Post-secondary students could see change in their institutions with further cutbacks being placed on international student permits.
The federal 2025 Budget has been announced, with plans to reduce international student study permits by 65 per cent next year. This brings the original projection of 437,000 permit allocations down to 155,000.
“There’s a logistical element of can [the government] absorb the number of immigrants across the different streams at the same pace that it’s been happening in previous years,” said Matt Farell, politics professor at Fanshawe College.
There are some “very real and tangible reasons”, says Farrell, for the government to include this in the budget.
This is taking place seven months after Fanshawe College suspended 40 of its programs following international student enrolment cuts. During that time, the college’s president, Peter Devlin, had said that the cuts held a projected $35 million deficit for the college this year and $60 million next year.
(Fanshawe College main campus, Naomi Ljunggren)
“It’s not really an intuitive case to include immigration in the budget,” says Farell, but suspects that from a political stance they may be trying to “undercut a bit of the conservative attacks” and bring in opposing parliamentary votes.
The budget states that this is part of the Immigration Levels Plan that aims reduce the total number of temporary residents to less than five per cent of the population by 2027.
Changes to international student permits can not only affect students, but staff as well, with a recent strike at the college being caused by the domino effect of loss in revenue from the previous slash.
With Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government decision, Farrell says the prime minister “recognizes it’s not only an issue for the Conservative party, but Canadians as well, it’s something that shows up in public opinion data,” said Farrell.
He also notes that the chance for public backlash or scrutiny could have influenced the decision to include issues of immigration in the budget.
Other key aspects of the budget include issues on housing, military, growing infrastructure, and supporting Canadian. Liberals are within two votes of passing the budget on their own, with the need for a few opposition members to vote in favour later this month.
