Immigrants positive about Canada: StatsCan
Apr 30, 2007 04:04 PM
Canadian Press
After immigrating to Canada from Dubai, Anne DeSouza felt depressed and sometimes cried as she and her husband were unable to find work for the first few months. But her husband’s positive outlook and willingness to take jobs below his qualifications saw the family through the hard time.
“It was teething troubles one has when one moves to a new place,” DeSouza, 50, said from her home in Mississauga.
After living in Canada for almost five years, the DeSouzas recently went back to Dubai for a visit.
“I wanted to see whether I felt that nostalgia or longing for the place. But it wasn’t there. I found it too crowded and fast, the traffic was crazy,” she said.
“We were missing Canada.”
DeSouza’s experience jibes with a report from Statistics Canada that suggests more than 80 per cent of new immigrants are positive about their decision to come to this country.
But immigrants did run into disappointments – in particular, difficulty finding work.
The agency’s report found half of those looking for employment said a lack of Canadian work experience was a problem.
DeSouza can attest to that.
“It’s never easy for immigrants when you come here because you don’t have the Canadian experience and nobody wants to give you the Canadian experience because you don’t have the Canadian (experience) … it’s a vicious circle,” she said.
The study is actually two reports. One examines immigrants’ assessment of life in Canada and the other looks at the relationship between new immigrants’ knowledge of the two official languages and their chances of finding an appropriate job.
Both reports were the third wave in the Longitudinal Survey of Immigrants to Canada. This survey was designed to examine how newly arrived immigrants adjust over time to living in Canada. The first wave was based on interviews with 12,000 immigrants aged 15 and older between 2001 and 2002, six months after their arrival. The second wave questioned 9,300 of the same immigrants about two years later and the final wave of 7,700 people was interviewed four years after their arrival.
DeSouza said her husband had a high position with a clothing manufacturer in Dubai, with clients that included Gap and Banana Republic. But after 9-11, American orders dried up, and he needed to find work elsewhere.
Their youngest daughter had just been accepted to the University of Toronto, their oldest daughter was going to university in the United States and they had cousins, albeit ones they’d never met, in Toronto.
So instead of going back to India, where they were born, they looked to Canada.
The Statistics Canada report found the most important reasons immigrants settle here are quality of life, to be close to family and friends, future prospects for their family and Canada’s peaceful nature.
The months following the DeSouzas’ arrival in Canada were tough. Her husband was unable to find work for almost six months. After paying the girls’ tuition and buying a house and car, their Dubai money was practically gone.
Her husband started in a low level job, and eventually became director of global sourcing at Roots Canada.
“We are the fortunate ones,” she said, adding many new immigrants, especially those whose first language is not English, go much longer without employment.
Owen Phillips, senior methodologist at Statistics Canada, dealt with the report on language barriers in finding work.
“Our data tell us the employment rate increases with the immigrants’ ability to speak English. People who speak English well, or very well, have a better chance of finding an appropriate job than those who speak English less well,” said Phillips.
“The effect of French isn’t as clear at the national level as what was observed for English.”
DeSouza, herself a holistic therapy practitioner, walked all over the city – going from spa to spa – with her resume in hopes of landing a job.
After months, she did.
Lack of contacts, lack of recognition of foreign experience and language barriers were also cited as problems when immigrants looked for work.
Some came to this country fully knowing the battles ahead.
Khaled Islaih, an economics consultant working with the United Nations in Ramallah, West Bank, brought his wife and three sons to Canada knowing he would not get work in economics.
“I knew … my accent, the way I look, it doesn’t fit with the Bank of Canada or the Ministry of Trade,” he said from his office in Brampton, Ont., where he works helping immigrants adjust at the Brampton multicultural centre.
“I took a totally different approach for my life in Canada.”
His wife, who works with computers, is staying home to care for their youngest son and taking English classes so she will be able to join the Canadian workforce.
Still, Islaih knew he wanted to come to Canada because the social climate here was more tolerant towards different cultures and religions.
“At the same time, I find Canada very complicated,” said Islaih, who up until two years ago lived in a city where gunshots and other violence were not uncommon.
