Douglas Todd: Ottawa insider warns about immigrant-investor schemes – Vancouver Sun

2024/01/20 Leave a comment

Wise warning (disclosure: I am friends of some of those quoted):

An adviser within Canada’s immigration department is warning about the dangers of entry programs that favour entrepreneurs, given the failure of earlier initiatives.

The internal cautions come at the same time the immigration department, which has been under fire from top bank economists for damaging the economy by bringing in a record 1.25 million permanent and temporary residents in a year, is expanding another program that gives preference to would-be entrepreneurs.

The internal government memo, obtained by Vancouver lawyer Richard Kurland under an access-to-information request, reveals how an adviser to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) warned that a variety of earlier immigrant-business programs suffered widespread abuse — resulting in a trivial number of new businesses being opened in Canada, and other problems.

The defunct schemes that targeted wealthy foreign nationals, which the correspondents generally refer to as “business-class programs,” opened the gates to a flood of foreign capital moving into Canadian housing, says the adviser. That raised prices, especially in cities such as Vancouver and Toronto. In addition, the internal email thread alerts decision makers to the way many entrepreneur immigrants ended up paying low amounts of income tax.

The in-house memo comes to light in the same month the Canadian Press reported the IRCC was internally warned two years ago that increasing immigration levels would harm housing affordability and services. A Nanos poll also finds support for migration has in less than a year plunged 20 percentage points, with 53 per cent now wanting fewer immigrants.

The group email shared by top immigration department officials, titled “The strange story of Vancouver,” reveals just how badly things went with the earlier schemes, specifically the longstanding immigrant-investor and entrepreneur programs, which were poorly monitored.

The email thread shows that senior officials in March of last year were working “under the radar” to expand similar business-class schemes, particularly the so-called Start-Up Visa (SUV) program, to welcome more would-be entrepreneurs into the country who have the “potential” to start a new business.

However, when the directors sought advice from Daniel Hiebert, a former UBC geography professor who is now working in the department’s strategic planning section, he said the earlier programs led to only 15 per cent of business-class immigrants actually starting a business.

“Ouch,” Hiebert says in the email, explaining how most of the business-class newcomers failed to start a new company even though their status as permanent residents was supposedly contingent on it.

The Conservatives disbanded the immigrant investor and entrepreneur programs in 2014, openly saying the people who came in through them were generally not having a long-term positive impact on the country, not bringing in significant investment capital for business, had low ability in Canada’s official languages, were tending not to stay in the country, and were paying far lower taxes than the average skilled worker.

Even many of those entrepreneurs who did begin a business through the old program dropped it after two years, said Hiebert. “They started businesses to meet requirements and then later let them go.”

Hiebert said, as far as he knows, not one of those entrepreneur-class immigrants ever had their permanent resident status revoked.

Furthermore, Hiebert explained how many of those business-class immigrants who bought expensive houses in the city tended to pay low mortgages and low income taxes.

“This is still the case,” Hiebert wrote. “The story is that many of the residents of these areas came through business-class programs with the intent to retire and live a comfortable lifestyle.”

After initially transferring their money out of their country of origin, typically somewhere in East Asia, Hiebert wrote, most purchased a house “along with a Mercedes, Audi or whatever. And then life is lived quite simply, on a small budget and with little owing in terms of income tax. The kids get to go to UBC or SFU while paying domestic fees, which is a big bonus.”

Hiebert concludes his March, 2023, memo by saying, “I think it’s time to review the economic outcomes of the Start-Up Visa program and I suspect they will show more of the same.”

At one point in the email thread, Umit Kiziltan, director general of the IRCC, said the “burning questions” that Hiebert raised required the “outmost (sic) attention” while the department evaluates whether to expand the Start-Up Visa program and others aimed at wealthy immigrants.

Also included in the thread are Maggie Pastorek, director of policy, and James McNamee, senior director in the economic immigration branch.

The group email includes a discussion of a study covered in a Postmedia article from 2022, which shows how UBC business professor Thomas Davidoff and others discovered the owners of Greater Vancouver homes with a median value of $3.7 million pay income taxes of just $15,800 — which is exceedingly low for North American cities.

