The odds of new applications from immigrants being accepted into British Columbia's nominee program this year have dropped to near zero for anyone other than health workers or entrepreneurs.
The province said the changes are aimed at prioritizing where it spends its nominations after the federal government slashed the number of available slots, but the B.C. Chamber of Commerce said a focus on the health care sector unfairly advantages the government’s needs over those of the business community.
A bulletin from the province says it was only allotted 4,000 nominations this year, about half of what it had last year and substantially less than the 11,000 it wanted.
It says the program, which help immigrants already living in Canada gain permanent residency if they fill key jobs, will accept 1,100 new applications this year, mainly for doctors, nurses and other health professionals as well as entrepreneurs.
Anne Kange, the minister of post-secondary education and future skills, called the decrease from the federal government "drastic."
"We are prioritizing health-care workers in clinical settings," Kang said in an interview, adding that related positions like social workers, therapists and early childhood educators are also part of that group.
The province said most of the remaining 2,900 slots will be used to nominate some of the applications it has already received.
The bulletin says the program anticipates nominating about 100 other people that it thinks are "likely to create high economic impact in B.C." from the registration pool, which currently has more than 10,000 candidates.
Fiona Famulak, president of the BC Chamber of Commerce, said in a statement that Ottawa's decision to cut the number for provincial nomination program slots "will be felt by businesses in every corner of the province."
B.C. needs more, not fewer, "economic immigrants," she said.
Famulak said the chamber disagrees with the decision toprioritize public sector job vacancies over the needs of the private sector this year.
"The decision to focus the (program) on applicants in the health-care sector unfairly advantages the government’s needs over the business community. We therefore call on the provincial government to rebalance the nominee allocations for 2025 and prioritize economic immigrants as the program was intended,” she said.
Last year, then-federal immigration minister Marc Miller announced plans to reduce immigration to alleviate pressures on housing, infrastructure and social services.
Vancouver immigration lawyer Richard Kurland said Tuesday that a lot of people and families "literally bet the farm" onbeing able to become a Canadian citizen through the nominee program.
"Now, instead of adding people we badly need, we've got tothrow people out of the lifeboat, because Ottawa cut the number of seats," he said.
Kurland said people locked out of B.C.'s program might consider moving to a different province. Other jurisdictions are also facing cuts to their nominee numbers, but will have their own set of rules for who can qualify, he said.
"If you're in one of those high demand occupations that B.C. says it needs, the chances are good other provinces have the same labour need," he said.
"You'll still have to uproot yourself from B.C., transplant into another province and then hope for the best."
Kurland is also predicting a continued uptick in refugee claims, from people looking for other ways to stay in Canada.
Kang said she's worried the reduction in the available slots for the nominee program could lead to the province not being able to fill critical roles.
"My fear is that we will not be filling the positions of the doctors and nurses and those who are in clinical work, those in ERs, or health-care workers that are directly working with our patients," she said.
