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August 26, 2020

Visitors can apply for a work permit by staying in Canada

The new policy laid by the Immigration Refugees and Citizenship Canada will be beneficial for the temporary residents who have job offers. Including those temporary residents, this policy will also help Canadian employers. This new policy will allow the visitors who are temporary residents, they can now apply for the work permit by remaining in Canada. Before this policy, the visitors had to leave the country, and they were required to renew their permits.

 

Immigration, Refugee and Citizenship Canada has also released that this new policy will be helpful only for those visitors who are already in Canada having a valid job offer. This policy will not be applied to those visitors who visit Canada after August 24, 2020.

 

The eligible visitors will be able to apply for this new temporary immigration policy.  This includes under the Super visa holders, business visitors, and the candidates who have come through Global Skills Strategy work permit exemption.

Before this new immigration policy by IRCC, the people applying for work permits as temporary residents, they were required to apply for initial work permits, before coming to Canada. Now, this policy will provide assistance and benefits to Canadian employers who are hiring foreign workers. Due to pandemic, there were labour shortages in the market, and the employers were required to hire foreign workers to fill the demand.

When the pandemic hit the world, the foreign workers, international students were also affected by it. This was due to the air travel restrictions, when the sanctions were imposed, the work permits and the status was expired, therefore there was a need to introduce this policy. Therefore, Canada has encouraged temporary workers and residents who have stayed in Canada to maintain their legal status.

The eligibility criteria for this policy is:

  • A valid “visitor” status in Canada on August 24, 2020. The applicant must have an intention to stay in Canada. Only workers/ applicants with legal status are encouraged to apply for this policy.
  • A valid job offer from a Canadian Employer
  • An application for an employer-specific permit that must be supported by Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) or
  • A Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) exempt job offer that must be submitted before March 31, 2021
  • The candidate must meet the standard admissibility criteria

The candidates who meet all the above requirements, and they had a valid work permit in the previous 12 months, will be able to begin their work for the new employer. The applicants can contact IRCC on their official website. On the website, the applicants can apply for work authorization.

This new permit and policy change will also be helpful in the economic sector of Canada, as due to Covid-19, the economies were hit.