Delay in the rollout of new pathway to permanent residency for caregivers put their status at risk

Thousands of caregivers from overseas may need to leave the country or risk staying here illegally as Ottawa delays the rollout of a new pathway to permanent residency for nannies and home support workers.

 

Since 2019, the Home Child Care Provider and the Home Support Worker pilot programs have brought caregivers and support workers to Canada from overseas on temporary work permits, allowing them the ability to apply for permanent residency.

 

But those programs ended in June, when the federal government announced it would introduce new pilot programs that have yet to be launched.

 

In a statement to The Globe and Mail, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada said the department needed time to reduce the number of existing permanent residence applications through the old pilot programs before launching the new ones. The statement from early December also said that full eligibility criteria and details on how to apply for the programs will be available in the “coming months.”

 

The delay leaves thousands of foreign workers in a state of uncertainty and, in some cases, at risk of becoming undocumented, in spite of a high demand from Canadian families for caregivers.

 

As the government works to clear the backlog of applicants in the old pilots, it is also tightening immigration requirements over calls to reduce the number of temporary workers in Canada in light of rising housing costs and pressure on services such as health care. The government has set a goal of reducing the temporary resident target to 5 per cent of the population by 2026; it currently hovers at 7 per cent.

Migrant worker advocates have been critical of the government’s approach to immigrant caregivers, noting that they are often subject to long waits that can last up to three years to obtain permanent residency, leaving them stuck in low-wage caregiving jobs. Most immigrant caregivers are also women and are separated from their spouses and children until they can obtain residency.

 

In October, after more than five years of working as a live-in caregiver in Toronto, Teresa Andrade’s temporary work permit expired. Ms. Andrade had applied for permanent residency through the Home Child Care Provider Pilot, but her application was rejected.

 

She has been waiting to apply for permanent residency again through the new pilot. In June, Ms. Andrade travelled to Ottawa with the Migrant Rights Network, an immigration advocacy organization, to meet Immigration Minister Marc Miller. She said Mr. Miller told her that details of the program would be announced in the fall.

 

For Ms. Andrade, the delay means she has lost the ability to stay in Canada on a valid work permit. She was here on a temporary work permit that was renewed twice by her former employer, for whom she was a live-in nanny from March, 2019, to June, 2023. When the family opted to hire another caregiver, Ms. Andrade was out of work. To stay in Canada, she applied for and was granted a visitor visa, which expired in October.

 

Immigrants who apply for permanent residency through various immigration streams can usually stay in the country through a Bridging Open Work Permit, if they have a letter from the government saying their application for permanent residency has been approved “in principle.”

 

“My last hope to remain in Canada was to apply directly for PR through this new pilot,” Ms. Andrade said. “I’ve lived and worked here since 2019. This is my home. Where is the program? Where are the details? How do we plan our lives?”

 

Foreign caregivers have come to Canada for decades through immigration streams including the Live-In Caregiver program that ran from 1992 to 2014.

 

The Home Child Care Provider and Home Support Worker pilot programs experienced high demand since launching in 2019, and as the number of applicants rose, the backlog of caregivers waiting to receive permanent residency did, too. According to IRCC data from September, there were almost 37,000 applicants waiting for permanent residency through the two programs. The 2025-27 Immigration Levels plan has allocated just 10,200 permanent residency spots for these pilots and the Agri-Food pilot, a farm worker immigration stream.

 

“There are hundreds of foreign caregivers who are in limbo right now because they hoped to apply for PR through these pilots and are waiting around for details. Meanwhile, they are losing status,” said Julie Diesta, migrant worker program co-ordinator at the South Vancouver Neighbourhood House, a community organization focused on helping integrate newcomers.

 

“The thing to remember is there is a high demand for caregivers. We are an aging population. We need these workers.”

 

Gabriela, whom The Globe is not identifying in full because she is concerned about her future immigration prospects, came to Canada from the Philippines in 2020 to pursue a diploma in personal support work. The 31-year-old, who recently graduated from Sault College in Toronto, is one of many people sharing their concerns on a Facebook group for immigrants waiting to apply to the new caregiver pilots.

 

Her hope was to apply for permanent residence through the Canadian Experience Class program, an immigration stream geared toward international students. Upon graduating, she held a three-year postgraduate open work permit and got a full-time job with a family, caring for a senior.

 

But changes to immigration policy have raised the cut-off score to obtain permanent residency through the CEC stream to a level that she will now be unable to meet. Since she has been working as a caregiver, she hoped the new pilot programs would launch in the fall so she could apply for residency. Her work permit expires this month, and without another pathway to permanent residency, she might have to return to the Philippines or find a caregiving job in another country.

An October report from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives on migrant caregivers said that there was consistently a mismatch between application caps announced by the government for caregiver pilots, and applications received.

 

Using figures from IRCC, the report said the department saw 37,568 applications between January, 2019, and January, 2023, for the Home Child Care Provider and Home Support Worker pilots. Of those, as of March, 2023, only 2,581 permanent residency applications were approved, and 1,971 were rejected.

 

IRCC had set an annual cap of 5,500 permanent resident spots for both pilots between 2019 and 2024.

 

Processing times for permanent residence applications through these pilots were consistently longer than other immigration streams, the report found, taking between 31 and 34 months as compared with seven months for the CEC stream.

 

Ms. Andrade, who hails from the Philippines, says she is concerned that with the recent tightening of immigration rules, IRCC might decide to not launch the program at all until they’ve cleared their caregiver backlog – a process that could take years.

 

“We’ve given so much to Canadian families, we’ve helped raise their children, we’ve paid our taxes. We’re just looking for clarity, and a path to be able to call Canada home.”

 

 

 

 

This article was first reported by The Globe and Mail