Migrant Workers Centre is one of the signatories to Migrant Rights Network recent letter to the new Federal Ministers:
May 15, 2025
The Right Honourable Mark Carney, P.C., M.P., Prime Minister of Canada, Ottawa
The Honourable Lena Metlege Diab, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship
The Honourable Patty Hajdu, Minister of Jobs and Families
The Honourable Gary Anandasangaree, Minister of Public Safety
On behalf of Migrant Rights Network, Canada’s largest migrant-led coalition, we congratulate you on forming Canada’s new government and call for immediate action on immigration rights and justice. We urge your government to:
● Ensure permanent residency for all migrants in Canada including international students, refugees, temporary foreign workers and undocumented people.
● Eliminate employer-tied work permits that enable exploitation.
● Strengthen protections and rights for all migrants.
● Prioritize family reunifi cation and end family separation.
● Reform refugee processes to uphold humanitarian values.
Building One Shared Society: No Worker Left Behind
Canada stands at a historic crossroads. As you begin your term, you do so amidst intersecting crises of affordability, economic instability, climate change, xenophobia and inequality, including persistent gender and racial inequities —but also immense opportunity for growth and prosperity. As you set out to implement your vision, we offer pragmatic recommendations that align with your priorities.
Over two million migrants—undocumented people, temporary foreign workers, international students, refugees, and others—are already living and working here. They are growing our food, raising our children, healing our sick, building our homes, and powering supply chains. Migrants are essential not just to our economies but also to our communities.
Addressing Root Causes, Not Scapegoating
We urge you to break from the failures of recent immigration policy. Research from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives and the National Right to Housing Network demonstrates that Canada’s housing and affordability crises stem from decades of inadequate public investment, deregulation, and investor-driven speculation—not immigration. Racist scapegoating of migrants linking them to the housing crisis fractures our society and undermines the core values of fairness, solidarity, and inclusion that Canada must uphold. Capping immigration and restricting access to permanent residency will not solve the crises we face.
Current permit expiration policies are creating economic disruption: approximately 1.2 million people, many of whom are on work permits, are expected to leave Canada this year. This instability represents an estimated $50 billion in potential lost annual tax revenue according to a RBC report while creating unnecessary administrative burdens and workforce disruptions across key industries. A 2024 report from the Conference Board of Canada on the other hand found that improving temporary resident pathways to permanent status could add up to 2.1% to Canada’s GDP by 2030.
Many migrants came to Canada with the promise of permanent residency over the last fi ve years. The reduction in immigration and temporary foreign worker levels announced in 2024 breaks that promise, eroding trust in this government and undermining our shared future.
Gender and Racial Justice Must Be Centered
Migrant women, racialized, queer and gender-diverse people face some of the greatest barriers to safety and rights. They are paid less at work, face sexual and physical violence when they are tied to their employers or spouses, are unable to care for their families when there are caps on pilot programs, are denied access to reproductive care and face double punishment when they speak up about abuse and mistreatment. Recognizing that women and LBGTQ people’s security and well-being are central to a strong and united society and economy means closing the immigration gaps that compound their vulnerability.
Permanent Residency Is About Rights, Not Numbers
Over the past two years, immigration debate in Canada has been reduced to numbers. But the real issue is not how many migrants live here—it is about what rights and conditions they face. In August 2024, the UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Slavery described Canada’s temporary immigration system as a “breeding ground for modern slavery.” This echoed what migrant-led organizations like us, academics, and advocates have long made clear: denying permanent residence status creates a power imbalance that fuels exploitation and weakens labour standards and human rights for all. This burden falls disproportionately on women, Black, Indigenous, and racialized migrants, deepening systemic inequities in Canada’s labour market.
Short-Term Economic Stability Measures (First 100 Days)
● Workforce Retention Initiative: Implement permit extensions for workers with permits expiring between 2024-2027, including post-graduate work permits, who have worked and studied in Canada for years but were negatively impacted by the recent immigration changes.
● Construction Sector Workforce Stabilization: Move quickly on the tripartite council (government, employers, labour unions) to create a regularization program for undocumented construction
workers. This directly supports your government’s ambitious housing targets of 500,000 new homes annually.
● Healthcare Workforce Retention: Continue accepting applications for the Home Care Worker Immigration program. The program was closed within hours of its opening, leaving over 40,000 applicants unable to apply, facing work permit expiration, separation from their families and facing continued abuse. This change will address critical healthcare staffi ng shortages and will support the government’s plan of in-Canada focus transitioning temporary workers to permanent residency.
● Administrative Efficiency Reforms to Humanitarian and Compassionate Application system: Reform the Humanitarian and Compassionate application process to provide interim healthcare, immediate work/study permits, and a stop to deportations while applications are processed.
