SoVote

Mr. Irek Kusmierczyk (Windsor—Tecumseh, Lib.)

May/9/22 2:10:45 p.m.
Watch

Mr. Speaker, I am proud to rise in the House and declare we are bringing back the third shift at the Windsor Assembly Plant. Last week, I had the privilege of hosting the Prime Minister in my community to announce a historic $3.7-billion investment with Stellantis to restore all three shifts in Windsor and Brampton. This is a great thing for auto workers. Auto workers are the heartbeat of our community, and when auto thrives our community thrives. From working families to restaurants and small businesses, young people now have thousands of good-paying jobs and a bright future here at home. This investment, plus last month's record battery plant announcement, mean thousands of new jobs in Windsor—Tecumseh. Our government has invested more in Windsor auto workers than any government in Canada's history. Together, we are building not just batteries and electric vehicles, but we are also building a strong, prosperous and zero-emission Canada.

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Context: House Hansard - 67 - May/9/22

Mr. Irek Kusmierczyk (Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Employment, Workforce Development and Disability Inclusion, Lib.)

May/9/22 7:11:29 p.m.
Watch

Madam Speaker, the member opposite presents a picture that is entirely out of step with reality. As the hon. member is fully aware, the world has been in a global pandemic for two years. Borders were forced to close worldwide and, for obvious reasons, this resulted in some processing delays in our immigration system. In spite of the pandemic's many challenges, Canada admitted a record 405,000 permanent residents last year. This surpasses the previous record from 1913, making it the most newcomers admitted to Canada in a single year in our entire history. Since the start of the pandemic, IRCC has worked to improve processing for all permanent residence applications, and our work to date has produced results. As part of the 2021 economic and fiscal update, our government announced an investment of $85 million to further build on our progress to date. This will enable us to further reduce processing times and process more permanent and temporary resident applications. Most importantly, we will get back to our processing service standards in various programs by the end of this year, including study permits, work permits and permanent resident card renewals. We are also working to reduce processing times for visitor visas and proof of citizenship. As the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship announced on January 31, the government has implemented a number of additional measures to further improve the client experience and modernize the immigration system. These measures are part of a broader process to address key challenges faced by our clients and to achieve the more predictable processing times that our clients expect and deserve. Canadian businesses are in need of support, and our government knows that we have a role to play in increasing the available workforce. On April 22, the minister addressed the decision made last fall to temporarily pause invitations to apply under the federal high-skilled stream, including the Canadian experience class, federal skilled worker class and federal skilled trades class. He announced, in July of this year, that we will end this temporary pause and resume inviting qualified candidates to apply for permanent residence. We anticipate that the vast majority of new applicants will be processed within the six-month service standard. At the same time, the miinister announced that beginning in mid-June, Canada will extend post-graduation work permits for recent international graduates. Those whose permits have already expired or will expire this year will be eligible for an additional open work permit of 18 months. In addition, as of April 25, nearly 35,000 agricultural workers have already arrived in Canada for the 2022 season, and this represents a 10% increase over the number of agricultural workers that had arrived by this time last year. As members can see, we are doing our utmost to ensure that employers have the workers they need. Moving forward, we are going to continue to support those who wish to live in Canada. I was pleased to learn that IRCC has surpassed its goal to make 147,000 permanent residence final decisions in the first quarter of 2022. From January 1 to March 31, 2022, there have been over 156,000 final decisions on permanent resident applications. This is a doubling of the number of final decisions in the same time period in 2021. This is an encouraging example of progress, but our work is not yet finished. We are moving forward to ensure that Canada's proud history of immigration is matched by a modern immigration system that supports our economic recovery, improves client experience and strengthens our communities.

598 words

Context: House Hansard - 67 - May/9/22

Mr. Irek Kusmierczyk

May/9/22 7:16:11 p.m.
Watch

Madam Speaker, I thank the hon. member for his questions and comments, but as he is fully aware, the world has been in a global pandemic for two years. In spite of this, we landed over 405,000 immigrants last year, which is an all-time record, to help with our economic recovery. As the Minister of Immigration announced on January 31, the government has implemented a number of measures to further improve client experience and modernize the immigration system. We have also committed an investment of $85 million to further reduce processing times and build on our progress to date. Most importantly, we will get back to our processing service standards in various programs by the end of this year. We are taking a whole-of-government approach to address labour shortages across our country. We have taken major steps toward this by processing more than 100,000 work permit applications in the first quarter of 2022, nearly doubling the number processed over the same period in 2021. As I mentioned—

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