Quebec’s Immigration Backlog Crisis: 142,500 Permanent Residency Applicants Left in Limbo

In total, 142,500 people are waiting for their permanent residence in the province. "In the categories of fundamental rights, we are heading towards a catastrophe," warns Laurence Trempe, co-president of the Quebec Association of Immigration Lawyers (AQAADI), thus referring to family reunification and the various categories of humanitarian immigration. "I don’t mince my words, it’s a real scandal," she says. In these categories, the people are mostly already settled here and working. However, they are "stuck" waiting for their permanent residence.

"It’s unacceptable," in addition to "artificially inflating the figures of temporary workers," the lawyer hammers, referring to the Legault government’s repeatedly expressed desire to drastically reduce the number of temporary immigrants. It intends to assess the possibility of welcoming 25,000, 35,000 or 45,000 new arrivals per year starting next year. A decrease in the number of temporary workers in Montreal and Laval is also being considered. As of January 1st, the number of temporary immigrants in Quebec stood at 616,552, according to the latest data from Statistics Canada.

Faced with this boom in applications, the processing times are lengthening for most permanent residence applicants, as the process is complex. The provincial Ministry of Immigration, Francization and Integration (MIFI) approves or selects applications before sending them to Ottawa. But these applications remain in the drawers waiting to have a place in the quota set by Quebec. In reality, the federal Department of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) "only processes the number of applications dictated by the Legault government each year, which means that the other files are accumulating," says Le Devoir.

"The last time Quebec granted permanent residence to less than 25,000 people was in 1986," the same source also points out, adding that "the average of the 1950s and 1960s exceeds 30,000 permanent residents per year." A consultation on these issues is scheduled for September 16 at the National Assembly.