Canada may not know if foreign students stay after visa expiry, audit shows

Canada may not know whether foreign students remain in the country after their visas expire, according to an audit by Auditor General Karen Hogan released on Monday, which also flagged weak enforcement and lack of follow-up in high-risk cases.

The report said the immigration department lacks systems to track departures and does not adequately act on cases of fraud or non-compliance, raising concerns about the integrity of the international student programme.

Limited checks and high-risk cases

Hogan said the department did not investigate or follow up on a large number of “high-risk cases.” The audit found that between 2023 and 2024, more than 153,000 students were identified as potentially not complying with study permit conditions, often because they were not attending their approved institutions.

However, the department had funding to investigate only about 2,000 cases each year. In total, 4,057 investigations were launched during this period. Around 40% of these cases, involving over 1,600 students, could not be closed because the students did not respond.

Hogan said investigations should be completed even if students fail to respond. “That should be happening no matter where you are in the reforms. That should be acting on the data you have — to preserve the integrity of programs should be something you worry about at the start when you get an application, throughout the application and when the permit has expired,” she said.

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Fraud cases not acted upon
The audit also identified 800 study permits issued between 2018 and 2023 where applicants used fraudulent documents or misrepresented information. These cases were flagged through the department’s own risk process, but no action was taken.

“There (are) clearly tools in their tool kit, things they can do when fraudulent documentation was used or if a student isn't following the conditions of their permit. We didn't see them consider that in these 800 cases,” Hogan said. “Their own risk process identified these 800 cases, and then no action was taken.”

The report noted that most of these individuals later applied for other immigration pathways. Overall, 92% of such permit holders sought to stay in Canada, and 456 received approvals, including 105 who were granted permanent residency.

Gaps in tracking departures
The audit found that authorities do not know how many students leave Canada after their visas expire. Of 549,000 people with study permits expiring in 2024, about 93% were allowed to remain, while 39,500 were expected to leave.

Only about 16,000 departures were confirmed with the Canada Border Services Agency, meaning the government could verify the exit of just 40% of those required to leave.

“While there were some adjustments made to improve the integrity of the program, what’s concerning for me is that the department isn’t acting on the information it has,” Hogan said.

Sharp drop in approvals across provinces
The number of international students in Canada rose to over 1 million in 2023 after the Covid-19 pandemic, prompting reforms such as caps on study permits and a plan to reduce temporary residents to below 5% of the population by 2027.

However, study permit approvals dropped sharply. Around 150,000 permits were approved in 2024 compared to a projected 349,000. Approval rates fell to 41% in 2024 from 58% in 2023 and 54% in 2022.

All provinces recorded steeper declines than expected. While reforms had projected decreases of 10% or less in provinces such as Manitoba, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick—and increases in Newfoundland and Labrador and Saskatchewan—each province saw a decline of 59% or more in 2024 compared to 2023.

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Verification system and government response
The department introduced a letter-of-acceptance verification system, which checked over 841,000 letters between December 2023 and September 2025. About 97% were verified automatically, while the remaining 3% were reviewed manually.

Immigration Minister Lena Metlege Diab said the audit reflects an early phase of reforms. “At the same time, this report captures only the first 18 months of a broader multi-year reform effort that runs through 2027. It reflects an early phase of implementation, not the full impact of the changes now underway,” she said.

She also described the findings as “a preliminary look” at the reform plan. “The early audit cannot offer a complete picture of these reforms. It can inform, though, what we do as a go-forward basis,” Diab said.