At the closed of 2023, the Federal Government announced that a temporary policy that removed the 20-hour limit on international students’ work hours will come to an end. The 20 hours cap was removed in November 2022 as a way to help address a Canada-wide labour shortage, allowing students to work more than 20 hours a week. The return to the 20-hour limit was supposed to begin in the new year.

However, since the Federal government increased the amount to which a student must have access by $10,000, they are having second thoughts about returning to the 20-hour limit; so, the policy was recently extended to April 30, after initially being set to expire at the end of 2023. The federal government said in a December news release that it is considering raising the limit to 30 hours per week.

International students studying in New Brunswick along with the province’s business community say they hope the federal government will make the increase permanent.

In New Brunswick’s largest city, these students fill hundreds of jobs, primarily in retail and restaurants.

In the Moncton region, 70 per cent of businesses are having trouble finding skilled labour, according to a survey by the chamber at the end of 2023. 

Jovial Orlachi Osundu, president of the international student association at the Université de Moncton, said many students have benefited from the policy change, which allowed them to work more.

“The cost of life in Canada has increased, so they also need to increase the number of hours,” she said.

Karelle Bohoua, a business administration student at the Université de Moncton, took advantage of the waived cap to pick up extra shifts at her part-time job at the Georges-L.-Dumont University Hospital Centre.

Set to graduate this year, Bohoua has worked at the reception desk, as an administrative assistant and as a COVID screener for up to 30 hours per week.

“The role that I had gave me experience, it allowed me to enter the workforce,” she said in French. “Since the cost of living is heightened, it allows me to meet my needs and to get experience.”