The Quebec province of Canada has set a cap of 13,000 applications concerning several categories of family sponsorship visas.
Of those, 10,400 will be allocated for spouses, common-law spouses, and dependent children aged 18 years and above. The remaining 2,600 are reserved for parents, grandparents, and other eligible family members VisaGuide.World reports.
The cap, which entered into force on June 26, 2024, will be effective until June 25, 2026, as reported by the CIC News.
After reaching the limit, Quebec authorities will no longer accept applications for the rest of the time. If individuals submit their applications after the slots are filled, the ministry will return them without processing or charging the procedural fee.
These Categories Will Not Be Affected By New Cap
However, not all categories of applicants will be affected by the new change. As further explained, the following groups will be exempt from this cap:
- A sponsor’s dependent underage child.
- Underage children the sponsor wants to adopt.
- An orphaned underage child of the sponsor’s brother, sister, nephew, niece, grandson, or granddaughter.
- A sponsor’s adult child who is dependent on a parent due to disability.
As the same source further reports, to be exempt from this limit, the individual being sponsored cannot be married or in a common-law relationship.
This measure is closely related to Quebec’s housing crisis, reportedly due to the increasing number of temporary residents.
Canada Aims to Reduce Number of Temporary Residents
In addition to the Quebec province, the Canadian authorities aim to reduce the overall number of temporary residents, as revealed by Immigration Minister Marc Miller in March 2024.
More specifically, Canadian authorities aim to decrease the number of temporary residents to five percent of the population, compared to the existing 6.2 percent.
Categories that would be affected by such a measure include foreign students, foreign workers, and asylum seekers.
As Minister Miller explained back then, this move aims to ensure a “sustainable” increase in the number of temporary residents entering the country.
Despite these caps, Canada relies on the foreign workforce in certain sectors. Therefore, construction and healthcare workers will be exempted from this policy following Canada’s labor shortages in these fields. These categories will be entitled to enter the country at current levels until at least 31 August.
According to Statistics Canada, the current number of temporary residents in Canada is 2.5 million, up from almost one million in 2021.