B.C. accepting only 1,100 new skilled immigrant applications after feds slash provincial nominee program

Business leader and immigration lawyer both say that province needs more immigrants to boost economy.
The odds of new applications from immigrants being accepted into British Columbia’s nominee program this year have dropped to near zero for anyone other than health workers or entrepreneurs.
The province said the changes are aimed at prioritizing where it spends its nominations after the federal government slashed the number of available slots, but the B.C. Chamber of Commerce said a focus on the health-care sector unfairly advantages the government’s needs over those of the business community.
A bulletin from the province says it was only allotted 4,000 nominations this year, about half of what it had last year and substantially less than the 11,000 it wanted.
It says the program, which helps immigrants already living in Canada gain permanent residency if they fill key jobs, will accept 1,100 new applications this year, mainly for doctors, nurses and other health professionals as well as entrepreneurs. Anne Kang, the minister of post-secondary education and future skills, called the decrease from the federal government “drastic.”
“We are prioritizing health-care workers in clinical settings,” Kang said in an interview, adding that related positions like social workers, therapists and early childhood educators are also part of that group.
The province said most of the remaining 2,900 slots will be used to nominate some of the applications it has already received.
The bulletin says the program anticipates nominating about 100 other people that it thinks are “likely to create high economic impact in B.C.” from the registration pool, which currently has more than 10,000 candidates. Source: cbc.ca/news/