Canada invited 888 Express Entry candidates to apply for permanent residence on 27 October. Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) invited candidates who had scores of at least 744. All invited candidates had received an automatic 600 points because they had a provincial nomination from a Provincial Nominee Program (PNP). This is the third largest PNP draw of the year.
Throughout the pandemic, Canada has been holding Express Entry draws that target PNP and Canadian Experience Class (CEC) candidates. Because of this, the number of Express Entry candidates invited over the past month has been significantly less. CEC draws are typically larger than PNP draws because there are significantly more candidates.
Even with the reduced number of invitations issued this month, Canada has still invited a record number of Express Entry candidates this year. So far in 2021, Canada has invited 111,265 Express Entry candidate to apply for permanent residence. Last year, Canada invited a total of 107,350 immigration candidates.
Also due to the PNP draws, the average score cutoffs have remained relatively high. This is entirely due to the 600-point award that comes with the provincial nomination.
On October 26, Fraser became Canada’s new immigration minister. Former immigration minister, Marco Mendicino, took over as the minister of public safety. The immigration minister’s job is to oversee IRCC. Fraser will be the figure head of the department who approves new policies, and makes the announcements on government initiatives that relate to immigration.
Now that the new minister has been chosen, IRCC can once again start to make major decisions on the Express Entry strategy.