TORONTO — Ontario is asking Ottawa for more immigrant-nominee spots even after using almost all of this year’s federal cap, Labour Minister David Piccini said at a press conference this week.The province received 14,119 Ontario Immigrant Nominee Program spaces for 2026 — up 31% from 10,750 last year, but well below the 21,500 it had in 2024. By mid-year it had already issued more than 13,600 invitations. Most of the year’s room was gone before the rebuilt program started drawing again.“We need greater allocation from the federal government because we can see those needs, those nuanced needs, just in Ontario,” Piccini said after a Toyota plant visit. “The needs in the North are very different from GTA.”Queen’s Park tore up the old program this summer. Eight streams were closed after integrity problems. A 2025 audit of 485 files produced 56 bans and 76 penalties. Officials had already killed the skilled-trades stream after finding many nominees were not staying in the trades they used to get in..A new Ontario Workforce Priority stream replaced them. The employer job portal opened August 4. Piccini said targeted draws are underway and more are coming, including a rural and northern track. Rural employers — those in census divisions under 150,000 people — face a lower $500,000 revenue bar.Ontario is not asking to loosen low-wage temporary foreign worker rules. In June it refused a federal offer to raise the rural low-wage cap from 10% to 15%, citing youth unemployment and a preference for permanent hires already on an employer’s payroll.Ottawa still sets the nomination limit. Until that number moves, Ontario can only reshuffle a pool it has already nearly emptied.
