Most people who are not Canadian permanent resident or citizen need to apply for a work permit in order to work in Canada. However, for some types of work and people a work permit is not required.
Depending on whether a person is in or outside Canada and their country of citizenship, there are several types of work permit one may apply.
Except for an open work permit which may be issued to certain types of people in Canada, one will generally needs a job offer from a Canadian employer to apply for a work permit. Most of the time such a job offer must be validated by Service Canada/Human Resources and Skill Development Canada. Whether a job offer will be validated depends on Canada’s labour market needs. The employer usually needs to first look for a Canadian citizen or permanent resident to fill the position by advertising the job opportunity for a certain period of time. If a job offer is validated, Service Canada/Human Resources and Skill Development Canada will issue a Labour Market Opinion, which will be given to the employer and employee for the work permit application.
Latest changes on April 1, 2011
There have been substantial changes with respect to the foreign worker program effective April 1, 2011. Click here for more information.
Labour market – based work permit
IT professional Work Permit
NAFTA Professional work permit
Intra-company transferee work permit
Significant benefit to Canada work permit
Post-graduation work permit
Spousal open work permit
Live-in caregiver work permit
Humanitarian based work permit