Health-care workers permanent residence pathway: Who can apply

On this page

• Who can apply
• Who you can include in your application
• The work experience you need
  • If you want to live outside Quebec
  • If you want to live inside Quebec
• If you don’t have the total work experience
• Who cannot apply

Who can apply

To be eligible to apply:

• You must be a pending or failed refugee claimant living in Canada.
  • You must have made your claim before March 13, 2020.
• You must have been issued a work permit after you made your refugee claim.
• You must have the required work experience in specific jobs in Canada’s health-care sector.
• You and your family members must not be inadmissible to Canada.
• You must meet Quebec’s immigration and work experience requirements if you plan to live there.

If you’re the spouse or common-law partner of an eligible refugee claimant who worked in Canada’s health-care sector and died from COVID-19, you can apply for permanent residence under this process if

• you and your family members are not inadmissible to Canada
• meet Quebec’s immigration requirements, if you plan to live there
• you have been in Canada since before August 14, 2020

If you’ve already applied for humanitarian and compassionate considerations, you can ask us to assess your application under this process instead if

• your application is still pending  ̶  this means we’re still processing it and haven’t made a decision yet
• you meet the eligibility and work experience requirements of this process

Who you can include in your application

You can include family members in your application if

• they’re living in Canada
• they meet all the medical, criminal, security and financial requirements to become permanent residents of Canada

You can’t include family members living outside Canada in your application. Instead, you must

• declare your family members living outside Canada in your application now (list them on your forms)
• apply to sponsor them after you become a permanent resident

The work experience you need

To be eligible for this process, you must have the required experience working in specific jobs in Canada’s health-care sector.

Depending on where you want to live, your work experience will be reviewed by

• Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, if you want to live outside of Quebec
• the Ministère de l’Immigration, de la Francisation et de l’Intégration du Québec (MIFI) if you want to live in Quebec

If you want to live outside Quebec

If you plan to live outside Quebec, you must have a specific type of work experience in Canada’s health-care sector for a specific amount of time to qualify.

Type of jobs (work experience)^{Footnote *}

Your work experience must meet all of the following requirements.

• Your experience is in one or more of these jobs:
  • Nursing co-ordinators and supervisors (NOC 3011)
  • Registered nurses and registered psychiatric nurses (NOC 3012)
  • Licensed practical nurses (NOC 3233)
  • Nurse aides, orderlies and patient service associates (NOC 3413)
  • Allied primary health practitioners (NOC 3124)
  • Home support workers (NOC 4412) - some occupations only
• Your job matches the National Occupation Classification (NOC) description
• You provided direct patient care in these jobs
• You did most of the main duties listed in the NOC descriptions for these jobs

Amount of time in a qualifying job^{Footnote *}

While working at a qualifying job, you must meet 2 requirements:

1. Between March 13 and August 14, 2020, you worked for at least 120 hours.
2. Before August 31, 2021, you have a total work experience of either
   • full-time work: 30 hours a week for 6 months
   • part-time work: 750 part-time hours

How to calculate your work experience^{Footnote *}

Include all the hours you worked up to August 31, 2021, in your total work experience.

• Include the 120 hours worked between March 13 and August 14, 2020, in your total.

You don’t need to have worked your hours consecutively (in one period). Your hours will count even if

• you took breaks or vacations
• you changed jobs and there was a period you didn’t work

If you want to live in Quebec

The Quebec ministry in charge of immigration is called the Ministère de l’Immigration, de la Francisation et de l’Intégration du Québec (MIFI). It has its own process to assess your work experience.

If you’re eligible, we’ll

• refer your application to MIFI
• invite you to apply for a Certificat de Sélection du Québec (CSQ) and submit supporting documents

If you meet Quebec’s work experience requirement, they’ll issue you a CSQ and inform us of their decision.

After we get MIFI’s decision, we’ll process your application.

Learn more about Quebec’s process.

If you don’t have the total work experience

If you don’t have the total work experience yet, you can still apply. You have until August 31, 2021, to get all the work experience you need.

• If you plan to live outside Quebec, we’ll accept your proof of work experience until October 31, 2021.
• If you plan to live in Quebec, MIFI will check that you met the work experience requirements.

Who cannot apply

You’re not eligible under this process if your refugee claim was

• determined to be ineligible to be referred to the Immigration and Refugee Board
• withdrawn or abandoned
• determined to be manifestly unfounded or with no credible basis
• determined to be excluded under Article 1F of the Refugee Convention
• cessated or vacated

If your refugee claim was refused, you can still apply for this process if you meet the eligibility criteria.

See the instruction guide (PDF, 1.16 MB) for detailed eligibility criteria.

Pending or Failed Refugee Claimant

A pending or failed refugee claimant is a person who has applied for refugee protection status while in Canada and either

• is still waiting for a decision on their claim or appeal from the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (IRB), or
• has received a negative decision from the IRB

Family Members

Family members include your spouse or common-law partner, dependent children, and their dependent children.

Eligible occupations under the home support worker (NOC 4412) category

The official job description of the NOC 4412 category lists main duties for 2 groups: “home support workers” and “housekeepers.”

For your job to qualify under NOC 4412 for this process, you must show that

• you primarily did the main duties of a home support worker, as listed in the NOC 4412 description
• your duties were for the patient and not for their family
• if you performed the duties of a housekeeper, as listed in the NOC 4412 description, they were done only in support of your primary role as a home support worker

Your job won’t qualify for this process if you’re

• a self-employed caregiver
• employed by private households (directly employed by the person receiving care, or by the family or guardians of the person receiving care)
• only doing the primary duties of a housekeeper, as listed in the NOC 4412 description

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