The History of

Immigration and
the Contributions
of Immigrants
BY SMILJKA TASIC
FOR CANADIAN PERSPECTIVES II
WEEK 10
“Thanks in great part to the newcomers we
have welcomed throughout our history,
Canada has developed into the strong and
vibrant country we all enjoy. Immigrants and
their descendants have made immeasurable
contributions to Canada, and our future
success depends on continuing to ensure
they are welcomed and well-integrated.”

M E S S A G E FR O M T H E M I N I S T E R O F I M M I G R ATI O N , R E FU G EE S A N D
C I T I Z E N S H I P, T H E H O N O U R A B L E A H M E D H U S S EN , P. C . , M . P.
2018
Challenges and Solutions
“Today, Canada faces new challenges such as an ageing population and
declining birth rate, and immigrants have helped address these by
contributing to Canada’s labour force growth.

With this in mind, Canada welcomed more than 286,000 permanent

residents in 2017. Over half were admitted under Economic Class programs.
The number also included over 44,000 resettled refugees, protected persons
and people admitted under humanitarian, compassionate and public policy
considerations.”
Source: 2018 Annual Report to Parliament on Immigration
Facts About
Immigration
- ‘93 percent of immigrants have knowledge of English
or French’

- ‘In 2016-2017, international students and visitors

contributed over $31 billion to the Canadian economy.’

- ‘93 % of immigrants have a strong sense of belonging

to Canada’

“Also in 2017, the Government of Canada adopted a

historic multi-year levels plan to responsibly grow our
annual immigration levels to 340,000 by 2020, with
60 percent of the growth in the Economic Class.”

2018 Annual Report to Parliament on Immigration

 The History of Immigration to
Canada
Immigration to New France
“Throughout the 17th and much of the 18th century, European colonial
administrations, charged with overseeing what would become Canada, did not
consider settlement a priority…However, policy eventually changed and colonial
authorities carefully and slowly encouraged settlement in Canada.
New France's population at the time of the British Conquest (1759–60) was
about 65,000. In Nova Scotia, a transplanted Scottish community was
supplemented by German and Swiss settlers, and in the late 1700s Irish settlers
reinforced Newfoundland's population” (Troper, 2017).
 The Loyalist Immigration

United Empire Loyalists were English-speaking settlers

who moved to present-day Canada due to the American Revolution.
They migrated here either because they did not want to become
Americans or because they “feared retribution for their public
support of the British.”

“Imperial authorities and military personnel offered supplies to

the new settlers and organized the distribution of land.
Despite the hardships the settlers endured, their plight was
undeniably made less severe by the intervention of government
agents” (Troper, 2017).
Mid-1800s
The great Irish potato famine and the European rebellions in 1848 sent new waves of immigrants to
North America.

“Irish emigrants wait with their few

belongings to board ship for North
America. Millions were forced to leave
by famine”
Irish Immigrants
“On the one hand, many of the Irish created a labour
force ready and able to fill the seasonal employment
demands of a newly expanded canal system,
lumber industry and burgeoning railway network; on
the other hand, because of their low income, their
Catholicism, the seasonal separation from their
families and differences in their way of life, they
were a visible minority group. They filled working-
class neighbourhoods and inflated majority fears of
social evils previously dismissed as peculiar to the
US” (Troper, 2017).
 The Great Western Migration

“In the late 19th century, Canada's future Prairie provinces were
opened to settlement, although it was not until a market developed for
the prairie agricultural output that serious settlement began. The
demand for farm goods, especially hard wheat, coincided with the
election of Wilfrid Laurier's government, which immediately
encouraged the settlement of the West with large-scale immigration.
Canada's new and aggressive minister of the interior, Clifford Sifton,
organized a revamped and far-reaching program” (Troper, 2017).
“Settling the West: Immigration to the Prairies from
1867 to 1914”
“From 1867 to 1914, the Canadian West opened for mass settlement,
and became home to millions of immigrant settlers seeking a new
life. This immigration boom created key industries still important to
Canada’s international role – like agriculture, mining, and oil…
Significant changes occurred in Canada after 1867 that made the
Prairie immigration boom possible: the construction of a
transcontinental railroad made transportation and travel accessible;
the Dominion Lands Act of 1872 created free and fertile
homesteads for settlers…” (Gagnon, 2020).
 Countries of Origin and Reasons
for Immigrating
“For Hungarians, Romanians, and Ukrainians, overpopulation and unemployment definitely prompted their
migration to the Canadian West.

