Question Period Note: Quebec Immigration

Canada-Québec Accord and immigration-related issues

• The Government of Canada values its partnership with the Government of Quebec. We continue to collaborate to manage immigration effectively, in accordance with the Canada-Quebec Accord.

• We are committed to work with Quebec on responsible immigration levels that preserve Quebec’s distinct identity and the French language.

• We continue to monitor volumes of asylum claimants, including at the land border, and appreciate the support Quebec has provided to claimants in their province.

Canada-Quebec Accord: roles and responsibilities

• The objectives of the 1991 Canada-Quebec Accord are to preserve Quebec’s demographic weight within Canada and support the integration of immigrants in the province, while respecting its distinct identity.

• Quebec selects economic immigrants and resettled refugees destined to that province and the federal government selects permanent residents in the family class and protected persons. Both governments jointly administer the International Student Program and the Temporary Foreign Worker Program.

• The federal government remains responsible for determining the admissibility (i.e., health, security and criminality) of all immigrants to Quebec and for issuing permanent resident visas.

• While the federal government is responsible for establishing annually the total number of immigrants for the country as a whole, it takes Quebec’s advice into consideration on the number of immigrants that it wishes to receive.

Quebec Immigration Levels Plan

• As established in the Canada-Quebec Accord, Quebec sets the immigration levels that the province plans to achieve, which the Government of Canada takes into account for the overall Immigration Levels plan.

• On October 31, 2024, Quebec tabled its Levels plan for 2025, maintaining its levels at 50,000 regular admissions per year, plus ongoing admissions of people selected under the “Quebec Graduates” stream, estimated at 15,000 admissions.

• Quebec is expected to launch public consultations as part of its next multi-year levels planning exercise and to inform the development of their next Levels Plan, to be tabled by November 1, 2025. This Plan will include targets for both temporary resident arrivals and permanent resident admissions. Quebec has indicated it is seeking to reduce the number of temporary residents currently in the province by half.

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Francophone immigration to Quebec

• Quebec seeks to prioritize francophone immigration, with a stated objective of 100% francophone economic immigration by 2026.
• To support their objectives, Quebec has asked that French language proficiency requirements be added to select temporary worker applicants where they do not have authority to do so themselves. The Department is pursing regulatory changes to its International Mobility Program in Fall 2025 and to fully implement this requirement by 2028 (aligned with Quebec’s planned implementation timeline).

Asylum Claimants

• Until recently, Quebec was the main recipient of asylum claims in Canada, driven by the surge in irregular claims between 2017 and March 2023 via crossings at Roxham Road.

• However, since the expansion in March 2023 of the application of the Safe Third Country Agreement (STCA) to those crossing between ports of entry along the Canada-U.S. land border, irregular claims dropped significantly.

• Overall, claims in Quebec are down roughly 40% (38%) when comparing January 1 to April 30, 2025, with the same period last year. This is despite the temporary spike in land border claims from the end of March to mid-April 2025. This spike was driven by claims made the Lacolle Port of Entry mostly by Haitian nationals living in the United States with family in Canada (enabling them to meet an exception under the STCA). However, land border claim volumes have returned to earlier levels since the end of April.

• The federal government provided $750M to the Government of Quebec in recognition of the temporary housing and asylum-related challenges caused by irregular border crossings between 2021 and 2024.

• Quebec continues to call for a redistribution of claimants across Canada, noting that the province has exceeded its capacity to welcome newcomers.
The Government of Canada has been working bilaterally with interested provinces and territories to develop relocation pilot projects for claimants.

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