Changes to spousal sponsorship

Cracking Down On Marriages Of Convenience – New and Proposed Measures

The Government of Canada has put in place a bar on sponsorship in an ongoing effort to deter people from using a marriage of convenience to come to Canada. Regulatory changes now in force mean sponsored spouses or partners will have to wait five years from the day they are granted permanent residence status in Canada to sponsor a new spouse/partner. Until now, a sponsored spouse/partner arriving in Canada as a permanent resident could leave their sponsor and sponsor another spouse/partner themselves, while their original sponsor was still financially responsible for them for up to three years.

In addition to the sponsorship bar, a new measure is being proposed to further strengthen Canada’s ability to crack down on marriage fraud. Under the new proposal, a spouse/partner being sponsored by a Canadian or permanent resident would be required to live together with their sponsor in a legitimate relationship for two years following receipt of their permanent resident status in Canada. If these steps are not pursued, the sponsored spouse/partner’s status could be revoked, possibly leading to their removal and in some instances, criminal charges could also be laid. For all legitimate relationships, the condition would cease to apply once the conditional period has elapsed.

Permanent Resident Cards may now be mailed to applicants

Permanent Resident (PR) Cards Mailed Directly Under New Pilot Project

CIC is launching a pilot project as part of its overall modernization agenda to streamline procedures and improve services to newcomers. Effective April 30, 2012, the vast majority of permanent residents who apply for Permanent Resident (PR) cards will no longer need to visit a CIC office and will instead receive the card by mail.

Mailing PR cards directly to applicants is expected to decrease wait times by up to four weeks.

News Release — Amendments to the Protecting Canada’s Immigration System Act

News Release — Amendments to the Protecting Canada’s Immigration System Act

Ottawa, May 9, 2012 — Minister of Citizenship, Immigration, and Multiculturalism Jason Kenney today announced that the Government is proposing amendments to Bill C-31, the Protecting Canada’s Immigration System Act.

“Over the past few weeks, I’ve listened to parliamentarians and witnesses,” said Minister Kenney. “We have always said that we were open to amendments that make Bill C-31 stronger and help us to fight human smuggling and to protect Canada’s immigration system. These amendments do just that, and make for a stronger bill.”

For example, some critics feared that the measures originally proposed in Bill C-31 with respect to the cessation of permanent residence status might be used in a way never intended by the Government. Others speculated that the Government would seek to remove permanent residence status from refugees who have become well-established in Canada, but whose rationale for refugee status ceases to exist due to improved conditions in their country of origin. The Government is introducing an amendment to clarify this section and to explicitly limit the application of this section of the legislation.

The proposed amendment would make it clear that where the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada (IRB) determines that an individual’s protected person status has ceased to exist solely due to a change in country conditions, that individual would not automatically lose permanent resident status. This was the original purpose of the provision in the bill, and the new language should make that purpose clearer.

Under the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, individuals with a final negative decision from the IRB were barred from applying for a pre-removal risk assessment (PRRA) for 12 months. This is because a PRRA is duplicative of the IRB decision, and a core purpose of the bill was to reduce redundancy and unnecessary delays in the removal process for failed asylum seekers.

The government is proposing to amend this provision so that the 12-month bar will apply as soon as Bill C-31 receives Royal Assent. There is no reason to delay the application of this provision, and the proposed amendment ensures there will be no such delay. The effect of this proposed amendment will be that individuals who received a negative decision from the IRB, or abandoned or withdrew their refugee claim, or received a negative PRRA decision within the 12 months prior to the date of Royal Assent would be barred from applying for a PRRA until 12 months after that decision.

The proposed amendment would also increase the temporal bar from 12 to 36 months for those from designated countries of origin who have received a previous negative decision from the IRB, abandoned or withdrew their refugee claim, or received a negative PRRAdecision. This change will discourage failed asylum seekers from going underground and evading removal for 12 months, and recognises that country conditions and the threat of real persecution in a presumptively safe country are not likely to change in the course of 36 months. There is, however, a provision in the Balanced Refugee Reform Act that would allow the Minister to make exceptions to the bar on PRRA to quickly respond to sudden changes in country conditions.

Under the Protecting Canada’s Immigration System Act, the Government had initially proposed mandatory detention without review for up to 12 months for those who arrive as part of a designated irregular arrival. This would allow for the determination of identity, admissibility, or any other investigations to take place before members or irregular mass arrivals are released into the community. Persons would, however, be released from detention before 12 months, if they are found to be genuine refugees.

