or study in Canada, these numbers have also seen a significant and rapid increase.

The latest annual report from the Immigration Department reveals a substantial surge in temporary worker visas, with the number of permit holders growing from 337,460 in 2018 to 605,851 in 2022.

“We have become quite addicted as a country to temporary foreign workers and it’s having perverse carry-on effects that perhaps were predictable, but I think unanticipated by some folks in the short term,”

The enrollment of international students has also witnessed substantial growth, with Miller having recently unveiled alterations to the validation process for school acceptance letters to combat fraud.

Former Immigration Minister Sean Fraser, now serving as Housing Minister, raised the possibility of imposing caps on international student visas as one potential solution to address housing challenges in university towns. However, Miller seems to be moving away from considering that particular option.

“There’ll be no sort of draconian measures that will be taken immediately,” he said.