Immigration policies in Canada

When Jean Talon became intendant of New France, he established policies that favoured immigration in order to increase the colony’s population. Later, under the British administration, inhabitants of the British Isles, “foreign Protestants,” and American emigrants were encouraged to settle in Canada. Between 1860 and 1870, the Canadian government consistently sought to attract farmers with capital, farm labourers, and female domestic servants, especially including hiring agents in Europe to attract immigrants of good moral character. The industrial development of the 1880s and the opening of western Canada to settlement made increased immigration a political imperative. While encouraging the arrival of immigrants from the United States, Great Britain, and northern Europe, the immigration policy was highly discriminatory on racial grounds, with some regulations deliberately impeding immigration from Asia and Eastern Europe. The acts of 1906 and 1910, among others, made immigration policy more selective and reinforced the government’s powers of exclusion and deportation. However, beginning in the 1960s Canadian governments introduced more open immigration policies – despite popular opinion against it – thus transforming the face of urban Canada.