This House of Commons committee meeting on Canada’s immigration system heard from six witnesses: Michael Barutciski, a professor at York University; Steven J. Paolasini, a regulated Canadian immigration consultant; Gauri Sreenivasan, co-executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees; Lou Janssen Dangzalan, an immigration lawyer; Parisa Mahboubi, associate director of research at the C.D. Howe Institute; and Wendy Luther, president and CEO of the Halifax Partnership.
Michael Barutciski argued that Canada’s asylum system has been based on invented rights, noting that asylum seekers are not automatically entitled to a hearing under the Refugee Convention or Canadian law, and that the safe third country agreement follows the convention’s logic. He recommended that Canada harmonize its rules with European partners, prepare legislative groundwork for extraterritorial mechanisms, and modernize annual reports to include detailed data on temporary residents to force open debate, adding that the government should cut temporary resident numbers considerably if three million people with expired visas do not leave.
Steven J. Paolasini criticized the economic class immigration system for being driven by administrative convenience and political quotas rather than merit, citing that nearly 50% of express entry invitations in 2025 went to francophone candidates overseas, while data scientists and skilled tradespeople in Canada are being overlooked. He recommended restoring merit-based all-program draws with a predictable cadence, revamping the CRS to target managerial and technical occupations, increasing francophone immigration only through the community pilot, mandating full transparency in planning, making stakeholder consultations meaningful, and triaging the start-up visa backlog to help entrepreneurs like Mostafa who are building in Canada.
Gauri Sreenivasan argued that Canada is stepping back from its humanitarian traditions by slashing private sponsorship, reducing government-assisted refugee numbers, and passing Bill C-12, which denies many claimants a right to a hearing and appeal. She recommended establishing reception centres for orientation, scaling up cost-effective transitional housing models from the non-profit sector, making refugee claimants eligible for settlement services before they reach protected person status, and improving legal aid coverage, while urging a whole-of-country effort to counter narratives that wrongly blame immigration for housing and social pressures.
Lou Janssen Dangzalan said that francophone category-based draws in express entry have been a good starting point but now reveal their limits, and he proposed integrating French as an enhanced factor within other priority categories, such as increasing the bilingualism cap to 100 points when combined with high-demand occupations like health care. He also called for system stability, predictability, and fortified service standards, noting that Canada’s reputation abroad has suffered from inconsistent messaging and sudden policy swings, which push talent toward Europe, Australia, or New Zealand.
Parisa Mahboubi argued that immigration levels must account for both permanent and temporary residents to align with housing supply, infrastructure, and labour market capacity, warning that rapid population growth without matching capital investment hurts productivity and GDP per capita. She recommended long-term planning with a consistent immigration rate of 0.7% to 0.9%, improved selection to focus on top talent, and reform of temporary resident programs to prioritize quality, adding that the government’s headline targets are misleading because they exclude one-time initiatives and fail to track whether temporary residents actually leave when their visas expire.
Wendy Luther emphasized that Atlantic Canada’s economic growth depends on population growth, and that recent immigration policy changes have disproportionately affected the region, with Nova Scotia undershooting its quotas and Halifax seeing a negative net change in non-permanent residents. She recommended consistent, predictable immigration policies to support business investment and talent attraction, noting that sectors like defence, renewable energy, and food processing rely on temporary foreign workers, and that businesses in rural areas are not viable without access to that labour.
The committee also heard brief exchanges where members questioned witnesses on topics such as the impact of immigration on housing and youth unemployment, with Barutciski and Mahboubi agreeing that rapid population growth has strained housing and labour markets, while Sreenivasan argued there is no direct correlation between immigration levels and housing shortages. No procedural debate, motions, or votes occurred during this meeting.
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