ARCHIVED – Immigration overview:Permanent and temporary residents

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Temporary residents

In addition to selecting permanent residents, Canada’s immigration program provides for the temporary entry of foreign workers and business people, foreign students and visitors. These temporary residents contribute to Canada’s economic development by filling gaps in the labour market, enhancing trade, and purchasing goods and services. Foreign nationals wishing to come to Canada as temporary residents must satisfy the visa officer abroad that they meet all applicable requirements under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA), including that they will leave Canada voluntarily at the end of their authorized stay.

Also, in accordance with IRPA, protection can be extended to individuals who seek asylum upon or after their arrival in Canada. The Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB), an independent administrative tribunal, oversees a quasi-judicial process that determines claims for refugee protection made in Canada. The IRB hears refugee protection claims referred by Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) and the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA). Persons whose claim for protection has been accepted may subsequently apply for permanent residence for themselves and dependants or close family members, whether in Canada or abroad. If the claim for protection is refused, the individual is informed of the reasons and is required to leave the country. A person whose claim is refused and who must leave the country may apply to the Federal Court for a judicial review. Refused claimants may also apply to CIC for a Pre-Removal Risk Assessment (PRRA) before removal from Canada. This process ensures that the risk to the individual is assessed before that person is removed from Canada, particularly in cases where there has been a change in situation in the country of origin, or new evidence indicates that the person needs protection. In most cases, a person has the right to remain in Canada pending the outcome of these processes.

In this publication, for the purpose of statistical reporting we have defined four mutually exclusive groups of temporary residents: foreign workers, foreign students, individuals in the humanitarian population and other temporary residents. Temporary residents are regrouped according to our determination of their “yearly status”—the main reason for which they have been authorized to enter and stay temporarily in Canada during each year of observation. Foreign workers are those other than Canadian citizens or permanent residents, who enter Canada solely or primarily for work and have obtained a work permit from CIC to legally perform such activities. In this report, a temporary resident is reported as a foreign worker if his or her main reason for staying in the country relates to employment whether or not this person is also a holder of other permits (e.g., a study permit). Similarly, foreign students are in Canada primarily to study, although they too may have other permits. Individuals in the humanitarian population are primarily refugee claimants, but this group also includes other foreign nationals allowed to remain in Canada on humanitarian or compassionate grounds under “special considerations." These other humanitarian cases include a small number of individuals who have never filed a refugee claim but who were processed under special programs established to handle refugee-like cases. The fourth group—other temporary residents—is comprised of individuals with a temporary resident permit or a visitor record who do not hold any other type of document. This group is not profiled in this publication.

In this section, a gender-based summary of entry statistics and present on December 1st statistics is provided for 1986 through 2010. In addition, for each group, gender-based entry and present on December 1^st statistics for the ten-year period from 2001 to 2010 are provided by source country*, intended destination in Canada (provinces or territories and urban area), skill level for foreign workers, level of study for foreign students and age for refugee claimants.

Due to privacy considerations, some cells in the following tables have been suppressed and replaced with the notation "‑‑". As a result, components may not sum to total indicated. In general, we have suppressed cells containing less than five cases except in circumstances where, in our judgement, we are not releasing personal information on an identifiable individual.

* Source country refers to country of last permanent residence for foreign workers, foreign students and the humanitarian population. However, source country refers to country of alleged persecution for tables highlighting refugee claimants.

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