Countries of origin included Romania, the Ukraine (approximately 170,000 Ukrainians settled in the Prairie
provinces), Iceland, and China. In addition, French settlers from eastern Canada moved to Manitoba, “where
distinct French communities had already been established by French fur traders and the Métis, well before
Confederation.”

“When the Russian government imposed intense Russification in the late 1800s, Doukhobors and Mennonites
experienced major violations of their cultural and religious rights… The social impacts of these groups in Canada are
also substantial; both Doukhobors and Mennonites introduced communal lifestyles and the practice of shared
communal goods to the Prairies. Currently, the population of Doukhobors in Canada is twice that which remains in
Europe, and Mennonites continue to be a dominant ethno-cultural group in Manitoba” (Gagnon, 2020).
 Women pulling a plough through a field in
Saskatchewan, 1903

A house with a thatched roof built by Ukrainian

settlers in the Prairies
 Chinese Immigrants
“Over 15,000 Chinese immigrants came from China and the United
States to help construct the Canadian Pacific Railway during the
1880s. The majority of these Chinese immigrants originated from
Taishan, in Guangdong province, which had been repeatedly ravaged
with floods, earthquakes, plagues, typhoons, droughts, and civil wars
during the late 1800s. The Chinese, like the Icelanders, saw Canada
as a refuge with ample opportunities for a better life” (Gagnon,
2020).
 More About the Canadian Pacific
Railway
Building the railway was essential for uniting Canada and
allowing for trade and easy travel between provinces. The CPR
was approved in 1881, and had to be completed by 1891. “The
railroad would be built in two sections. The western section
would move east over the Rocky Mountains and join up with
the central section, which was to begin in Ontario and move
west. The two sections would eventually connect at
Craigellachie, B.C…“Chinese labour was used to build the
railroad, and later to maintain it.” (The Ties, n.d.).
 The Building of the Railroad
“The Chinese were divided into groups of 30 men. Each group had a cook, an assistant cook, a
Chinese record keeper who kept track of work hours and other details, and a white foreman or
"herder" who dealt directly with the record keeper. Once the groups were formed they made their
way to Lytton on uphill mountain trails with supplies suspended on shoulder poles or in large
packs on their backs. Often holding onto a rope, they climbed in single file up the mountains to
the work sites” (The Ties, n.d.).

Between 600 and 4,000 Chinese workers were killed while building the railroad. “Workers died
in landslides, cave-ins, from disease, drowning, and explosions. Blasting tunnels through the
mountains of B.C. made it the most dangerous, time-consuming, and deadly section of the
railroad” (Sylvester, 2016).
Building the CPR in British Columbia
 The Chinese Head Tax in Canada

“The Chinese head tax was enacted to restrict immigration after Chinese labour

 was no longer needed to build the Canadian Pacific Railway. Between 1885 and
1923, Chinese immigrants had to pay a head tax to enter Canada. The tax was
levied under the Chinese Immigration Act (1885). It was the first legislation in
Canadian history to exclude immigration on the basis of ethnic background. With
few exceptions, Chinese people had to pay at least $50 to come to Canada. The
tax was later raised to $100, then to $500. During the 38 years the tax was in
effect, around 82,000 Chinese immigrants paid nearly $23 million in tax. The
head tax was removed with the passing of the Chinese Immigration Act in 1923.
Also known as the Chinese Exclusion Act, it banned all Chinese immigrants until
its repeal in 1947. In 2006, the federal government apologized for the head tax
and its other racist immigration policies targeting Chinese people” (Chan, 2016).

