May 29, 2023 – After introducing legislation that banned regulated professions from requiring Canadian work experience in more than 30 occupations, Professional Engineers Ontario (PEO) are the first association to remove it from their application criteria.
Roughly 300,000 jobs continue to go unfilled across the province every day. At the same time, studies have shown only a quarter of internationally trained immigrants in Ontario work in the regulated professions they trained for. Currently, even if a newcomer has the skills and technical ability to pass their profession’s licensing exams, they may still be barred from registering in their profession without Canadian work experience.
Ontario is the first province in Canada to ban unfair or discriminatory Canadian work experience requirements to help newcomers work in the professions they trained for. In December 2023, all unfair requirements for Canadian experience will be automatically voided unless an exemption is granted by the Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development for public health and safety.