“Most luxury homes in Greater Vancouver appear to be purchased with wealth derived from sources other than earnings taxed in Canada,” said Davidoff’s study, which confirmed earlier research by Statistics Canada and Hiebert himself.

Several years ago, StatCan and Hiebert found the average value of a detached house bought by more than 4,400 millionaire immigrants who came to Metro Vancouver under the investor program was $3.2 million. That compared to an average of $1.5 million for a Canadian-born owner.

While working at UBC, Hiebert’s studies also found a correlation between neighbourhoods with large foreign-born populations and neighbourhoods that appear to have unusually low taxable incomes, despite their inflated housing prices, such as Richmond and Vancouver’s west side.

Based on the documents provided in response to an access-to-information request by Vancouver immigration lawyer Richard Kurland, it is not clear how the internal discussion affected later decisions the Liberal government made about its Start-Up Visa program

Last year, however, Ottawa scaled up the annual intake of the Start-Up Visa program from 2022, when it offered 1,000 spots. The program’s intake rose to 3,500 last year and is set to bring in 5,000 this year and 6,000 in 2025.

Immigration department officials did not respond by deadline.

Source: Douglas Todd: Ottawa insider warns about immigrant-investor schemes

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Immigration Minister urged to crack down on international student ‘no shows’ at colleges

2024/01/19 Leave a comment

All the negligence on the part of federal and provincial governments, education institutions and others for having enabled this degree of fraud and, in many cases, exploitation.

Likely worth looking into ownership of these private colleges to assess whether any degree of political complicity or corruption involved:

The International Student Compliance Regime, implemented in 2014, is designed to help identify bogus students and help provinces identify questionable schools.

Most of the colleges on IRCC’s top ten list of schools with the highest potential non-compliance rates are privately run and in Ontario, catering heavily to students from India.

The IRCC’s Student Integrity Analysis Report, dated November, 2021, found “no shows” to make up as much as 90 per cent of students at some private colleges. “No shows” are students with letters of acceptance, who should be enrolled but either did not confirm the acceptance, never attended class or suddenly stopped attending.

The Academy of Learning College in Toronto had a 95 per cent “overall potential student non compliance rate” among students, the report said. Ninety per cent of students were recorded as “no shows.”

The 2021 Student Integrity Analysis Report, obtained by immigration lawyer Richard Kurland through an access to information request, found that Flair College of Management and Technology in Vaughan, Ont., had a “no show” of 75 per cent of students.

Both colleges did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Mr. Kurland said the IRCC has known for years which colleges have large numbers of international students not attending classes but have so far failed to act on study permits.

He said the data suggest that some schools may have a business model based on bringing students into Canada and getting their tuition, even if the student doesn’t attend.

“The integrity of our International Students Program is of the utmost importance,” she said in an e-mail.

Source: Immigration Minister urged to crack down on international student ‘no shows’ at colleges

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‘Breaking point’: Quebec premier asks Trudeau to slow influx of asylum seekers

2024/01/19 Leave a comment

Valid concerns but with respect to costs, Legault avoids discussing the disproportionate amount Quebec gets under the Canada Quebec accord that ensures Quebec gets a fixed percentage of settlement funding irrespective of the immigration share:

Quebec Premier François Legault is asking Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to slow the influx of asylum seekers entering his province, which he said is nearing a “breaking point.”

Legault made his request in an official letter to Trudeau sent Wednesday afternoon, a copy of which was obtained by The Canadian Press.

“We are very close to the breaking point due to the excessive number of asylum seekers arriving in Quebec month after month. The situation has become unsustainable,” Legault wrote.

He said that in 2022, Quebec took in more asylum seekers than the rest of the country combined.

The closure of the unofficial Roxham Road crossing point south of Montreal in 2023 “momentarily” slowed the flow, he said.

“However, the arrivals have continued to increase at airports. The number of people arriving on a visitor visa and applying for asylum is also increasing significantly.”

Nearly 60,000 new asylum seekers were registered in Quebec in the first 11 months of 2023, which has put “very significant pressure” on services, the premier writes.

