Cuts could lead to newcomer agencies closing

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This article was published 15/12/2024 (297 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Groups that help immigrants say funding cuts by the federal government, which recently announced a reduction to newcomer targets, are forcing them to close their doors.

The Manitoba Federation of Labour Occupational Health Centre’s cross-cultural community development program has run workshops to newcomers in their first language and one-on-one counselling for more than 25 years. Most of the funding, about $110,000 annually, has come from grants by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada since 2010.

Organizers learned in late November that funding would end as of March 31.

“It’s just a really cold and brutal way to end a long-standing program that has done a lot of good,” Thomas Linner, the program’s interim executive director, said.

Linner said thousands of permanent residents had received support through the centre, including 150 people who had gone on to train others.

He called it an “incredibly disappointing” response that will unfairly hurt newcomers.

“We saw the federal government taking steps to reduce levels of immigration… we were all therefore kind of expecting, maybe, that programs funded through IRCC would get a bit of a haircut,” Linner said.

“You do more with less, as governments often like to tell settlement agencies and non-profits to do. But instead, what we saw was kind of these wholesale kinds of cuts to a number of different programs, including our own.”

A government spokesman said the amount of money available for immigrant resources depends on how many newcomers are set to arrive.

“Since fewer newcomers are expected in 2025 (to) 2027, available resources have been reduced to match this decrease, this has resulted in a reduction in service providers,” he said in an email.

“The department considered a number of factors, including the best possible value for money, availability of core settlement and resettlement services, and continued focus on high-quality services to ensure the recommendations fit within available funding.”

Immigration levels are set to be reduced from the admission of 500,000 permanent residents to 395,000 in 2025, 380,000 in 2026 and 365,000 in 2027.

An organizer at another Winnipeg program, who didn’t want to be named, said it received funding but was told abruptly that it would be reduced to a three-year time frame from five years.

She said organizations across Manitoba are “holding their breath,” unsure whether they will be able to open past March, and several have received bad news in the past few weeks.

The IRCC spokesperson confirmed the change, saying it was made “to stay nimble and responsive to client needs in an increasingly uncertain global context.”

Putting aside the immigration drop, the program organizer said newcomers are struggling, and the number of resource providers in Manitoba have wait-lists.

“There will be some organizations that won’t be providing service anymore, so there’ll be more pressure on those of us who will be,” the organizer, who requested anonymity because funding negotiations with the federal department are ongoing, said.

“It’s a big surprise because a year ago, we were basically applying for this with a lot of optimism and a lot of supportive rhetoric from the federal government about what a great job we’re doing, and how important this is, and these really high immigration levels. Less than a year later, it all just shifted.”

Jose Chinchilla, an immigrant from El Salvador who joined the cross-cultural program after getting injured on the job in 2000 and now trains others in Spanish, said the program has changed his life.

“It’s kind of near and dear to my heart,” he said. “We as immigrants in general, we should be aware of our rights and responsibilities.”

He said working in Manitoba as an immigrant can be a “different world.” He’s helped people who worked despite having a broken bone or other serious injury, or who were exploited by employers.

He hopes the federal government hears those stories and reconsiders the funding cut.

“It’s kind of disappointing, but we know we’re not the only ones,” he said. “We hope that they might change their mind and see their value.”

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca