Lena Metlege Diab

was once tasked as Nova Scotia’s immigration minister in 2013 to increase the province’s overall population numbers by

using different immigration programs

to counter growing school and hospital closures and more young people exiting the region.

More than a decade later, Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government has, to a certain extent, asked her to do the opposite on a national scale

as the country’s immigration minister

: reduce the number of newcomers while keeping an eye out for global talent.

“It’s not an easy job to do,” Metlege Diab said, but it’s a “very important” one to ensure that

immigration numbers are “back in control”

and the system remains sustainable following an unusual spike in numbers after the pandemic.

Canada’s population grew

at record rates between 2022 and 2023, primarily due to an increase in temporary residents, such as foreign workers and students, to help companies trying to fill thousands of empty jobs. However, as the unemployment rate increased, Justin Trudeau’s government in 2024 announced caps on temporary residents and reduced its

immigration targets

.

As a result, population growth in recent quarters is estimated by

Statistics Canada

to be at around zero per cent.

After being named immigration minister in May, Diab’s first major announcement was the annual immigration targets, which came out with the budget in November.

She did what analysts expected her to do — continue the cuts — but she also sprung a bit of a surprise with respect to permanent residency.

Canada will invite 380,000 permanent residents each year from 2026 to 2028, slightly lower than the 395,000 target in 2025. But it will also conduct two one-time initiatives to grant permanent residency to 33,000 temporary foreign workers and 115,000 people categorized as “Protected Persons in Canada” in 2027 and 2028.

The one-time initiatives could increase the target to about 450,000 permanent residents in each of those years, but Metlege Diab said she doesn’t think they should be added to the 380,000 target because they have been living in Canada “for a while,” working and contributing to the economy.

The 115,000 eligible protected persons have already been granted the right to reside in Canada, she said.

“They have housing,” she said. “These are not people new to the country, so they’re not taking away some of our housing. They are not temporary residents,

like workers

,

like students

, who come to Canada for a purpose based on their visa.”

But some analysts don’t agree with that reasoning.

“The government’s statements that the 140,000-plus additional spots on top of the plan weren’t included in the plan because they are already living in Canada doesn’t fully make sense,” Steven Muerrens, an immigration lawyer and partner at Larlee Rosenberg, said.

He pointed out that the 380,000 annual target already includes immigrants who live inside Canada.

The government said more than 60 per cent of the permanent residents are expected to be from the economic category — people who are skilled and expected to get jobs in Canada — and may already be temporary residents working here. The remaining 40 per cent is allocated for categories such as family reunification, refugees and protected persons, amongst others.

Muerrens said the stated rationale for the special initiatives doesn’t seem accurate since there already are fixed quotas for these categories.

Metlege Diab said granting permanent residency to 33,000 temporary foreign workers will prioritize those in rural communities where there continues to be a labour shortage and in other “high-need” sectors.

But Diana Palmerin-Velasco, a senior director at the

Canadian Chamber of Commerce

, which represents more than 200,000 businesses, said 33,000 people are “insufficient to meet the labour needs” of many sectors in rural and remote communities.

She also said one-time initiatives are by nature “very limited and do not necessarily restore clarity and consistency” in the system.

“I am not sure where the 33,000 number came from and we need to see more details on how this one-time initiative will be rolled out,” she said. “Many of the chamber’s members have already lost valuable employees who were unsuccessful in renewing their permits due to recent policy changes and there are significant concerns for businesses about the lack of certainty.”

Some analysts have floated the idea that the government might be trying to reduce the headline number to avoid criticism at a time when anti-immigration sentiment seems to be on the rise.

But Metlege Diab dismissed that idea. She said the initiatives were “innovative solutions” that were planned for months and created to resolve the unique challenges Canada faces.

“These are policy decisions, policy choices,” she said. “We worked for months with the prime minister … to ensure that we came up with something that we believe makes sense to grow our economy … but also makes sense for Canadians and people that are here. We believe we have struck the right balance.”

Rachel Battaglia, an economist at

Royal Bank of Canada

, said the immigration plan this year isn’t “terribly different” overall from last year. The one-time initiatives are likely to increase the permanent residency targets in the coming years, but the decision to reduce the number of temporary residents balances the levels.

“This year’s levels plan looks more like a reshuffling of buckets rather than a big overhaul of the whole policy,” she said. “If you’re looking at sheer numbers, a lot of that increase on the permanent resident side is being offset by decreases on the nonpermanent resident side.”

The latest immigration targets also plan to continue to increase the number of French-speaking newcomers outside Quebec. One way that’s happening is through category-based invitations, a policy that was introduced by the federal government in 2023 to allow it to pick and choose applicants belonging to certain in-demand groups as opposed to following the general criteria in the points-based ranking system for prospective immigrants.

For example, there may be a permanent residency candidate with higher points because of their work experience and education, but they are unlikely to qualify if they don’t fall into a specific category.

Some of the people Ottawa has announced it wants to bring in include health-care workers, tradespeople, people from the education sector, doctors and French speakers.

Some economists have criticized the decision to keep French speakers as a category because it hurts Canada’s productivity if better-skilled people don’t make the cut just because they don’t know a language.

Metlege Diab, though, doesn’t agree.

“I’m very proud of the fact that we have both French and English as our languages here,” she said. “We need to ensure that we grow it and we maintain it … promoting the economic development of Francophone minority communities is extremely important.”

At the same time, the number of temporary residents, including students, is expected to decline to 385,000 in 2026 and 370,000 in each of 2027 and 2028 from 673,650 in 2025.

The mindset that international students coming to Canada are very likely to receive citizenship in the long run was something promoted by previous politicians, immigration analysts say, which compelled foreign students to spend thousands of dollars to study at schools here.

As a result, there are thousands of temporary residents who have been living in Canada for at least five years — most students study for two years and used to receive three-year work permits — whose work permits are set to expire and will have to leave the country.

“If you are an international student thinking of Canada, I invite you to apply to our institutions,” Metlege Diab said. “But not necessarily with the idea that you will stay, become a permanent resident and become a citizen.”

If they fit any of the immigration streams, they might be able to stay here, she said, but otherwise the government expects they will leave.

“For those coming in new, it shouldn’t be a surprise. Everything is transparent and we are telling people the truth,” she said. “If you can fit into one of our streams, we would love to have you; otherwise, we welcome you to go and work anywhere else in the world and become an ambassador for Canada.”

But Rebekah Young, an analyst at

Bank of Nova Scotia

, said the government has yet to resolve issues around the points system to better identify “potential” and reward visas accordingly.

“

This could also help manage expectations of those vying to come (and stay) in the country, while also avoiding moral hazard risk with some of the one-time transitions now in the table,” she said.

Young also wants to better understand how the new targets translate into population growth, how many of the 380,000 permanent residents in 2026 are likely to come from within Canada and how many the government expects will leave. In 2024, the government said it expected at least 40 per cent of the total number of permanent residents to come from within Canada. 

“We still have to apply considerable judgment on that population path ahead and calibrate as data come in,” she said. 

Metlege Diab didn’t provide an exact percentage, but said the goal now is to focus on the quality of newcomers as opposed to quantity.

“Our job is difficult,” she said. “It involves balancing all the programs … but we will get there.”

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