BREAKING: Poilievre will cap immigration at 250,000 newcomers annually
Most recent immigration data uncovered 471,550 new permanent residents, 766,520 temporary foreign workers and 1,040,985 foreign students came to Canada in 2023.
An exclusive Juno News interview with Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre has revealed his plans to reduce immigration targets to Harper-era levels — but is it enough?
“It would be a lot more like the Harper numbers that were basically the same for 40 years before Trudeau took office — we were bringing in about 200,000 to 250,000 a year,” Poilievre told Juno News co-founder Candice Malcolm.
The Tory leader last October 24 condemned Trudeau’s “uncontrolled immigration” policies despite 20% retractions to record-breaking immigration targets.
Poilievre slams Trudeau's new immigration measures as a massive admission of failure.
— Rebel News (@RebelNewsOnline) October 24, 2024
"Trudeau called anyone who disagreed with these radical policies, racist. Now he's the one cutting immigration to pull back on the disastrous mistakes that he made." https://t.co/TXq29qhTJo pic.twitter.com/3gDI6Wuvwr
“Canada made me a promise. It makes all of us a promise,” opined Poilievre at the time. “Whether we're born here [or] arrived as immigrants, if you work hard, you get a good life. Anyone from anywhere … gets a powerful paycheck that buys affordable food and homes in safe neighborhoods.”
“And that promise, like everything else, is broken after nine years of Trudeau and the NDP-Liberals. Most of all, he broke our immigration system,” he said.
The most recent Immigration Levels Plan cuts back the number of permanent residents through 2027, from 485,000 in 2024 to 395,000 this year. It also plans further reductions in 2026 (380,000) and 2027 (365,000).
A previous plan tabled 500,000 additional permanent residents in each of the next two years. “We didn't get the balance quite right,” Trudeau admitted then.
PM Trudeau, after years of the Liberals supporting mass immigration, announces a reduction to "give all levels of government time to catch up ... to accommodate more people in the future."https://t.co/TXq29qhTJo pic.twitter.com/FMzxRraLCW
— Rebel News (@RebelNewsOnline) October 24, 2024
Last February 12, MPs demanded a review of federal immigration policy after the House of Commons adopted a non-binding motion to revise targets. The proposal passed by a vote of 173-150 but was not immediately accepted upon by the federal government.
Most recent immigration data uncovered 471,550 new permanent residents, 766,520 temporary foreign workers and 1,040,985 foreign students came to Canada in 2023.
The prime minister’s “last minute pre-election reversal cannot be believed,” the Tory leader told reporters. “He said six months ago he's going to cap the number of temporary residents in this country to 5% of our population. Since that time, it's gone up to 7.3%.”
“We will cap population growth so that it is always below the growth in housing, health care and jobs,” Poilievre promised. “We will reverse the uncontrolled approach.”
Builders and bureaucrats acknowledged that Trudeau’s plans for affordable housing were doomed to failure, citing low investor interest and outrageous immigration targets.
— Rebel News Canada (@RebelNews_CA) February 7, 2025
READ MORE: https://t.co/tCdKHZjpMs pic.twitter.com/fBjZYotenc
Poilievre’s proposed immigration targets would align new housing with population growth for the first time in nearly a decade. “We had more houses than were necessary to house the new people coming to the country.”
“We were building about the same number of homes as we were adding people, so we had a housing surplus. I would bring in a simple mathematical formula: we cannot bring in people faster than we add houses,” he told Juno News.
A 2020 memo forewarned current targets could pose serious challenges to housing, education and health service infrastructure for provinces and municipalities.
The Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation (CHMC) projects the housing stock will grow by approximately 2.3 million between 2021 and 2030. An additional 3.5 million housing units are needed beyond current projections to restore affordability.
“I would actually make sure that we’re building housing surpluses over the next four years because that’s how we close the gap that has built up,” Poilievre clarified.
“Conservatives will fix what Trudeau and the NDP-Liberals broke. We will restore the best immigration system in the world,” he claimed.
Alex Dhaliwal
Journalist and Writer
Alex Dhaliwal is a Political Science graduate from the University of Calgary. He has actively written on relevant Canadian issues with several prominent interviews under his belt.
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COMMENTS
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Bruce Atchison commented 2025-02-14 21:11:54 -0500That’s still too high. Unless these people have skills we need, keep them out!
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Bernhard Jatzezck commented 2025-02-13 21:20:35 -0500How many of them are skilled workers and can actually contribute something to this country, and, no, being cheap labour isn’t a credential. -
Bruce Atchison commented 2025-02-13 19:22:09 -0500I’m thrilled that Pierre Poilievre has finally set a cap on immigration. But this isn’t good enough. Illegal aliens who do crimes must be deported. And foreign students must be sent back to their country of origin and forced to immigrate legally. Then proceed with forcing cities to increase housing starts and clear away red tape.
