“If we just reduce the levels, all that will happen is there will be less whining if you like, but we’re not going to solve a quarter of the problem,” he said during a conference on 2024 economic forecasts organized by CFA Montréal.
He asserted that the problem is not that Canada is taking in more immigrants than it can handle, but rather that it is not taking enough immigrants in construction, reported The Canadian Press.
“I’m worried that the pendulum is swinging too far the other way,” he said in an interview after his speech.
“I think we have a very strong consensus in Canada and Quebec historically on the benefits of immigration, which has been documented by economic research. So there is a reason why we have this strategy in place.”
There have been increasing debates about immigration’s potential link to the housing problem, with leading authorities and experts in the field holding vastly different outlooks on the matter.
Just last month, for example, Bank of Canada deputy governor Toni Gravelle said in a speech to the Windsor-Essex Regional Chamber of Commerce that recent inflow of immigrants into Canada has not added to overall inflation. However, it has put pressure on the country’s housing market.
He said that immigration is putting upward pressure on rent prices in the short term because new immigrants rely on rent when they first come to Canada.
Jean highlighted Hydro-Quebec’s investment plans, which will need 35,000 construction workers, to demonstrate how readily Canada needs immigrant workers.
“We also need to think about all our ambitions because sooner or later, the question will, by default, come up again. Doing less is not necessarily the solution, it’s really about doing better.”
However, he did add that the debate is more balanced in Canada, unlike in the United States.
“We’re not like Donald Trump saying that immigration is poisoning the nation’s blood.”
Canada stabilized its immigration targets at 500,000 for 2025 and 2026 in November 2023, after recognizing the need for sustainable growth in housing, infrastructure planning, and population growth.
