Ontario Just Closed 8 PR Streams. Here’s What the New Workforce Priority Stream Means for Filipinos

On June 25, 2026, Ontario closed eight of its provincial nomination streams as part of a full redesign of the Ontario Immigrant Nominee Program. In their place, the province announced a single employer-driven pathway on June 26, 2026: the Ontario Workforce Priority stream.

This is not a tweak. It is the biggest restructuring of Ontario’s provincial nomination program in years, and it landed with very little warning.

Sa madaling salita

Noong June 25, 2026, sinara ng Ontario ang walong (8) OINP streams — kasama na ang Employer Job Offer streams at lahat ng Express Entry streams ng probinsya. Pinalitan sila ng iisang bagong daan: ang Ontario Workforce Priority stream.

• Kung may naka-pending kang EOI na walang invitation pa — awtomatikong kanselado ito. Kailangan mong mag-register ulit.
• Kung may approved na job offer ang employer mo sa lumang stream — hindi ito dala-dala sa bago. Bagong job offer at bagong aplikasyon ang kailangan.
• Kung nakapag-submit ka na ng aplikasyon matapos ka mabigyan ng invitation — ligtas ka. Ang lumang rules pa rin ang gagamitin sa iyo.
• Ang bagong EOI system ay hindi pa bukas — “later this summer” pa raw ayon sa Ontario.

At ang pinakamalaking balita para sa marami sa atin: may hiwalay na daan para sa TEER 4 at 5 na trabaho — mga trabahong dati ay limitado lang sa iilang okupasyon. Ngayon, kahit anong okupasyon, basta may kwalipikadong job offer, at CLB 4 lang ang language requirement.

Which streams closed

The streams that no longer exist:

• Employer Job Offer: Foreign Worker
• Employer Job Offer: In-Demand Skills
• Employer Job Offer: International Student
• Master’s Graduate
• PhD Graduate
• Express Entry Human Capital Priorities
• Express Entry French-Speaking Skilled Worker
• Express Entry Skilled Trades

The new Ontario Workforce Priority stream has three routes: TEER 0–3 occupations, TEER 4–5 occupations, and self-employed physicians.

If you had something in progress, read this carefully

Ontario has been explicit about who is protected and who is not.

You are protected if you already received an invitation to apply and submitted your application. Ontario states these “will continue to be assessed against the eligibility requirements that were in effect when the application was submitted.” Nothing changes for you.

You are not protected if you had an Expression of Interest sitting in the system without an invitation. Ontario is withdrawing these automatically — in its words, EOIs and job offers registered under the former streams that have not resulted in an invitation to apply “will be automatically withdrawn over the coming weeks.”

Employers: registration carries over — you do not need to register again. But an approved employment position does not. Once the Employer Portal reopens, employers must “submit a new job offer and a new application for an approval of an employment position” under the new stream.

That last point is the one causing the most quiet damage right now. We are seeing workers who believe they still have an approved position waiting for them. They do not. The approval died with the stream.

The part that matters most to the Filipino community

The old In-Demand Skills stream limited lower-skilled applicants to a short list of approved occupations — mostly agriculture, construction, and trucking. If your job was not on the list, there was no OINP door for you.

The new TEER 4–5 pathway removes that list. Ontario now accepts any National Occupational Classification occupation, subject to the stream’s requirements. For a community heavily represented in caregiving, personal support work, food service, hospitality, warehousing, cleaning, and long-term care, this is a genuine opening that did not exist three weeks ago.

The requirements Ontario has published for the TEER 4–5 route:

• Work experience: at least 9 months of cumulative, paid, full-time work experience in the employment position your employer is seeking approval for and which is set out in your job offer, gained within the 2 years before you submit your application
• Language: CLB 4 or higher in all four abilities
• Education: a Canadian secondary school diploma or its equivalent from another country
• Job offer: full-time and permanent, in Ontario, urgently necessary to the employer’s business, and not affecting a labour dispute
• Licensing: any licence or authorization required by law for the occupation

CLB 4 is a meaningfully lower language bar than most permanent residence pathways demand. For the TEER 0–3 route, the requirement is CLB 6, dropping to CLB 5 for skilled trades.

And you do not have to already be in Canada. Ontario’s requirements address applicants living outside Canada or working outside Ontario, with legal-status rules applying only to those applying from within Canada. An Ontario employer can extend a qualifying job offer to a candidate still in the Philippines or working overseas as an OFW.

One exclusion worth knowing: expressions of interest or applications where the Ontario Public Service or an OPS entity is the employer will not be accepted.

On wages — be careful what you are told

There is no single mandated minimum wage figure for this stream. Wage is scored, not gatekept: higher offered wages earn more points in the selection ranking, with the top band being $40 per hour or higher. A lower wage does not automatically disqualify a candidate; it simply scores nothing on that factor.

Be skeptical of anyone quoting you a hard “minimum wage requirement” for this stream as if it were a pass/fail threshold. Ontario has not published one.

Estimate your score

On July 20, 2026, Ontario published the full selection grid for this stream. Wage is only one of eleven scored factors — TEER level, occupation, Ontario and Canadian work experience, earnings, legal status, education, Canadian credentials, language, and where in Ontario the job is located all carry points too. A job-offer applicant is scored out of 130; a self-employed physician out of 115. Ontario has not published a cut-off, so treat the result as a measure of relative strength, not a pass mark. You can also open the standalone Workforce Priority Stream points calculator to bookmark or share.

What it means for you — practical next steps

If your EOI was withdrawn. Do not treat this as a refusal. It is an administrative reset. Confirm with your employer that they intend to re-submit under the new stream, and be ready to register the moment the EOI system opens.

If you are working in Ontario on a work permit in a TEER 4 or 5 role. Start counting. The 9 months of full-time experience must be in the specific position your employer will seek approval for, within the 2 years before you apply. If your work permit expires before you can accumulate it, that timing problem needs attention now, not later.

If your employer is unfamiliar with the new stream. Many are. The employer carries real obligations here — years in active business, a business premises in Ontario, revenue and employee thresholds that vary by location, and hard deadlines once an invitation is issued: 14 calendar days for the employer to submit, 17 calendar days for the applicant.

If someone offers to sell you a spot. There is no way to buy priority in this stream, and there is no way to submit anything at all right now, because the EOI system is not open. Anyone charging you today for an OINP Workforce Priority application is selling you something that does not exist yet. This is the moment scammers move — a brand-new program, confused applicants, and no live portal to check against.

If you already submitted after an invitation. Do nothing differently. Your old rules still apply.

What we are watching

Ontario has not announced a firm opening date for the new EOI system beyond “later this summer.” Phase 2 of the redesign has not been detailed. Notably, Ontario currently has no active Express Entry-linked nomination stream at all — the three former Express Entry streams closed and were not replaced in Phase 1. What replaces them, and when, is the open question for anyone with an Express Entry profile who was counting on an Ontario nomination.

We will update this page as Ontario publishes more.

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Kung hindi ka sigurado kung saan ka papasok sa bagong sistema — o kung nawalan ka ng EOI at hindi mo alam ang susunod na hakbang — mas mabuting malaman mo ngayon kaysa sa huli. Book a consultation para pag-usapan ang sitwasyon mo.

Written by Josef-Jake Camacho Aguilar, licensed in both Ontario, Canada and the Philippines. This article is general information current as of July 22, 2026, and is not legal advice for your specific situation.