“Asylum seekers have trouble finding a place to live, which contributes to accentuating the housing crisis,” the letter said. “Many end up in homeless shelters, which are overflowing.”

He said organizations that help asylum seekers can’t keep up with demand. Legault said the children of asylum seekers are also straining schools that already have a shortage of teachers and space.

The premier reminded Trudeau that asylum seekers who are waiting for work permits receive financial assistance from Quebec. Last October, some 43,200 asylum seekers received $33 million in aid.

Legault expressed particular concern over Mexican nationals, who he said represent a growing proportion of the asylum seekers coming to the province.

“The possibility of entering Canada from Mexico without a visa certainly explains part of the influx of asylum seekers,” he said.

“The airports, particularly in Toronto and Montreal, are becoming sieves and it is time to act,” he added.

Legault is formally asking the prime minister to tighten its policies around granting visas. He’s also seeking the “equitable” distribution of asylum seekers across Canada, possibly by busing them to other provinces.

Source: ‘Breaking point’: Quebec premier asks Trudeau to slow influx of asylum seekers

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Sean Speer: Trudeau’s empty-calories economic agenda is failing Canada

2024/01/19 Leave a comment

Of note:

The key point here is that even if one is motivated by normative commitments to reducing inequality in our society, the answer isn’t to neglect the imperative of intensive growth. A policy agenda that sought to boost business investment and innovation in the name of increasing overall wealth wouldn’t necessarily involve a major equity trade-off. Higher GDP per capita growth is ultimately key to boosting living standards for all Canadian households.

The bigger point though is that the Trudeau government’s experiment with an extensive growth agenda rooted in high immigration and high public spending has manifestly failed to produce positive results. It may have staved off a technical recession, but it has contributed to deep recessionary conditions for Canadian living standards that are having far-reaching socio-political consequences including heightened pessimism about the future among ordinary citizens.

This growing realization has led to renewed debate about Canadian immigration policy. That’s a healthy development. We need to restore a more responsible policy that sets reasonable targets and reprioritizes high-skilled immigrants. Pierre Poilievre deserves political credit for taking a big step in this direction.

But that’s a necessary yet insufficient response to what ails Canada’s economic life. What we ultimately need is to replace the Trudeau government’s empty-calories economic agenda with a healthier mix of pro-growth policies to boost investment, productivity, and living standards.

source: Sean Speer: Trudeau’s empty-calories economic agenda is failing Canada

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Bad News For Employers, Immigrants And H-1B Visas In Second Trump Term

2024/01/19 Leave a comment

Of note. May be one of the only benefits for Canada, drowned out by likely negative impact on our economy:

A second Donald Trump term would bring new restrictions on legal immigration that would affect employers and likely drive more work and tech talent out of the United States. Trump’s actions during his first term, his rhetoric during campaign rallies and statements by allies signal unwelcome news for companies that rely on foreign-born scientists and engineers to grow and innovate. With Donald Trump winning the Iowa Caucus and leading Joe Biden in some polls, employers may wish to include the prospect of a Trump presidency in their contingency plans.

H-1B Visas Would Face New Restrictions

If Donald Trump becomes president again, companies should expect new restrictions on employing foreign-born scientists and engineers in H-1B status. After he took office in 2017, Trump’s immigration policies increased the denial rate for H-1B petitionsfor initial employment (typically new employees counted against the annual H-1B cap) to 24% in FY 2018 and 21% in FY 2019. In 2020, a legal settlement forced U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services to end several practices, causing denial rates to plummet to 2% by FY 2022.

H-1B petitions for continuing employment rose to 12% in FY 2018 and FY 2019. Those petitions were usually extensions for existing employees at the same company. The denials caused employees who could not obtain extensions to leave the United States. The legal settlement resulted in H-1B petitions for continuing employment to decline to 2% by FY 2022.

If Trump officials in a new administration directed USCIS adjudicators to act more restrictively, denial rates would increase. Even successful lawsuits could leave employers with the policies in place for years, which happened after Trump officials restricted H-1B petitions in 2017.

