Toronto has made history by affirming itself as a “sanctuary city,” the first Canadian city with a formal policy allowing undocumented migrants to access services regardless of immigration status.

On Thursday, City Council passed the motion by a vote of 37 to 3 that also requires training all city staff and managers to ensure Toronto’s estimated 200,000 non-status residents can access its services without fear of being turned over to border enforcement officers for detention and deportation.

In this policy brief MPI Europe Director Elizabeth Collett sketches the challenges in developing a strategic, long-term agenda on migration even as Europe remains beset by fiscal uncertainty and a jobs crisis that is particularly acute for the young. Against such a backdrop, few governments are willing to have a serious conversation about anything but skilled immigration.

Migrant workers building sites and infrastructure for the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia, have been cheated and exploited. With exactly one year to go before the Winter Olympics, Russia and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) should make rigorous monitoring of workers’ rights on Olympic construction sites a top priority to prevent further abuses.

Migrant workers in Malaysia’s electronics industry are heavily indebted by the time they start working because of extortionate fees of recruitment agencies. Migrant workers are paid less, sometimes even only half, of what they were promised by the agencies that recruited them, and deductions are made from wages without proper explanation. Workers will undergo HIV testing as part of medical screening and women workers have to have mandatory pregnancy tests and are sent back home if they get pregnant.