Toronto: Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has acknowledged that his government “made some mistakes” leading to record immigration levels, necessitating a “big turn” in policy.
Those remarks came in a video posted on Trudeau’s YouTube channel on Sunday.
“In the last two years, our population has grown really fast, like baby boom, fast and increasingly bad actors like fake colleges and big chain corporations have been exploiting our immigration system for their own interests,” Trudeau said in the video.
Trudeau said there was a demand after the Covid-19 pandemic to bring in labour. “So, we brought in more workers. It was the right choice. It worked. Our economy grew. Restaurants and stores reopened, businesses kept running, but most importantly, in spite of lots of economists’ predictions, we avoided the worst-case scenario – a recession. But some saw that as an opportunity to profit to game the system,” he said.
“Far too many colleges and universities used international students to raise their bottom line,” he said, adding, “There is fraud and abuse and it needs to end.”
He attributed that trend to some educational institutions being able to charge international students tens of thousands of dollars more for the same degree than that paid by domestic students. “And then there are really bad actors who outright exploit people who target vulnerable immigrants with promises of jobs, diplomas and easy pathways to citizenship promises that would never come true,” he said.
Trudeau also admitted that Ottawa was slow to respond to the challenge. He said, “Looking back when the post pandemic boom cooled and businesses no longer needed the additional labour help, as a Federal team, we could have acted quicker and turned off the taps.”
He said Ottawa is looking to “effectively pause population growth” for the next two years, and from 2027 onwards, it will “slowly start increasing again at a sustainable pace”.
As refugee claims have increased to a historic level, Trudeau said, “Some temporary residents may turn to our asylum system when their visa expires as a shortcut to stay in Canada. Those claims will be analysed and processed, and if their claim fails, they’ll be sent home.”
The new levels plan announced on October 24 by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), will see a decrease from the proposed 500,000 permanent residents (PRs) in 2025 to the revised figure 395,000. Similarly for 2026, the number is being reduced from 500,000 to 380,000. The target for 2027 is 365,000. The number of PRs to be issued this year was 485,000.
This was Trudeau’s government cut PR numbers since it came to power in 2015.
On September 18, IRCC stated that the cap for issuing study permits for 2025 will be at 437,000, down from the target of 485,000 for this year. The “stabilising” 2025 figure will also apply for 2026.
The new levels plan is expected to result in a marginal population decline of 0.2% in both 2025 and 2026 before returning to growth of 0.8% in 2027. It also forecast reducing temporary resident volumes, which includes temporary workers and international students, to 5% of Canada’s population by the end of 2026.
The surge in immigration has been blamed for partially contributing to a housing affordability crisis in Canada along cost-of-living problems and pressure on health and transport infrastructure.
It has dented the ruling Liberal Party’s prospects of returning to power when the next Federal elections are held. According to the polling aggregator 338Canada, if those elections were held now, the opposition Conservative Party would secure a strong majority, with 214 seats, a gain of 95, while the ruling party would drop to 66, a loss of 94.
Federal elections are scheduled for October 2025, but with the Trudeau regime facing challenges like no confidence motions in the House of Commons, there is speculation they could come earlier, potentially in the spring.