Charles Sousa

By Gerald V. Paul

Ontario Immigration Minister Charles Sousa stressed that the data in a federal review is out of date and this province is behind, after reading a Citizenship and Immigration Canada report released last Thursday.

“Ontario is lagging behind in reaping the benefits of federal provincial programmes that brings in skilled immigrants more quickly and more successfully,” he said.

According to Sousa the review of the Provincial Nominee Programme (PNP) which allows provinces to select their own immigrants based on local economic needs, found 80 per cent of selected immigrants are employed in the first year- most of them in their area of expertise.

“The PNP has grown a great deal, representing 20 per cent of the total economic class immigration in 2009,” says the report. “For some provinces such as Manitoba, New Brunswick and Saskatchewan, the programme is the primary vehicle through which they attract immigration to their province.”

Sousa said that Ontario does not benefit to the same extent, even though it’s still Canada’s top destination for immigrants with almost 120,000 – or 42 per cent of all immigrants- settling in that province in 2010.

Ontario was a latecomer to the programme, launching its own nominees procedure only in 2007. Between 2005 and 2009, only 1,247 nominees- or 12 per cent of the national total-came to Ontario.

Sousa said that the evaluation report “does not fully capture our high retention rates or the high calibre of PNP immigrants coming to Ontario. “This is because they used data predominantly from the years before our programme was fully up and running,” Sousa said.

He said the province’s nominee target of 1,000 is set by Ottawa and “has been unilaterally frozen for this year. This is just another reason why Ontario needs a stronger stay on immigration selection.”

The highly touted programme isn’t without problems.

There are differing levels of rigour applied by provinces and territories when confirming applicants adherence to eligibility criteria and as a result, fraud and misuse can occur,” said the report.

It calls for the establishment of minimum language standards for all nominees and stronger links between their occupation and specific local labour marker needs.