As More Immigrants Come to Canada, Fewer Are Becoming Citizens: StatCan Data

New Canadian citizens take an oath at a ceremony hosted by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada at Government House in Halifax on Nov. 20, 2017. Andrew Vaughan/The Canadian Press

More immigrants are coming to Canada than ever before, but fewer are becoming citizens, according to newly released data from Statistics Canada.

The number of immigrants arriving in Canada within nine years of each census who went on to become citizens has fallen significantly, says the StatCan study. The rate has dropped nearly 30 percent since 1996 when rates hovered in the 75 percent range. Only 45.7 percent of recent immigrants sought residency in 2021.

“Focusing on immigrants who arrived in Canada five to nine years earlier provides a good indication of emerging trends,” the study authors wrote. “Most immigrants who become citizens do so by the time they have been in Canada for nine years. Relatively few immigrants become citizens after 10 or more years in Canada.”

Nearly half of the citizenship decline occurred from 2016 to 2021, with approximately 40 percent of the most recent decrease “possibly related to COVID-19 pandemic restrictions,” StatCan said. The citizenship rate declined at a faster rate from 2016 to 2021 than during any other five-year intercensal period since 1996, even with the pandemic effect taken into account.

The decline in citizenship rates from 1996 to 2021 was more significant among those with lower levels of education, lower family income and lower official language skills, the study found.

The reduction was also more noticeable among immigrants from East Asia, Southeast Asia and West Asia compared to citizenship rates among these ethnic groups in the United States, Western Europe and Southern Europe.

StatCan numbers match up with numbers released late last year by the Institute for Canadian Citizenship (ICC).

A study by the ICC and the Conference Board of Canada found the number of immigrants choosing to leave the country after being granted permanent resident status has been on the rise since the 1990s, although the first major spike didn’t occur until 2017.

On average, 0.9 percent of people granted permanent residence in or after 1982 leave Canada each year, the study found.

The average migration rate, which sat at 0.8 percent in 2016, shot up to 1.15 percent in 2017, a 43 percent increase. The number rose again in 2019 to hit a record high of 1.18 percent, 31 percent higher than the average migration rate.

That works out to approximately 60,000 people leaving Canada in 2017 and another 67,000 people leaving in 2019. Numbers have yet to be tallied for 2020-2023.

Immigration Quota

Immigration has been a hot topic in the House of Commons in the past few months, as the federal government grapples with the country’s housing crisis. Increased levels of immigration have been labelled by some as a contributing factor to the shortage.

MPs recently called on the federal cabinet to reevaluate Canada’s immigration quotas, which stand at a record high. A Feb. 12 Bloc Québécois motion was supported by every member outside the Liberal Party, passing with a vote of 173 to 150.

The motion, while not legally binding, urges the cabinet to discuss with each province the capacity of various regions to integrate newcomers. It demands the presentation of a revised immigration plan within 100 days, aiming to adjust the 2024 federal immigration targets based on these integration capabilities.

The current immigration plan sets the annual quota at 500,000, excluding the 227,000 permits for temporary foreign workers and the 983,000 foreign students permitted each year.