Chinese immigration certificate, 1918

 Migrants and Urban Centres

Some immigrants chose to settle in cities

because they did not want to be isolated in
rural areas. “Furthermore, many of these
foreigners saw themselves as living in
Canada or North America only temporarily,
earning enough money to buy a piece of
land at home, to assemble a dowry for a
sister, or to pay off a family debt” (Troper,
2017).
IMAGE: The largest city in English-Canada, Toronto covered a relatively small area. Public
celebrations—like this one for the Boer War in 1901—brought thousands into the streets.
Immigrants in cities did a variety of jobs, including working in textile
factories, digging sewer systems, and laying streetcar tracks. In spite of
their valuable contributions, many Canadians saw them as a threat
and “demanded strict enforcement of immigration regulations and
restriction of admission along ethnic or racial lines” (Troper, 2017).

Early 1900s: A woman

working in the textile
industry

Laying Street Car Tracks on

10th Street
Construction for a municipally
owned streetcar system in
Brandon began in 1910.
Daly House Museum
CA DHM 1977.1-1986.1.170
 Quebec
Quebec set up its own immigration department. “In co-
operation with federal authorities, immigration agents were
sent into New England to encourage French Canadians to
return home to recently opened and marginal agricultural
lands.” They eventually also welcomed immigrants from
Eastern Europe, from countries like the Ukraine. (Troper,
2017).

Ukrainian immigrants in Quebec, 1911.

 World War I (1914-1918)
“During the First World War, anti-German hysteria erupted in Canada…Groups such as Italians,
Serbians, Poles and some Jews were encouraged to return to the armies of their mother country or were
recruited into specific British army units reserved for allied foreigners of various origins. Without
national armies of their own to join, many Jews, Macedonians and Ukrainians volunteered for the
Canadian Army” (Troper, 2017). Canadians of African origin (Black Canadians) were also in the army.

Members of No. 2
Construction Company at
La Joux Camp in France.
La Joux had men of
various nationalities
working there.
World War II (1939-1945)
Internment of Japanese Canadians
“The forcible expulsion and confinement of Japanese Canadians during the Second World War is one
of the most tragic sets of events in Canada’s history. Some 21,000 Canadian citizens and residents
were taken from their homes on Canada’s West Coast, without any charge or due process. Beginning
24 February 1942, around 12,000 of them were exiled to remote areas of British Columbia and
elsewhere. The federal government stripped them of their property and pressured many of them to
accept mass deportation after the war. Those who remained were not allowed to return to the West
Coast until 1 April 1949. In 1988, the federal government officially apologized for its treatment of
Japanese Canadians. A redress payment of $21,000 was made to each survivor, and more than $12
million was allocated to a community fund and human rights projects” (Robinson, 2020).

