The waiting lists for the processing of several immigration files extended in 2024, revealed the Minister of Immigration, Jean-François Roberge, in parliamentary committee on Thursday.
This is the case in the family grouping category, where, in January of this year, 42,000 separate files were waiting to be processed, against some 38,500 in April 2024. The portrait is the same among refugees awaiting the permanent residence. They were 35,000 a year ago, then 45,600 last January.
As for the waiting list of the humanitarian immigration category, it increased from 10,100 to 12,700 over the same period.
The Minister of Immigration provided these data to the deputy for Québec Solidaire Guillaume Cliche-Rivard, who asked him to study the credits of the Ministry of Immigration, Francization and Integration (MIFI).
According to the most recent data, deadlines for family reunification with a spouse from abroad are 36 months old in Quebec. For refugee people who have already obtained their status, but still awaiting permanent residence, the MIFI indicates to receive “currently an exceptional volume of requests” and deploy “efforts […] To ensure the processing of your file as soon as possible ”.
“Not human”
Asked about this on Thursday, Guillaume Cliche-Rivard denounced Minister Roberge’s double speech in terms of deadlines for immigrants. “The Minister has insurpointed in credits, calling the average period of 37 months for the processing of asylum requests to the federally, but he also omits that he is also responsible for the queues that lengthen,” deplored the interim co-spokesperson of Québec Solidaire.
Mr. Roberge had indeed taken advantage of a passage from the study of credits to strongly criticize the processing of asylum requests to the federal. “It is absolutely necessary that there is a rapid reduction in the analysis period for asylum seekers. Many people arrive, apply for asylum; It takes years … “he said. “It’s far too long. »»
“Thirty-seven months of analysis … It is not human for them. It doesn’t make sense, “he added.
-On Thursday, Guillaume Cliche-Rivard asked Minister Roberge to show the same indignation in the face of waiting times for the means of obtaining the permanent residence in Quebec. “This is a very sad news for all the people who pay the price for the explosion of deadlines, especially in family reunification,” he said.
According to a light opinion poll published on Saturday, 67 % of Quebecers consider themselves “rather” or “completely” agree that the deadlines for family reunification reach at most 12 months. Also according to this study, 64 % of Quebecers believe that these groupings “should be an important priority” in terms of immigration.
Roberge targets some foreign students
In committee on Thursday, Jean-François Roberge again demanded that the federal government are working to halve the number of temporary immigrants in Quebec territory. For his part, he said he tackled a growing phenomenon: immigrants who arrived in Quebec as students who later ask for asylum.
According to data from the MIFI presented Thursday, almost a quarter (23 %) of asylum requests filed in Quebec in 2024 were by study license holders. In total, nearly 6000 people respond to this definition, compared to 2800 (15 % of asylum requests) in 2023.
“So, people who arrive in Quebec with false pretexts and then apply for asylum, there are more and more,” said Raberge.
« [Ça] shows the necessary resumption of control of the arrival of foreign students on Quebec territory, “he said, in reference to the bill he tabled and had last year adopted to reduce the number of foreign students in Quebec.
In February, the Minister of Higher Education, Pascale Déry, adopted a ministerial decree to ensure that nearly 32,000 less requests than in 2024 from international students were accepted in 2025.
A previous version indicating that the deadlines for family reunification with a spouse from abroad is 26 months has been corrected.
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