In a second term, Trump’s team could return to its H-1B interim final rule published in 2020 (after solving its procedural issues). A lawsuit stopped the rule on procedural grounds. The administration tried to publish parts of the rule again before Donald Trump left office.

Source: Bad News For Employers, Immigrants And H-1B Visas In Second Trump Term

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Chris Selley: Backing the Houthis exposes the raw Jew-hatred of the pro-Palestinian protesters

2024/01/19 Leave a comment

Such extremism has little place in Canada and those publicly supporting such extremism need to reflect more on the impact of their actions:

Canada is broken in many ways, but the ability of different people from very different backgrounds to get along has not thus far been one of them. That’s very much at risk. Obviously many Jewish Canadians arrived many weeks ago at where I now find myself: Overt public support for Hamas, which is only slightly more subtle about its genocidal aims than the Houthis, has destroyed friendships and professional relationships, and weakened confidence in Canada as a safe place for Jews to live.

I abhor the idea of asking any individual Muslim (or any other Canadian) to explain and justify his position on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. We’re allowed to think whatever we want about geopolitics inside our own heads, so long as we can be civil to each other out in the real world. But more and more, these protests are becoming an overt rejection of that latter.

Calling for an end to Israel’s war against Hamas is fair enough. The death toll is appalling, the prospects of a lasting victory uncertain. But if they’re as worried about Islamophobia as they claim to be, Muslim organizations and advocates desperately need to repudiate the naked extremism that now seems to have free run within the cause.

Source: Chris Selley: Backing the Houthis exposes the raw Jew-hatred of the pro-Palestinian protesters

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Yakabuski: The Trudeau Liberals created a ‘population trap’ that is making us poorer

2024/01/18 Leave a comment

Further piling on but correct assessment regarding the political difficulties in changing/reversing course:

Reducing immigration numbers will not be easy. Businesses and postsecondary institutions will bellyache and the Liberals risk alienating some progressive and ethnic voters. Paradoxically, it could cause short-term economic pain by temporarily reducing domestic consumption.

But cutting immigration is no longer an option that Mr. Miller can just “consider.” It must be his top priority.

Source: The Trudeau Liberals created a ‘population trap’ that is making us poorer

And from the Globe Editorial:

Another mistake being made in Canada is the Liberals’ failure to address the immigration issue. The government’s refusal to take obvious steps to end even the worst abuses of the student visa program, for instance, risks harming Canadians’ support for immigration.

Canadians should take note of how ignoring immigration issues has worked out south of the border. Decades of incompetence by both Republican and Democratic administrations has led to the point where the two sides cannot reach a bipartisan solution. That impasse has opened American voters to the idea of a radical fix, and has allowed Mr. Trump to win support for his inhumane threat to put illegal immigrants in concentration camps.

Source: The U.S. may be on the brink, but no democracy can be taken for granted

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Tasha Kheiriddin: Trudeau frittered away a good immigration policy for the sake of Liberal votes – National Post

2024/01/18 Leave a comment

Discounts the flawed policy rationale of the Barton commission recommendations but of course, political considerations also played a role. And, as we saw during the Kenney years, the liberals cannot take these voters for granted:

Immigrants are also grateful to the party that bring them in. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau learned this from his father. Pierre Elliott Trudeau took credit for the citizenship of millions of Canadians, even though many had come to Canada under previous governments. Why? Because they took their oath under his watch. And when it came to elections, the immigrant communities of the day — Italians, Greeks, Haitians, Vietnamese — tended to vote Liberal.

The implications of Trudeau Jr.’s replication of this policy are dire. Studies show that they are turning Canadians against immigration: even 62 per cent of current immigrants think we’re letting in too many people. They are impoverishing Canadians, both current and newcomer, according to the bank study. And they are also helping fuel Quebec separatism, as francophones look with alarm at rising immigrant populations in the Rest-Of-Canada. By the end of the century, Quebec risks becoming a bit player in Confederation, with only 15 per cent of its population.

This cannot continue. Instead of flooding the country with newcomers, the government needs to boost domestic productivity. That’s a harder fix — and one that won’t give them more votes. But then again, if Canadians can’t afford a decent life, the Liberals may not get their votes either.