Japanese Canadians being relocated in B.C., 1942
“DID YOU KNOW?
The term enemy alien referred to people from
countries, or with roots in countries, that were
at war with Canada. During the First World War
, this included immigrants from the German,
Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman empires and
Bulgaria; during the Second World War, people
with Japanese, German and Italian ancestry”
(Robinson, 2020).
 Evolution in Canadian Humanitarian
Attitudes and Legislation Regarding
Refugees
“After the Second World War, Canada became more open to refugees. In 1956, Canada accepted
37,000 Hungarian refugees, responding both to public pressure and to the need for workers in
Canada’s booming economy. In 1969, Canada at last signed the United Nations Convention
relating to the Status of Refugees, first approved in 1951. Countries that sign this
Convention have an obligation to provide international protection to refugees. More
specifically, these countries must make provisions to resettle refugees, and when their protection
cannot be guaranteed in the country where they first seek refuge, consider their resettlement in a
third country. After signing the Convention in 1969, Canada exercised flexibility in admitting
refugees several times in the 1970s: Tibetan refugees in 1970,
ethnic Asian refugees expelled from Uganda in 1972 and Chilean refugees in 1973” (Lambert,
2017).
Refugee and Asylum Seeker:
Definitions
 The 1950s and 60s
In 1951, Canada created an annual immigration quota. “As racial and national
restrictions were lifted in the 1960s, South Asian migration grew
significantly. Canada also began to receive immigrants from Southeast Asia,
which includes 11 countries, 10 of which are members of the Association of
Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN, whose members include Brunei Darussalam,
Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore,
Thailand and Vietnam.) Although groups of Southeast Asians have arrived in
Canada for this country’s opportunities and advantages, many have come as
refugees, most famously the Boat People of the late 1970s” (Bonikowsky, 2013).
 Canadian Response to the "Boat
People" Refugee Crisis
“The welcoming and resettlement of many thousands of refugees
from Southeast Asia in the late 1970s and early 1980s represents
a turning point in the history of immigration in Canada. It was
the first time that the Canadian government applied its
new program for private sponsorship of refugees — the
only one if its kind in the world — through which more than
half of the Vietnamese, Cambodian and Laotian
refugees who came to Canada during this period were admitted.
In recognition of this unprecedented mobilization of private
effort, the people of Canada were awarded the Nansen
Medal, an honour bestowed by the United Nations for
outstanding service to the cause of refugees” (Lambert, Vietnamese refugees in Quebec
2017).
 Syrian Refugees
“On 24 November 2015, Trudeau’s newly elected
government unveiled its resettlement response to
the Syrian conflict, and met its goal of resettling
all 25,000 Syrian refugees at the end of
February 2016. The Liberals also made a number
of progressive policy changes to cement its
position as a leader on the refugee front, and to
show a more welcoming side of Canada…The
government also reinstated full healthcare
coverage for all refugees, including Syrians,
which was substantially cut under the former
Conservative government” (Molnar, 2017). Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon (centre) and his wife, Yoo
Soon-taek (left), meet with Syrian refugee families recently
resettled in Canada.
 Syrian Refugees in Canada
Overall, at the start of 2017, the Liberal
Government had resettled a total of almost 39,000
refugees since coming to power in November
2015. This figure includes both Government-
Assisted and Privately Sponsored refugees.

The Qarquoz family, owners of Damascus Cafe and

Bakery on Beech Street in Sudbury, Ontario, show
off a banner welcoming them to the downtown.
Sudbury's Syrian eatery to be revived
Damascus Restaurant to open at
a new location on Lasalle
Boulevard

Jim Moodie

Publishing date:

Nov 12, 2021 

https://www.northernnews.ca/new
s/local-news/sudburys-syrian-
eatery-to-be-revived
 Immigration in the 1980s and
1990s
“During the late 1980s and early 1990s … Canada opened new avenues for other immigrants to enter the country,
especially those with employable skills or significant financial resources.

…those with capital that they were prepared to invest in Canadian enterprises or with money and skills
necessary to start business that promised to create new employment and wealth in Canada were invited to apply for
Canadian immigration. Many did. As a result, the number of entrepreneurial or business immigrants rose
dramatically, reaching 6 per cent of all immigrants entering Canada.

