the federal liberals appear to be slowly waking up to the disastrous results of neglecting canada’s immigration programs beyond infinitely expanding them. last week, immigration minister marc miller, who has spent the past several months hemming and hawing about “competing policy priorities” and an alleged “labour gap,” finally announced minor changes to international student requirements.
take, for example, an international student landing in the greater toronto area (gta). if that full $20,635 were to only pay for rent alone, a student could afford to pay $1,719 per month. the average rent for a one-bedroom in toronto is currently over $2,600. in brampton, home to many of the most egregious diploma mills that prey on young foreigners, the average one-bedroom rent is $2,195. notably, brampton food banks have recently resorted to turning away a growing tide of international students.
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in an early december speech to the windsor-essex regional chamber of commerce, bank of canada deputy governor toni gravelle underscored this point. “shortly after immigration began ramping up in 2015, canada’s vacancy rate — a measure of how many apartments and houses there are available to rent or buy — started to fall,” he said. “the construction of new housing was not keeping pace with population growth. then, when newcomer arrivals picked up sharply in early 2022, that steady decline in the vacancy rate became a cliff.”
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