Good afternoon, Madam Chair and honourable members. Thank you for the opportunity to meet with you this afternoon.

I am here as the chief executive officer of Century Initiative, and I'm joined by my colleague Jon Medow.

We're a non-partisan network of Canadians from the business, academic and charitable communities. We share the belief that with the right approach to growth, Canada can enhance our economic strength and resilience here at home and our influence abroad. We also share a vision of a Canada that thinks and plans not just for today or for the next election cycle, but for future generations of Canadians, because prosperity takes planning and our planning must include a smart approach to immigration.

Canada is at a crossroads. Our population is aging, our workforce is shrinking and the need for skilled labour is growing. At the same time, our population growth is sitting at its lowest level in over a hundred years because of COVID-19. This represents a significant threat to Canada's long-term economic health and prosperity. It means fewer tax dollars to support programs and services such as health care, our schools, our roads, public transit and social services. Over time, that will contribute to a decline in our quality of life, our standard of living and the cultural fabric of our country.

Simply put, we have a choice to make. We can manage our growth or manage a decline. If we choose the former—and the fact that we are here before you suggests this committee has—then immigration must play a central role in our plans. Immigration is critical to growing our population. Immigration will contribute to reducing the burden on government revenues, which fund health care, old age security and other services. It would also mean more skilled workers to meet our labour market needs, would contribute to innovation and would fuel entrepreneurship.

This is why last fall Century welcomed the government's 2021-23 immigration levels plan, which represents a significant increase over the previous targets. A recent Scotiabank analysis showed that meeting our immigration targets would add billions of dollars to Canada's economy by 2023. We must ensure that we stay focused on achieving these targets. We must also be deliberate about identifying and attracting skilled immigrants who meet the country's labour market needs not just for today, but for the jobs of tomorrow as well. Of course, we must ensure that as a country we are fulfilling our family reunification and humanitarian commitments. Regardless of what draws immigrants to Canada, we must also support them so that they can succeed and fully contribute to the country's social and economic life.

Earlier this year, Century Initiative released our national scorecard on Canada's growth and prosperity. The scorecard is a unique new tool that we created to help Canada's policy- and decision-makers track our progress in growing the country's population. It takes a holistic view and tracks a range of factors that together will contribute to smart, sustainable population growth. For instance, it shows that Canada remains among the top countries in the world when it comes to our international reputation and that most immigrants report high levels of life satisfaction.

These are powerful tools that we could use to attract people to Canada, but the scorecard also shows that we can do a better job of supporting communities across the country to attract and retain immigrants. This includes in smaller rural communities. In this regard, we know that while our immigration retention rates are generally high, in the five provinces with the lowest retention rates, on average, almost half of immigrants left within five years to other provinces. We need to better understand why and then develop strategies for tracking them to communities that are desperate to grow and to benefit from the social and economic contributions they make. That will require a coordinated and sustained effort between federal, provincial and municipal levels of government.

To date there have been some successful programs in that regard: the provincial nominee program, the Atlantic immigration pilot, which is now permanent, and the rural and northern immigration pilot program. They're all examples of targeted programs to allow provinces to select economic immigrants. Canada has also indicated its intention to focus on locally driven economic immigration through the municipal nominee program. Century Initiative welcomes this commitment to community-level engagement, which will help meet local needs.

We need to ensure that this work continues. While Canada has some challenges that must be addressed if we want to benefit from greater immigration, we are in a fortunate position. Support for immigration in this country is generally high. We need to sustain that support through community-level conversations, which can help local residents see immigration as a key part of their future, and we need the political will to take the steps required for smart population growth.

We look forward to the government's response to the committee's work. These steps and others are essential to ensuring that the benefits of immigration are widely shared across Canada.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today, and we look forward to your questions.

Transcript

Discussions (0)