The Media Roundup provides links to recent and archived articles, in both English and French, on immigration and diversity appearing in the national and local news. Some international content is also included. Articles are updated weekly.
The Guardian – Further Curbs On Non-EU Migrants To UK Proposed
Skilled migrants from outside Europe are to be banned from having a further 70,000 jobs, including as vets and orchestral musicians, under the latest revision of Britain’s shortage occupation list, published on Monday. The proposal from the migration advisory committee, which is likely to be endorsed by the home secretary, Theresa May, will reduce the number of jobs open to highly skilled migrants from outside Europe from 260,000 currently to 190,000. More than 1m jobs were originally open to skilled migrants from outside Europe under tier two of the points-based immigration system, introduced three years ago. The actual number of tier-two skilled migrants coming to work in shortage occupations is limited to 20,700 a year, and applications are running at just over half of the limit.
Minister Touched By Plight of Women Who Got Pregnant Hoping To Stay In Canada
Employment Minister Thomas Lukaszuk has stepped up his push to get permanent status for temporary foreign workers in Alberta after hearing of recent cases of abuse of some Filipina women. These women were told they could gain permanent status if they had babies here — a false statement — and a handful were impregnated, Lukaszuk said. Now their lives are complicated — pregnancy will soon force them to leave their jobs and accommodations. At that point, they have to leave Alberta and face going back home with their babies, he said.
Globe and Mail – Ontario’s Hudak Gambles On Knowing Immigrants’ Minds
In the first days of this fall’s campaign, Tim Hudak took the biggest risk of his career. If it works, it will help make the Progressive Conservative Leader the next premier of Ontario. If it fails, it could undermine years of hard work by Conservatives to replace Liberals as the first choice of new Canadians. Mr. Hudak’s attacks on Liberal Leader Dalton McGuinty’s proposal to provide employers with a tax credit of up to $10,000, in return for hiring skilled immigrants, have been appealing to Ontarians’ worst instincts. But they represent a gamble that the Tories have their fingers on the pulse of most immigrants. If Mr. Hudak were appealing only to his party’s traditional white and rural base, he could stop at referring to the policy as “affirmative action,” which would be a contentious but defensible interpretation. Instead, he has described it as an “affirmative action for foreign workers.”
It has been quite the start to the 2011 Ontario election campaign. In fact I can’t remember a time when the gloves came off even before the election writ was issued. It’s been my experience as a campaign reporter and observer of provincial elections that the “nasties” build over time. But not this time. The spark for some heated exchanges between Liberal leader Dalton McGuinty and Conservative leader Tim Hudak was — and remains – the Liberal plan to offer a $10,000 tax incentive to companies hiring new Canadians who live in Ontario and have lived in the country for up to five years.
More than a dozen Canadians have told the Psychiatric Patient Advocate Office in Toronto within the past year that they were blocked from entering the United States after their records of mental illness were shared with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. Lois Kamenitz, 65, of Toronto contacted the office last fall, after U.S. customs officials at Pearson International Airport prevented her from boarding a flight to Los Angeles on the basis of her suicide attempt four years earlier.
The Government of Canada is offering a new tip line through the Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) Call Centre where tips on suspected citizenship fraud cases may be reported, Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Minister Jason Kenney announced today. “Canadian citizenship is not for sale. I encourage anyone who has information regarding citizenship fraud to call our tip line,” said Minister Kenney. “My department will ensure that all tips are investigated and that appropriate action is taken.”
