B.C. premier frustrated with Quebec immigration funding
CBC
Federal immigration money is being "showered down" on Ontario and Quebec "at the expense" of Western Canada, B.C. Premier David Eby said Monday.
Eby told a news conference to mark the end of the annual Western Premiers' Conference in Whitehorse that Ottawa's offer of $750 million to Quebec to help pay for a surge in temporary residents there is frustrating, and B.C. should also get a share.
Eby said there are 10,000 people coming to British Columbia every 37 days. Refugees have to stay in homeless shelters and international students don't have support.
"And so to see a single-province agreement with Quebec, is an underlining of a sense of frustration that I heard around the table," he said.
"I won't put this on anyone else, but I'll say for British Columbia, how frustrated we are to see the money being showered down on Quebec and Ontario, and us scrabbling around for what's left over. It's not acceptable."
Quebec Premier François Legault had said the offer from Ottawa came after he asked for $1 billion to cover costs associated with a surge in temporary residents.
Eby said Canadians are seeing resources go to Ontario and Quebec "at the expense, in my opinion, of the west."
"That announcement today with Quebec, frankly, is the straw that broke this camel's back," he said on Monday.
"I cannot understand how that could happen. I cannot understand why we cannot get a per capita share at a minimum."
Legault has previously said the number of temporary residents coming to the province — including asylum seekers, students and workers — had "exploded" to 560,000, a number he says doubled in two years, straining social services.
B.C. government figures show there were 475,778 non-permanent residents in the province as of Jan. 1, an increase of about 84 per cent from two years earlier.
Federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller's office did not provide a response in time for deadline.
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