Immigration Minister Kathleen Weil announced that the Liberal government hopes to welcome 51,000 immigrants to the province in 2017.
Regardless of backlash from opposition parties, the Quebec minister desires to increase the number of immigrants gradually to 52,500 by 2019.
“I have done three consultations,” the minister said. “Nobody ever asked that we lower the number.”
The government plan is to emphasize to assign minimum 63% of the annual Cap to economic. Since qualified workers and business people are the group of new immigrants who will directly contribute to the province’s economy.
During the consultations and the evaluation period of Quebec immigration programs Weil heard from many employers and community organizations worried about a shortage of skills in certain regions and the replacement of the working-age population.
This is what she hopes to address with economic immigrants and proper integration techniques.
“People just want to make sure that you’ve got a good plan,” Weil said.
“That the new immigrants will invest in integration after arrival and we are going to invest in French language courses, and make sure these people find a job. People are interested to see the unemployment rate drop.”
The minster’s primary condition is that 85 per cent of qualified workers selected to immigrate to Québec must already have knowledge of the French language when coming to the province. This would significantly improve the speed as well as the efficiency of integration.
Federal Government put extra pressure on Quebec to raise the proportion of family reunification in the province.
Finally, the large arrival of Syrian refugees was an important part of the 2016 immigration plan and Weil hopes to welcome 8,500 more refugees in 2017.
Since none of items from the minister's would be possible without new help from the government. Something that will be addressed by the creation of an inter-ministerial committee that will improve the coordination and efficiency of services provided to immigrants.
Weil hopes the committee will be able to keep a higher proportion of new arrivals in the province and increase the overall retention rate.
