As Immigration Minister Jason Kenney prepares to table a new immigration levels plan for 2013 this week, he has much to lay claim to in Canada's restructured immigration system.
Kenney's most commonly proclaimed achievement has been to move the country toward more efficiently accepting migrants who can best contribute to the Canadian economy. That shift will be visible yet again in this year's target levels across all categories of economic immigrants.
A promised final recalibration of the points system that governs the foreign skilled worker category was also set to be unveiled this week, but that announcement has been pushed back to January.
Still, most of the planned changes to the points system are already widely known: They will place increased weight on youth, job skills and, most importantly, strong English- or French-language skills.
The new system will also provide for better pre-screening of foreign education credentials. And there will be some new streams added, including a long-needed "skilled trades" stream that will address the large trades gap.
In the meantime, the government has fixed the processing times, wrangling them down to less than a year. Under the old system they stretched in some cases to nearly a decade.
The willingness to limit the intake is the reason processing times are finally down, and it is the most effective measure Kenney has taken, according to a Vancouver immigration lawyer, who adds the foreign skilled workers category has undergone a major fix.
As for the backlog of files received under the old system, last spring Kenney made another controversial move: a plan to delete the backlog of some 280,000 foreign skilled worker applications. That stack of files has been an albatross, sitting stagnant for years with no responsiveness to current labour market needs. Some applicants have languished in the queue nearly a decade.
Under Kenney's plan, those whose files had not yet been opened will be refunded their application fees.
However, to those whose files were about to be processed, the move appeared grossly unfair. They have launched a legal challenge and it's not yet clear what the outcome will be.
Observers generally agree that some improvements to the system include:
The expansion of the Provincial and Territorial Nominee programs: Thus far, most provinces have proven more adept at choosing the people with needed job skills than Ottawa has been at choosing them through the foreign skilled worker category. Expect to see those levels increase or remain steady for another year in a row.
Creation of the Canada Experience Class: No longer do the best and brightest foreign students and skilled workers who already have experience in Canada have to leave the country in order to reapply for permanent residency. Now, they can transition into becoming Canadians while they continue to contribute to the Canadian economy.
Still, for many workers in Canada, there is no easy transition to residency despite months or years of backbreaking labour here. It's a problem critics say must be considered when assessing how well Kenney has shifted the country's focus to immigration as an economic tool.