Medium-Term Economic Growth & Equity Measures (First Six Months)
A. Ensure Permanent Resident Status for All Migrants in Canada to Fuel Economic Growth & Collective Well-Being
Healthcare and Childcare:
○ Expedite and ensure permanent residence for migrant and undocumented care workers to address critical healthcare staffing shortages and support workers essential in implementing the $10-a-day childcare program. Program eligibility must be expanded to include home care workers, security guards, cooks, cleaners and administrative staff at care facilities.
Agriculture and Fisheries:
○ Ensure permanent residence for all migrant food sector workers—including those in the Seasonal Agricultural Workers Program, fish processing, aquaculture, and undocumented workers—who are essential to Canada’s food security. Reopen and expand the Agri-Food Immigration Program, and remove job offer, education, and language barriers.
Modernize immigration and guarantee permanent resident status for all:
○ Expand federal immigration permanent residency levels.
○ Recognize all work (gig, low-wage, part-time, seasonal, unpaid, on the study permit) toward permanent residence eligibility.
○ Eliminate discriminatory scoring systems based on age, education, or wage level.
○ Expand Provincial Nominee Program allocations.
○ Remove job offer letters or job experience requirements to reduce employer control.
○ Conduct consistent immigration draws.
○ Guarantee dignity and equality for all by ensuring immigration status is not conditional on paid work.
○ Implement a comprehensive regularization program for undocumented residents.
○ End all detentions and deportations.
B. Ensure Security, Stability, and Decent Work
● End employer-specific work permits.
● Reject the insufficient “Sector Specific” work permit model planned for 2027, and reject proposals to increase wage deductions on temporary foreign workers.
● End hour/industry exclusions (including 24 hours of work limit for international students and exclusions of sex related industries) that entrench indentured labour.
● Implement enforceable national housing standards for migrant workers.
● Work with provinces to harmonize employment standards and regulate inter-provincial recruiters.
● Provide open work permits to all undocumented people.
● Allow all international students regardless of program or length of study to apply for post-graduate work permits.
● Ensure full access to unionization for all migrants including through sectoral certifi cation and bargaining
● Transform the Open Work Permit for Vulnerable Workers program to better protect migrants by ensuring work permits are valid for at least five years and renewable; granting automatic permanent residence to whistleblowers; extending work permits to family members; requiring automatic investigation of implicated employers with support for workers seeking reparations; implementing 5-day processing with transparent, uniform rules; allowing applications from undocumented migrants; shifting the burden of proof to employers; and providing housing and employment support.
● End Canada Border Services Agency collusion and partnerships with other federal departments; as well as provincial and municipal bodies and agencies, including police and Ministries of Labour, which are largely resulting in the criminalization of migrants who are attempting to protect themselves.
C. Economic Security Measures
● Improve accessibility and adequacy of EI benefits for all. Reduce hours worked to 360 for eligibility and increase EI benefits to 75% of previous earnings with a minimum benefit of $600 per week.
● Ensure seasonal migrant workers can access EI benefits while abroad.
D. Justice for Refugees
● Expand the Government-Assisted Refugee Program.
● End the Canada-US Safe Third Country Agreement – the US is not safe for refugees.
● Urgently expand and ensure resettlement of Sudanese and Palestinian refugees, as well as others escaping conflict, in coordination with their representative bodies.
E. Unite Families
● Prioritize family reunification across all immigration streams.
● Ensure all workers and students can live with their families, with access to open work/study permits, healthcare, and federal benefits.
Implementation Partnership
You have been elected on a platform of hope, urgency, and the belief that Canada can do what was once thought impossible. We urge you to act on that promise by ensuring that migrants who already contribute to Canada’s economy, health, and communities are granted permanent residency and access to rights.
We request a meeting with the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada; Minister of Jobs and Families and Minister of Public Safety within the next 30 days to discuss practical implementation of these recommendations.
The path forward is not about fixing a broken system—it is about transforming it. And that work starts now. Let us build a future of shared prosperity, justice, and opportunity for all. This future must be feminist, anti-racist, and inclusive, ensuring that gender and racial justice are at the heart of all immigration and social policy.
Please reach out to Syed Hussan, at hussan@migrantworkersalliance.org and 416-453-3632 to schedule a meeting.
Sincerely,
Migrant Rights Network
Migrant Rights Network includes Butterfly – Asian and Migrant Sex Workers Project (ON), Careworker Connections Education Support Organization (ON), Centre for Migrant Worker Rights Nova Scotia, Chinese Canadian National Council Toronto Chapter (CCNCTO), Cooper Institute (PEI), FCJ Refugee House (ON), Madhu Verma Migrant Justice Centre (NB), Migrant Students United Vancouver, Migrant Workers Alliance for Change (National), Migrant Workers Centre BC, Migrante Canada, Migrante Ontario, OCASI – Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants, Parkdale Community Legal Services (ON), RAMA Okanagan, Sanctuary Health Vancouver, Vancouver Committee for Domestic Workers and Caregivers Rights, and Workers’ Action Centre (ON). See full list of members at MigrantRights.ca/About
