Immigration Minister Sean Fraser’s parliamentary secretary announced nearly $1.5 million in funding to help newcomers to Canada’s health sector get to work faster.
The purpose of the funds is to promote cooperation and information sharing in the healthcare department. Specifically, to provide help internationally educated health care professionals increasingly recognize their credentials.
This project is structured on the success of the N4 (National Navigation Newcomers network). It is an online platform for those national healthcare professionals who want to work in provinces of Canada. N4 was introduced by the children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO) in the year 2019.
Marie-France Lalonde said that CHEO has a proven track record to secure and social health services department occupations have good knowledge and tools and they have to give equal care and service to newcomers. These services will be helpful for the success of newcomers and also help in making a better future for all people of Canada.
Apart from, helping internationally educated professionals who work in Canada, the N4 fund will be able to provide a platform for newcomers where they can find information about foreign qualifications and credentials which is required in all territories and provinces outside Quebec.
Newcomers are an essential part of the community of Canada they help in short-term recovery and long-term success and address the labor shortage of Canada, healthcare workforce is also included.
This funding comes from a stream of IRCC’s settlement program to support the future programming settlement. According to the information, a total of approx. $1.02 billion has the issue by IRCC in service of settlement in 2022-2023, and it increased about 11% from 2021-to 2022.
Canada is facing a shortage in the labor market, and there is more shortage in the health department. Recently Statistics of Canada shows a record level of job requirements in the health care department and social assistance.
Some Express Entry for healthcare occupations
Healthcare professionals are qualified for the express entry programs such as FSWP – (Federal Skilled Workers Program) and CEC – (Canadian Experience Class).
Express Entry is a migration application management system that controls immigration applications online for the government of federal in Canada. It uses the Comprehensive Ranking System-(CRS) to rank the profile of qualified applicants from the express entry pool which is based on some factors such as proficient work experience, age, educational qualification, and language ability in English and French in Canada, and other factors. To be invited in to apply for permanent residence status in Canada candidates must have scored the highest in the express entry draw.
Although draws for CEC and FSWP candidates have been paused during the pandemic, Immigration Minister Fraser previously announced that these draws will start again in the month of July. The minister also said that the application processing standard for new express entry applicants will be returned in six months.
PNP draws for health care professionals
Even though IRCC decided who can migrate to Canada, provinces are able to nominate qualified candidates via PNP (Provincial Nominee Program). Some PNPs are specifically dedicated to healthcare professionals, while others have more general work experience requirements, but immigration targeting candidates in this field can be an enrollment draw.
Provinces have several programs to immigrate healthcare professionals. Sometimes PNPs attract candidates through an express entry system and invite them to apply for provincial enrollment. Candidates who are nominated get 600 CRS points which are automatically added to their Express Entry scores.
Some pathways of immigration for healthcare professionals are given below:
- Healthcare professionals who wish to work in Ontario can apply through its Human Capital Priorities Stream.
- Healthcare professionals immigrate to British Columbia through its PNP category of Skills Immigration and Express Entry.
- Healthcare professionals can immigrate to Saskatchewan through the International Health Worker (EOI) pool which was recently introduced by Saskatchewan.
- Nova Scotia’s Labor Market Priority Stream sometimes invites health care professionals to apply for provincial enrollment.
- Nurses who can fluently speak English & French can immigrate through New Brunswick’s Internationally Educated Nurses (IEN).
Quebec
The province of Quebec controls its own migration system to conduct its draws in which Some programs, such as PNP and Express Entry, are not available for candidates.
Quebec provides its regular Skilled Worker Program and the Quebec Experience Programs as an immigration pathway to Canada. Health care professionals will be qualified for any of these programs and candidates must have a working knowledge of the French language to be eligible for both of these programs.
Caregiver pilot programs for immigration
Caregiver applicants who want to apply for permanent residency status in Canada are able to apply through the Home Child Care Provider Pilot. To be eligible to apply they must have a job offer to work in eligible professions and they have to be qualified for other eligibility criteria. Their work experience should come under the NOC codes 411 and 4412.
Candidates are eligible to obtain an open work permit via these pilots and go to Canada and work temporarily.
To be eligible for the permanent residence status in Canada candidates must have 2 years of full-time work experience before 36 months of filling out the application. They also need a Canadian Language Benchmark (CLB) of 5 or higher and language test results after one year of secondary education. As with all permanent residency applicants, they will also need to pass an acceptance check.
