Foreign Student Refugee Applications Exceeded 11,000 in First 8 Months of 2024

Immigration Minister Marc Miller delivers remarks at a press conference in Ottawa, on Dec. 21, 2023. The Canadian Press/Spencer Colby

Canada experienced an influx of foreign students claiming refugee status after Ottawa announced cuts to study permits last year, according to government data.

A total of 11,630 international students applied to stay in Canada as refugees between January and August of 2024, representing an average of more than 340 applications per week, the department of immigration wrote in a report to the Senate.

Student claims made up roughly 10 percent of all asylum claims received during that period, according to the document first covered by Blacklock’s Reporter.

The wave of activity began after Immigration Minister Marc Miller’s announcement last January on the government’s intention to slash the number of foreign study permits both in 2024 and 2025.

The number of visas issued last year was capped at 364,000, reflecting a 35 percent drop from the nearly 560,000 that were issued the year prior.

Miller has called the spike in asylum claims from students an “alarming trend,” and said the applicants are using the international student program as a “backdoor entry into Canada.”

The immigration department report to the Senate did not define the high volume of refugee claims as fraudulent.

“It is important to note that the number of asylum claims does not reflect the quality or thoroughness of the temporary resident visa, study permit or work permit application process,” the report said. “Some temporary residents come to Canada as genuine visitors, students, or workers and then make an asylum claim because of developments in their country of origin.”

Miller has said the growing number of international students claiming asylum can be linked directly to tuition fees for foreign students.

Many asylum claims are a bid to “drop the tuition fee down to Canadian rates,” he said. “There’s some opportunism that’s being used and exploited there.”

Canadian graduate and undergraduate students typically pay between $7,360 to $7,662 annually in tuition fees, according to Statistics Canada. International graduate students pay $23,233 while the average fee for undergraduate students is $40,114.

Miller has also urged universities and colleges to strengthen their screening and monitoring practices to filter out individuals seeking to scam the system.

International Student Cap

The government announced in September its plan to further limit the number of international students entering Canada in 2025, reducing the number of international study permits by 10 percent.

The new target for international student permits will drop to 437,000 for 2025 and 2026 from the 485,000 permits handed out in 2024, Immigration Canada said.

The federal cap is a bid to lower the number of temporary residents in Canada from 6.5 percent of the total population to 5 percent by 2026, the ministry said. The cap is part of Ottawa’s plan to address the challenges brought on by rapid population growth via the immigration system and the corresponding strain on housing supply and public services.

The cap, Miller said, needs to be coupled with universities and colleges cracking down on lax recruiting and admitting practices.