Open the Doors: Canada’s strong pro-immigration policy is more than just a humanitarian stand; it’s an economic imperative

Ultimately, experts say, immigration’s role in addressing this century’s biggest economic challenge for Canada will only succeed to the degree that the growing immigrant population can be successfully and productively integrated into the labour force.

That will not only be an issue of logistics – of matching the right communities with the right jobs with the right immigrants – but of getting businesses and voters to continue to embrace immigration as a key element in strengthening both their economic well-being and their community.

“It can’t just be the government that pushes it,” Mr. Barton says. “If businesses feel strongly, they have to pound the table.”

“We need to continue to build public support for immigration as an essential part of nation building,” says Canadian Senator Ratna Omidvar, a leading advocate for immigration and the executive director of the Global Diversity Exchange at Ryerson University in Toronto.

She says the “conditional multiculturalists” in this country “need to be convinced [immigration] is working well” in order to garner the political support necessary to sustain an expanded immigration policy.

Read the full article on the Globe and Mail’s website.