Immigration Minister Lena Metlege Diab proudly announced earlier this month that the federal government had exceeded last year’s “ambitious” immigration target for francophones outside of Quebec. What she didn’t say, however, is that this strategy of passing over better-qualified applicants who don’t speak French will likely harm Canada’s economic growth.

It’s one in a series of policies that has upended Canada’s successful economic immigration program by watering it down to meet other objectives.

Francophones are now the highest priority group of skilled workers, with their numbers surpassing those with Canadian work experience, or expertise in health care, education or trades.

The cut-off scores for francophone immigrants, based on factors such as age, education and work experience, are substantially lower than those for other skilled workers offered permanent residence. The lowest cut-off score for French speakers last year was 379; it was 462 for health care workers and 515 for applicants with Canadian experience. According to research from C.D. Howe’s Christopher Worswick and other economists, lower-scoring workers are more likely to struggle economically and make less money. Bringing them in over more highly skilled workers hurts productivity and reduces tax revenue.

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The government’s rationale, according to last year’s policy paper from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, is the “urgent need” to address the decline of francophone and Acadian communities. The government aims to restore their demographic weight to 1971 levels, when it was 6.1 per cent of the population outside Quebec, from 3.5 per cent in 2021.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/editorials/article-canada-has-gutted-its-economic-migration-program/