(MONTRÉAL) — Quebec’s Ministry of Immigration, Francisation and Integration announced a 2026–2029 immigration plan that closes a major permanent residency route for workers and tightens key temporary foreign worker rules, leaving businesses in Montréal, Laval and several high-demand sectors warning they could lose staff they already employ.
Companies that relied on Quebec-linked pathways to keep experienced workers now face fewer options and longer timelines, after the province ended the Programme de l’expérience québécoise (PEQ) and folded skilled-worker selection into a single process under the Programme de sélection des travailleurs qualifiés (PSTQ) through Arrima, with a sharper emphasis on French.
The plan also pairs permanent selection changes with new limits on temporary admissions and restrictions tied to hiring in specific regions and wage bands, narrowing how employers can recruit and retain workers while they pursue permanent residency.
Key changes and timelines
PEQ, long used as a direct path to permanent residency for temporary foreign workers and Quebec graduates, ended on November 19, 2025, with Quebec no longer accepting new applications under that program.
Quebec continues to process PEQ files that applicants already submitted, but workers and employers can no longer treat PEQ as an option for new hires or for employees who had not filed by that date.
The province also closed three pilot programs for permanent selection on January 1, 2026, cutting off additional pathways that had served targeted occupations. Those pilots covered food processing workers, orderlies, and AI/IT/visual effects workers.
Quebec set its permanent immigration target at 45,000 in 2026, down from prior levels like 61,000, and shifted skilled-worker intake toward PSTQ as the sole skilled worker pathway via Arrima.
PEQ closure and pilot programs
The difference between PEQ and PSTQ matters because PEQ provided a streamlined, experience-based route to permanent residency for many temporary workers and Quebec graduates, while PSTQ runs through Quebec’s broader selection framework and Arrima.
By ending PEQ and closing the three pilots, Quebec removed several familiar off-ramps from temporary status into permanent residency and consolidated skilled-worker selection under PSTQ.
This section leads into an interactive tool that will help employers and workers map who was affected by the PEQ cutoff and the pilot closures, and what filing dates preserve an applicant’s position in the processing stream.
Permanent selection: PSTQ, Arrima and language emphasis
The province’s approach centers French-language emphasis as a selection priority, a change employers say reshapes who qualifies and how quickly candidates can move from temporary status to permanent residency.
With PSTQ as the default skilled-worker option, businesses must align workforce planning to PSTQ’s selection dynamics and the competitiveness of an Arrima-based process.
Quebec’s pivot changes how workers present candidacies: French-language ability plays a larger role in selection and can affect who receives attention from the system.
Temporary measures: LMIAs, CAQs and caps
The ministry paired permanent selection changes with limits on temporary admissions and new restrictions tied to hiring in specific regions and wage bands.
Quebec extended LMIA suspensions for low-wage jobs in Montréal and Laval to December 31, 2026, limiting employers’ ability to bring in temporary foreign workers for those roles through the usual federal LMIA process.
Quebec also uses its own authorization step for certain temporary work situations through a Certificat d’acceptation du Québec (CAQ), which supports a worker’s ability to take a job in the province under the applicable program rules.
Those temporary constraints arrive as Quebec caps overall temporary admissions at 84,900–124,200 in 2026, a limit set as part of a broader effort to reduce non-permanent residents.
Language and CAQ requirements for Temporary Foreign Workers
Language rules now play a more explicit role in the temporary pathway, influencing whether workers can stay employed while waiting for a permanent decision.
From December 17, 2025, CAQ applicants under the Temporary Foreign Worker Program with 3+ years in Quebec need Level 4 spoken French. Quebec paired this requirement with exemptions and a transition that runs to December 17, 2028.
For affected workers, the rule ties together time spent in Quebec, the CAQ authorization step, and a French-language threshold that becomes a gatekeeper for continued work-authorization planning.
This section leads into an interactive tool that will clarify how time-in-Quebec, CAQ steps, and language levels interact for individual cases and employer planning.
Practical effects for employers and sectors
Employers that built staffing models around multi-year retention now have to account for which employees approach the three-year mark and how quickly they can line up documentation and language proof needed to support CAQ requests or PSTQ candidacies.
- Businesses in Montréal and Laval face LMIA restrictions for low-wage roles until December 31, 2026.
- IT and AI employers face a tighter permanent selection environment after the AI/IT/visual effects pilot closure.
- Food processing employers lose a targeted permanent residency channel previously provided by a pilot program.
- Healthcare employers are affected by the closure of the orderlies pilot and the combined tightening of temporary rules.
Across sectors, Quebec’s measures reduce flexibility in hiring and retention at the same time, increasing pressure on employers to adapt recruitment, training and retention strategies.
Impacts on workers and ongoing applications
For temporary foreign workers already in Quebec, the immediate question is whether an existing permanent residency file remains viable.
Quebec continues processing applications submitted under programs that later closed, including PEQ files lodged before November 19, 2025, and pilot applications submitted before January 1, 2026.
That preserves the position of some applicants, but it does not help workers who planned to apply later or who expected employers to hire them first and then transition them through the same streamlined routes.
Employers also face practical documentation pressures even when a worker has an in-process file. Maintaining clean records of status and proof of submission can matter when a worker needs to extend authorization, switch employers, or demonstrate where they sit in the pipeline.
Strategy and planning considerations
With a smaller permanent target in 2026 and a single skilled-worker pathway, businesses anticipating steady flows of invitations may have to plan for longer waits and a more selective environment.
That can influence retention strategies, including whether to invest earlier in language training, how to sequence job changes, and when to consider federal options that sit outside Quebec’s permanent selection system.
Fragomen analysis described the direction as creating “stricter eligibility criteria, smaller candidate pools, and increased pressure on employers in urban centers,” reflecting concerns that the plan’s combined effect reduces flexibility in both hiring and retention at the same time.
The province framed the changes as aiming to ease housing pressures and boost French integration, while the business community has focused on the risk that tightened policy reduces stability for workers already filling hard-to-staff roles.
For many employers, the challenge now is keeping temporary foreign workers on the payroll long enough to compete in a tighter PSTQ process, while managing CAQ and LMIA constraints that can limit hiring flexibility in the very regions and sectors that rely on those workers most.