Source: Tasha Kheiriddin: Trudeau frittered away a good immigration policy for the sake of Liberal votes – National Post

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White Americans who dislike Jews also tend to endorse anti-Muslim attitudes, study suggests – PsyPost

2024/01/18 4 Comments

Survey dates from 2014 but likely same trends apply:

The researchers focused on responses that reflected attitudes towards Muslims and Jews. Questions in the survey pertained to the cultural belonging of Muslims and Jews (e.g., whether participants would approve of their child marrying a Jew or Muslim, their agreement with a Muslim or Jewish ‘vision of America’), their loyalty, assimilation, and perceived power (e.g., ‘more loyal to their religion or Israel than to America’, ‘less like other Americans’, ‘have too much power’), and associated problems (e.g., ‘a threat to public order and safety’, ‘do not share my morals or values’, ‘take jobs and resources’, ‘are intolerant of others’, ‘want to take over political institutions’, ‘do not contribute to my community’, ‘are dependent on welfare and government’).”

The results showed that levels of anti-Muslim sentiment were several times higher than anti-Jewish sentiment. A clear majority of participants disapproved of a marriage between their child and a Muslim and roughly two thirds considered Muslims to be more loyal to their religion than to America. About one in four participants associated Muslims with public safety issues, while one in three believed they did not share their moral values and were intolerant.

In contrast, only about 17% of participants objected to their child marrying a Jew. Thirteen percent disagreed with Jews’ ‘vision of America’, 14% perceived them as more loyal to Israel than to America, and other negative views were less frequent.

Further analysis identified four distinct groups among the participants. The largest group, comprising 54% of participants, held few or no negative views towards both Muslims and Jews (low anti-Muslim, low anti-Jew). Another group, encompassing 26% of participants, exhibited moderate anti-Muslim and anti-Jewish views. The third group, making up 17% of participants, held strong anti-Muslim views but low anti-Jewish attitudes. The smallest group, approximately 4% of participants, harbored highly negative views towards both Jews and Muslims.

Membership in these groups was not associated with education. Men were twice as likely as women to hold high anti-Muslim, but low anti-Jew views. Older individuals were also more prone to this configuration of views. People with lower income were more likely to be in the fourth group (strong negative views of both groups). Republicans and evangelical Protestants were much less likely to be in the first group than in any of the other three groups.

“Although anti-Muslim opinion is more extensive, the two track together empirically and share a cultural logic as connected forms of ethno-religious boundary-making. Latent class analysis shows that anti-Semitism is nested within anti-Muslim attitudes, with political and religious identifications as consistent predictors of opinion,” the study authors concluded.

Source: White Americans who dislike Jews also tend to endorse anti-Muslim attitudes, study suggests – PsyPost

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ICYMI: Tying immigration to homes a ‘good’ idea but not a fix-all: Housing minister – Global News

2024/01/18 Leave a comment

Apart from the irony of the former immigration minister waking up to the fact that his policies contributed to housing availability/affordability problems, it is valid to say it is not a “fix-all.” But it is an essential part of the mix, particularly in the short-to-medium term:

Fraser says temporary immigration programs are putting pressure on the housing system and creating a “serious issue we need to address.”

He pointed to the temporary foreign worker and international student programs. The federal government has said they are considering a cap on international student, but want to take a year to work with provinces first to try to find solutions.

“Enough is enough,” Immigration Minister Marc Miller said in announcing changes to the international student program last year. “If provinces and territories cannot do this, we will do it for them and they will not like the bluntness of the instruments that we use.”

Miller previously described the idea of a cap on international students as akin to “surgery with a hammer” during an interview with Global News

Fraser said the program has grown “by hundreds of thousands of people each year” in the last couple of years.

“There are some institutions in parts of this country, I have the sincerely held belief, have come to exist just to exploit the program for the personal financial gains of the people behind some of these schools, if we can call them that,” he said.

Source: Tying immigration to homes a ‘good’ idea but not a fix-all: Housing minister – Global News

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