By Barry Ellsworth
TRENTON, Canada (AA) – Canada will cut international students coming to the country by 35%, the country’s immigration minister announced Monday.
The government hopes the temporary two-year cap will hit at the “bad actors” who are gouging post-secondary international students with exorbitant tuition fees and allowing too many students to flood courses.
The cap will not apply to international students who are applying for higher education, master’s and PhD programs, said Marc Miller.
“Those are the bright people we need to retain,” he explained.
The cap will differ for each of Canada’s 10 provinces, based on population.
Cutting so-called “bad actors” is not the only reason for the cap, though. The provinces have complained that there are too many non-permanent residents like international students entering the country while Canada faces an extreme housing crisis.
The number of foreign students getting visas to enter Canada jumped to more than 800,000 in 2022, and last fall Miller predicted the number would be triple what it was a decade ago. As of Dec. 31, 2022, there were 6,885 Turkish students in Canada.
The two-year cap will cut the number of study visas to 364,000 in 2024. The 2025 number will be determined at the end of this year, Miller said.
Miller said the goal is not to punish foreign students who want to get educated in Canada, but to hit at “some private institutions” who have taken advantage of students with higher tuition charges.
“Those institutions need to be shut down,” Miller said.