The Express Entry draw for this week was cancelled. IRCC has provided clarification about the cancellation of this draw. The previous immigration draw was held on Wednesday, October 14th. This draw was cancelled because some changes were made in the Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS) score. These changes in the CRS were done by the federal government.
On the IRCC’s website, it was announced that the French-speaking Express Entry candidates will be awarded more CRS points. Beneath the Express Entry application system, IRCC has set a criterion to provide the CRS score to the immigration candidates. The scores are based on the following factors: age, education, language proficiency, skilled work experience, and other more.
IRCC usually holds the Express Entry draw after every two weeks. In these draws, the immigration candidates with the highest scores are invited to apply for Canadian permanent residence. IRCC has justified that this delay in the Express Entry draw is not caused by the pandemic, as it was due to the changes made in the Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS) score. The 30 more points will be given to the French-speaking candidates, that are enrolled in the Express Entry applications. IRCC will have to update the CRS scores of the French-speaking candidates in the Express Entry management pool.
After these changes, the Express Entry draws will be held regularly. After the announcement of the Immigration Level Plan 2021-2023, it is quite evident that the government has decided to bring the draws to the normal routine and to invite more immigrants to Canada. In this Immigration Level Plan, the country will invite around 400,000 immigrants annually. Whereas, in this figure of 400,000, on average 110,000 immigrants will belong to the Express Entry programs.
The main purpose of making the changes in the CRS score was the encouragement of the Francophone skilled workers. As those workers will immigrate to the French communities of Canada, and it will be beneficial for the local labour sector, and skilled work sector. It is a known fact that Canada has two official languages: English and French. Similarly, in Quebec province of Canada, French is spoken, and also the purpose of the Quebec immigration programs is to attract the Francophone immigrants. IRCC has figures suggest that Francophone comprise about 4.4% of all the immigrants that are outside Quebec, whereas this figure is around 2.8%. This initiative by IRCC to give more points to the French-speaking immigrants will attract more workers from the community.
Express Entry is the main economic immigration stream of Canada. This system is responsible for managing the applications for the following streams:
- Federal Skilled Worker Program
- Federal Skilled Trades Program
- Canadian Experience Class
The successful candidates are invited to apply for Canadian permanent residence. In 2020, Canada has issued around 82,850 ITA’s.