Su | GTA election results show how immigrants are shaping communities

I think the lack of significant differences among generations, including non-immigrants and “old-stock” Canadians is one of the more significant findings:

…The swing back suggests a welcoming country that has lost confidence in how the system was being run, after years in which population growth outpaced housing and services. And the data support this. Among those who still say there is too much immigration, the most common explanations are that it is poorly managed by the government and that it hurts the economy. Meanwhile, 3-in-4 Canadians say immigration has a positive economic impact.

On the numbers, the generations barely differ. Between 46 and 52 per cent of first-generation immigrants, and their Canadian-born children say there is too much immigration, close to the national figure.

On values, they split. Asked whether too many newcomers are not adopting Canadian values, 63 per cent of first-generation immigrants agree, more than any other generation. Among the second generation, it is 52 per cent.

This is an old pattern. Immigrants who chose Canada often believe in it more fiercely than people born here. A Statistics Canada study found immigrants more likely than the Canadian-born to say Canadians share values like human rights and diversity, while those who arrived as children see things much like everyone else.

Anyone raised in an immigrant family, like I was, will recognize the result. Newcomers who worked hard to belong hold new arrivals to standards they set for themselves. Their children, who grew up in classrooms where diversity was ordinary, take it for granted. Every generation of newcomers becomes, in some measure, the gatekeeper for the next.

Future gatekeepers

What is changing is who those gatekeepers will be. Statistics Canada projects that by 2041, immigrants and their Canadian-born children will make up 52.4 per cent of the population under its main scenario, up from 40 per cent in 2016. Those projections were made before Ottawa announced cuts to immigration levels in 2024, so the crossover may come later. But the composition has already shifted.

In 1971, 12 per cent of recent immigrants were born in Asia, including the Middle East. By 2021, 62 per cent were. By 2041, Statistics Canada expects 1-in-4 Canadians to have been born in Asia or Africa. The immigrant-origin majority of the 2040s will look very different from the one that produced Lastman and Crombie.

Yet, Canada’s future majority will not be a voting bloc. It will be a conversation between generations, with different memories of arrival and differing ideas of what belonging requires.

Chow, Tedjo and Brown are living proof of what welcome makes possible. But leaders are not the whole story. When my children are old enough to answer the Environics survey, I hope they remember that someone once had to make room for each side of their family, and that it will soon be their turn to make room for others.

Source: Opinion | GTA election results show how immigrants are shaping communities