Abhishek Parmar has spent more than six years making Windsor-Essex his new home. But now he is one of the 2.1 million temporary residents who may have to leave Canada this year.
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Parmar’s work permit expires mid-March. Now his plans of making Windsor his forever home, starting a business and buying his first house here are on hold.
Parmar is not alone.
According to the data shared by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), 1.49 million temporary residents had their permits expire last year. Another 1.4 million will expire this year, for a total of 2.9 million over two years. These do not include study permit or study permit extension holders.
Of those 1.4 million expiring this year, 55 per cent are due to expire by June alone.
IRCC says 395,000 spots were available for PR last year and another 380,000 this year. While some of those 2.9 million will get PR status, at least 2.1 million people will still be left with expired or expiring visas.
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“Having a temporary status does not guarantee that a person will eventually be accepted as a permanent resident.”
If someone is out of status, IRCC said, they may be able to apply to restore it. Foreign nationals have 90 days from the date they lose their temporary resident status to apply for restoration.
“Little is known about the undocumented population in Canada, and gathering data is very challenging as this population generally tries to stay undetected due to their fear of removal,” IRCC said.
“However, research indicates that there may be 200,000 to 500,000 undocumented migrants in Canada.”
IRCC said under the 2026-2028 Immigration Levels Plan, PR admissions will remain below 1 per cent of the population after 2027, and the total number of temporary residents will be reduced to less than 5 per cent of the population by the end of 2027.
“Canada is regaining control of its immigration system in order to restore balance and sustainability, while continuing to meet its humanitarian commitments,” IRCC said.
Lou Janssen Dangzalan, a Toronto-based immigration lawyer, said IRCC is working on the assumption that people with expiring permits will return home.
“It assumes too much of a good faith behavior from everyone that everyone’s going to simply follow the rules as it is,” he said.
For the longest time, Dangzalan said, Canada was advertised as a place to get your PR easily. Now many who had sold all their assets back home, took out shark loans or incurred huge debts, may go undocumented.
Canada Border Services Agency numbers show Canada removed more than 18,000 people or nearly 400 per week in 2024-25 at the cost of $78 million. The majority were asylum seekers who were denied refugee status.
“It’s the canary in the coal mine. If you see people getting deported and you’re out of status, you might as well just leave yourself. But not everyone’s going to do that,” he said.
“Is it realistic to do that for 2.1 million? I don’t think so. From an administrative perspective, it is just impossible. This is going to be a very painful process.”
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