an alliance of university, community, and government partners dedicated to fostering welcoming communities and promoting the integration of immigrants and minorities across Canada
The Media Roundup provides links to recent and archived articles, in both English and French, on immigration and diversity appearing in the national and local news. Some international content is also included. Articles are updated weekly.
Windsor Star – Chamber of Commerce Seeks to Bring Immigrant Investors to Windsor
A pilot project to entice millionaire immigrant investors to Canada could bring much-needed capital to Windsor, says the head of the local Chamber of Commerce. The Immigrant Investor Venture Capital Pilot Program began accepting applications on Wednesday and will continue until Feb. 11, or earlier if it receives the maximum 500 submissions. The program will admit 60 people as permanent residents. Those people have to have a net worth of $10 million or more and a Canadian post-secondary degree or equivalent certification. The education requirement can be waived if applicants have a net worth of $50 million or more. Those selected will be required to put down $2 million toward a government venture capital fund, that will be invested “exclusively for the purposes of benefiting Canada.” “A $100 million dollar impact in Toronto doesn’t really hit the board to the same extent as $100 million in Windsor-Essex,” said Matt Marchand, president and CEO of the Windsor-Essex Regional Chamber of Commerce. “We’ll be continuing to advocate to expand the program with a mechanism to direct investors to smaller or medium-sized communities in Ontario.”
Winnipeg Free Press – Sped-Up Process Means Refugees May Arrive from Syria by Spring
After being told it could take up to two years to bring three Syrian refugee families to Winnipeg, the group that’s sponsoring them has learned they could arrive as early as this spring. “Things are really speeding up — at least for our families,” said Rev. Loraine MacKenzie Shepherd at Westworth United Church. It spearheaded Refuge Winnipeg, a collection of multifaith and non-faith people and groups who’ve come together to raise money and support a handful of the 3.8 million refugees who’ve fled Syria. They’ve committed to supporting three families who have relatives in Winnipeg. There are six adults and 18 children. The group has raised just over $30,000 — a quarter of their $120,000 fundraising goal — to help them get settled and on their feet, Shepherd said last week. […] The group sponsoring the three families includes several United Church congregations in the city, the Unitarian Universalist Church of Winnipeg, the Manitoba Islamic Association, the Syrian Assembly of Manitoba as well as Jewish community members and private individuals, said Shepherd.
The Guardian – The Guardian View on Syrian Refugees: More Should be Allowed to Come to the U.S.
Amnesty International, Christian Aid, Islamic Relief and other organisations appealed last week for the British government to take many more refugees. In the spring of last year, the Home Office minister, James Brokenshire, announced that: “Our country has a proud history of granting protection to those who need it … we have launched the Syrian vulnerable persons relocation (VPR) scheme to provide protection in this country to particularly vulnerable refugees who are at grave risk.” […] The government might defend its policy on grounds of squalid realpolitik. It has given a lot of money to the support of refugees within Syria and the neighbouring countries. The British government is not alone in making promises it cannot live up to and has no intention of trying to keep. The only European countries to respond to the Syrian emergency with anything approaching generosity have been Germany and Sweden – and in both the government is facing a populist backlash against such decency. […] If 10 times as many of the most vulnerable people were admitted from Syria as are at present, that would still only be a thousand a year.
Le Devoir – L’avenir de l’immigration passe par les régions, dit Charles Taylor
Le philosophe Charles Taylor, qui a coprésidé avec Gérard Bouchard la commission de consultation sur les demandes d’accommodement religieux en 2008, est d’avis que le gouvernement Couillard devrait inciter bien davantage les candidats à l’immigration à s’installer en région plutôt qu’à Montréal. En entrevue à La Presse Canadienne, M. Taylor a dit que le gouvernement devrait conclure une sorte de marché avec les étrangers intéressés à vivre au Québec: ils s’engageraient pendant une période donnée, disons cinq ans, à demeurer en région pour y occuper un emploi précis et en échange leur dossier serait traité en priorité. L’avantage de ce procédé serait double: disperser l’immigration et combler les emplois vacants en région. «Ce sera une espèce de marché qu’on conclut avec une personne: il y a ce travail concret, on a beaucoup de mal à le remplir. Vous allez le remplir, alors là on est très d’accord pour vous faire passer rapidement à travers toutes les étapes» du processus de sélection, a-t-il illustré. Entre 2009 et 2013, deux immigrants sur trois (70 %) ont choisi de prendre racine à Montréal. Si on inclut Laval et la Montérégie, on découvre que la très grande majorité (84 %) des nouveaux arrivants s’implantent dans la métropole ou autour, dans ce qu’il est convenu d’appeler le «450». Leur présence en région paraît infinitésimale: 0,1 % ont choisi la Gaspésie, 0,2 % l’Abitibi et 0,3 % le Saguenay, durant la même période.
Toronto Star – Germany Housing Refugees in Former Death Camps
The German city of Augsburg decided to turn a branch of the former death camp at Dachau into a refugee centre. The asylum seekers were slated to live in a building where thousands of slave labourers suffered and died under the Nazi regime. The Dachau outpost is not the only concentration camp site that is being turned into a refugee centre in Germany. In the middle of January, the German city of Schwerte started to move asylum seekers who had volunteered to be relocated into a branch of the former Nazi concentration camp Buchenwald. […] Birgit Naujoks, a representative of a local council of asylum seekers, voiced similar skepticism about such projects, speaking to the Washington Post on Friday: “Generally, the use of former concentration camp compounds as refugee centres awakens associations with the site’s Nazi-era [use], where people were forcefully herded together,” she said. She added, however, that the refugees living at the former death camp compound in Schwerte were so far happy with their accommodations, despite its history. “They say that they have much more space there compared to the building they had previously lived in,” Naujoks said.
Le gouvernement Couillard entend réformer les règles d’immigration dans l’espoir, notamment, qu’elles permettent de mieux répondre aux problèmes de rareté de main-d’oeuvre. Moins habituée que d’autres à accueillir des travailleurs étrangers, la région de Québec compte aujourd’hui de plus en plus sur leur aide en la matière. La ministre québécoise de l’Immigration, Kathleen Weil, ne s’en cache pas. L’un des principaux objectifs de la réforme qu’elle vient de mettre en branle est de nature économique et vise à dénicher à l’étranger, avec le plus de précision possible, les talents qui manqueront aux entreprises québécoises. La tâche ne sera pas facile, admet-on, non seulement parce qu’il faudra aussi trouver le moyen de mieux intégrer qu’on ne le fait actuellement cette main-d’oeuvre venue d’ailleurs, mais également parce que le Québec n’est pas seul à en avoir besoin. La région de la capitale fait face à des défis semblables, mais à une autre échelle.
