By Feleshia Chandler
If you’re new to Atlantic Canada, or planning to make the move, you may be wondering how recent immigration policy changes will affect you. Canada has been known as an immigrant hot-spot for years, but the latest Immigration Levels Plan could reshape how and where you settle in.
1. Temporary Visas Expiring 2025
One big change is the government’s shift toward reducing temporary residents—visitors, students, and workers.
This means that in order to meet new immigrant ‘controlled target’ numbers, possibly hundreds of people in Nova Scotia with temporary visas (around 1.2 million nationally) may have to leave by the end of the year when their visitor status expires.
If you’re looking to stay in Canada, applying for a visitor record is crucial, but more than 40 per cent of this year’s permanent resident admissions will be for temporary residents already in the country
2. Less People Approved for Permanent Residency
The number of permanent residency approvals is also getting the chop.
This year, only 395,000 will be allowed, down from the previous plan’s target of 442,500 to 550,000 in 2025.
3. No Points From A Job Offer
Jobs won’t give you extra points anymore.
Previously, landing a job could potentially add 50 to 200 extra points, upping one’s chances of a permanent residency offer.
People looking to come to Canada through express entry using Canada’s Comprehensive Ranking System or CRS (the point system used to rank candidates for permanent residency), will now have to rely on things like work experience, education, and language skills to meet the target score of at least 480.
This change also impacts employers, as job offers will no longer carry the weight they once did when it comes to the selection process.
That said, people will still be able to enter Canada through category-based draws.
Category-based draws focus less on CRS score and more on category-based labour market needs, meaning someone with a lower score could still be chosen for permanent residency. For example, this could help people come to Nova Scotia who have skills that could help fill badly needed industry gaps, such as in IT sectors, healthcare, and food service.
4. Less Student Visas
There’s a new cap on student visas: Bad news for people looking to study abroad in Nova Scotia and bad news for local universities already facing cuts.
Last year the federal government cut undergraduate study permits by 35 per cent. Now, there’s a new cap of 437,000 national study permits nationwide—10 per cent less than last year. Nova Scotia expects to see around 8,297 approved study permits this year, as opposed to 18,602 in 2023-2024.
5. New Permanent Residency Pathways
There are four new permanent residency pathways: the Enhanced Caregiver Pathway, the Rural Community Immigration Pilot, the Francophone Community Immigration Pilot, and Manitoba’s West Central Immigration Initiative. These initiatives can make it easier to get permanent residency if you work in certain professions or communities.
What has been the response?
Immigration advocates and business professionals across the country have expressed criticism when it comes to the new policy changes, but in a public release introducing the new plan, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada stated that this will “pause population growth in the short term,” but the goal is “to achieve well-managed, sustainable growth in the long term.”
