By Canadian Press

Uproar from students after Quebec restricts access to fast-track immigration

Nov 7, 2019 | 2:03 PM

QUEBEC — In a rare show of solidarity, all of Quebec’s opposition parties gathered Tuesday with a group of foreign students to denounce the government’s latest immigration reforms, which they described as cruel and inhumane.

Hundreds of foreign students in the province recently learned they might be forced to leave because of retroactive changes to a popular fast-track immigration program, which used to be open to all university graduates and others who completed technical degrees.

The Quebec experience program will now be open only to a select list of graduates who are seeking work in industries the government says are facing labour shortages, Immigration Minister Simon Jolin-Barrette announced last week.

Monsef Derraji, a Liberal member of the legislature, told reporters Tuesday the government’s latest immigration reforms are breaking lives and killing dreams.

“We attracted them to Quebec — with a big publicity campaign — from all over Europe, Africa, Asia, South America … they speak our language, share our values, survived our winters …. It’s unacceptable,” Derraji said.

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Derraji stood alongside members of the other opposition parties as well as about 20 foreign students, many of whom had tears in their eyes during the news conference.

Clement Sageste, a student from France who is well-established in Quebec, said, “I felt an anger, a betrayal …. they give you something, then take it away. It’s inhumane.”

A woman from China broke down in tears describing how she and her husband had moved to Quebec three years ago, learned French and bought a home, and may now have to leave the province.

Jolin-Barrette told reporters later in the day the Quebec experience program must be open to people who can fill the needs of the province’s economy. He rejected calls to modify the reforms by allowing foreign students already in the province to qualify under the old rules.

Quebec doesn’t just need people who have university degrees, he said.

“There are enough lawyers in Quebec,” the minister said. “What we need … are people who can respond to the jobs that are available in all the regions, notably in factories, in professional and in technical jobs.”

Quebec Premier Francois Legault, like his immigration minister, shrugged off the morning’s emotional news conference. He said the fast-track residency program remains open to graduates the province desperately needs, such as people with degrees in information technology, engineering, artificial intelligence and nursing sciences.

Legault said he was sensitive to the concerns of the students who were cut out of the program, but added “no student was given a study permit with the guarantee they would eventually be given citizenship.”

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 5, 2019.

— With files from Giuseppe Valiante

Patrice Bergeron, The Canadian Press