Immigration from Africa (mainly from South Africa, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Kenya, Ghana, Uganda, and Nigeria) also
grew in the 1980s and 1990s. Some of these newcomers were professionals with academic qualifications seeking
better working conditions in Canada, but the vast majority were refugees fleeing war, famine, and political and
economic instability in their countries of origin” (Troper, 2017).
 “In the late 1960s, Canada introduced a point
system for determining the desirability of
individuals applying to immigrate to Canada.
Under this system, each applicant was awarded
points for age, education, ability to speak English
or French, and demand for that particular
The Point applicant's job skills. If an applicant was in good
health and of good character and scored enough
System points, he or she was granted admission together
with their spouse and dependent children. Those
who did not score enough points were denied
admission. More recently, Canada has modified its
procedures to give preference to the admission of
independent, skilled and immediately employable
immigrants” (Troper, 2017).
 Comprehensive Ranking System (CRS)
Criteria – Express Entry
https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/services/immigrate-
canada/express-entry/eligibility/criteria-comprehensive-ranking-system/grid.html
 Canada Today
“Canada is recognized as one of the most open immigration countries in the
world. Since 2001, the number of newcomers has averaged between 220,000 and
260,000 a year. According to the 2011 National Household Survey (NHS),
approximately 6,775,800 inhabitants were born outside the country. This
equates to 1 person in 5, or 20.6 per cent of the total population of Canada.
In addition, Canada boasts the highest proportion of foreign-born inhabitants of
all the countries in the G8, outstripping Germany and the US, which recorded
2010 percentages of 13 per cent and 12.9 per cent respectively.” (Troper, 2017).
 Sources of Immigration
“From 2006 to 2011, Canada welcomed over 1,162,900 immigrants. Asia and the Middle
East continued to be the main sources of immigration , with 661,000 persons
arriving in Canada, or 56.9 per cent of all newcomers. Europe was the second largest
source, with about 159,700 immigrants, but it accounted for only 13.7 per cent of all recent
newcomers. Immigration from Africa, the Caribbean, Central America, and South America
has increased slightly since 2006. Currently, Africans are the third-largest group of
immigrants to Canada with 145,700 newcomers, or 12.5 per cent of all recent
immigrants. Immigration from the Caribbean, South America, and Central America is
almost as high, with 12.3 per cent of all newcomers from 2006 to 2011” (Troper, 2017).
2016: Sources of Immigration
Canada: Immigrants by Source
Country – 2016

“For a third year in a row, the

Philippines and India were the top
source countries of immigrants to
Canada. In fact, immigration from
these countries accounted for 28% of
the total intake in 2016. Syria ranked
as the third source country of
immigrants, accounting for 11.8% of
the total intake in 2016” (Canadian
Magazine of Immigration, 2017).
 Bibliography pg. 1
2018 Annual Report to Parliament on Immigration. Retrieved from
https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/corporate/publications-manuals/
annual-report-parliament-immigration-2018/report.html
Bonikowski, L.N. (2013, September 30). Coming to Canada: An Overview of Immigration
History. Diplomat International Canada. Retrieved from
https://diplomatonline.com/mag/2013/09/coming-to-canada-an-overview-of-immigration-history/.

Canada: Immigrants By Source Country – 2016. (2017, April 23). The Canadian
Magazine of Immigration. Retrieved from
https://canadaimmigrants.com/canada-immigrants-by-source-country-2016/
Chan, A., (2020). Chinese Head Tax in Canada. In The Canadian Encyclopedia. Retrieved from
https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/chinese-head-tax-in-canada
 Bibliography pg. 2

Gagnon, E. (2020). Settling the West: Immigration to the Prairies from 1867 to 1914. Canadian Museum
of Immigration at Pier 21. Retrieved from
https://pier21.ca/research/immigration-history/settling-the-west-immigration-to-the-prairies-from-186
7-to-1914
Lambert, M. (2017) Canadian Response to the "Boat People" Refugee Crisis. In The Canadian Encyclopedia.
Retrieved from https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/canadian-response-to-boat-people-refugee-crisis

Molnar, P. (2017, March 23). Canadian Response to the Syrian Refugee Crisis. The Canadian Encyclopedia.
Retrieved from https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/canadian-response-to-the-syrian-refugee-crisis

The Ties That Bind. (n.d.) Retrieved from http://www.mhso.ca/tiesthatbind/BuildingCPR.php

Troper, H. (2017, September 19). Immigration in Canada. The Canadian Encyclopedia. Retrieved from
https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/immigration
 HOMEWORK
Heritage Minute Report due Friday, November 26th at
11:59PM Eastern Time.

1. Download “Heritage Minute Report Winter 2021” from Moodle Week 10 to read the
instructions.
2. Write the report and submit it via Moodle, under Week 11 of ESL1020 Writing
II.