Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Premier François Legault met in Quebec City on Monday afternoon to talk immigration. The pair had met in March and promised to meet again before the end of June.
Reports are that Ottawa will offer the province $750 million over five years to help with the costs of welcoming newcomers.
The Quebec premier has been asking for $1 billion to pay for asylum seekers; a better distribution of asylum seekers throughout the country; and for Quebec to have a say in selecting temporary foreign workers – with French language skills being a priority.
“It’s a great pleasure for me to be back in Quebec City to sit down with Premier Legault, to continue the conversations we started in March on immigration,” said Prime Minister Trudeau before the meeting. “It’s an opportunity for us to build on the great conversations that have happened between our ministers over the past few months, and continue our work together to grow a strong economy and lots of opportunities for Quebecers and all Canadians.”
Trudeau added that during the meeting, they would talk about the challenge of temporary workers. He said more than half the permits issued to temporary workers are controlled by Quebec, “and we’ll work with them to reduce these numbers.”
“In recent years we’ve seen an explosion in the number of temporary immigrants. The number of doubled over the past two years and has caused us major problems in terms of housing, health services and education. We’re short of teachers and nurses. It’s also a problem for the future of French, because a third of temporary immigrants don’t speak French,” added Legault.
“Now, some of this is controlled by Quebec, and we’re going to work together on that, but some, like asylum seekers, are not controlled at all by Quebec, and there’s an urgent need to see a concrete reduction in the next few months. So, that’s what we’re going to talk about.”