Opposition members have asked for amendments to this detention review schedule, so that these individuals would receive a review of their detention much sooner than initially proposed. They have, for example, suggested that a first detention review should occur within 14 days of detention, with subsequent reviews every 30 days. Other witnesses and critics of this provision of Bill C-31 have suggested other time periods, including an initial review shortly after detention, followed by subsequent reviews at least every 6 months.

After listening to parliamentarians, the Government is proposing a compromise, which would see a first detention review within 14 days and subsequent reviews after every 180 days. As before, a person would be released before this time, upon being found to be a genuine refugee. As an additional safeguard, the government will also propose an amendment to allow the Minister of Public Safety, on his own initiative and at any time, to release a detained individual when grounds for detention no longer exist.

"I believe that these amendments show that the Government is open to reasonable suggestions that improve our Bills," said Minister Kenney. "We have listened to parliamentarians on Bill C-31 and, as a result, we have a stronger bill that will continue to protect genuine refugees, while ensuring that bogus asylum seekers are detained, processed, and swiftly removed, and sending the message to human smugglers that targeting Canada will no longer pay."

The cap has been reached for Federal Skilled Worker applications

The cap has been reached.  Citizenship and Immigration Canada has received 10,000 complete Federal Skilled Worker applications for processing since July 1, 2011.

However, certain applications are still eligible for processing. From now until June 30, 2012, CIC will only consider applications:

• with an offer of arranged employment, or
• submitted under the PhD stream (see below) until the cap of 1000 applications is reached.

If new Ministerial Instructions are not issued before July 1, 2012, the current cap of 10,000 new applications will re-set on that date.

Recent changes to the National Occupation Classification (NOC) may affect applicants in certain occupations.

Applications received from PhD applicants:

Starting November 5, 2011, CIC will accept a total of 1,000 applications from international students who:

• have completed at least two years of study in Canada towards a PhD, or
• who graduated from a Canadian PhD program in the 12 months before the date we receive their application.

Applications received toward the overall cap: 657 of 1,000 (as of May 8, 2012)


For more information visit www.ycanada.com

News Release – Economic Growth and Prosperity the Focus of Immigration Changes

Montreal, April 20, 2012 — Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Minister Jason Kenney spoke at the Montreal Council on Foreign Relations and outlined how a transformed immigration system would benefit the Canadian economy.

In his speech the Minister outlined a series of changes planned for the immigration system to make it faster, more flexible and focused on jobs to promote national economic growth and prosperity that can benefit all regions of Canada.

Proposed changes to the economic immigration system include eliminating the backlog of old Federal Skilled Worker applications, modernizing how selection is done under that program to better reflect the importance of younger immigrants with Canadian work experience and better language skills, creating a new Federal Skilled Trades program, and modifying the Canadian Experience Class to better facilitate the transition to permanent residence by successful skilled temporary workers.

Economic Action Plan 2012 also announced changes to CIC’s Business Immigration Programs, which will target more active investment in Canadian growth companies and more innovative entrepreneurs.  Under proposed legislative amendments, CIC intends to introduce new small-scale programs on a temporary basis to try innovative approaches to economic immigration. Improvements to the existing Immigrant Investor Program (IIP) could be rolled out over a longer timeframe, as any changes would require extensive consultations with provinces and territories, particularly the province of Quebec, which operates its own Investor program under provisions in the Canada-Quebec Accord. Furthermore, adjustments to the current IIP would have to go through the regulatory process.

“The changes I’ve announced are to ensure that immigrants who come to Canada can contribute to the economy quickly,” Minister Kenney said. “And the cornerstone of success is being able to speak one of Canada’s official languages. That is why the government is also proposing changes to the citizenship rules so that new citizens have the language abilities they need to succeed.”

Under the proposed change, prospective citizens would be required to provide objective evidence of their language ability with their citizenship applications. Applicants would be able to demonstrate language ability by submitting a variety of evidence, including the results of approved third party tests, evidence of completion of secondary or post-secondary education in English or French, or evidence of achieving the appropriate language level in certain government funded language training programs.

“The proposed change would encourage citizenship applicants to ensure that they can speak English or French when they apply,” Minister Kenney said. “Language is an important component of the successful integration of immigrants and new citizens.”

Adequate knowledge of English or French is a requirement for citizenship in Canada and has been a requirement since the first Citizenship Act of 1947. The Government of Canada provides language training free of charge to permanent residents.

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/department/media/releases/2012/2012-04-20.asp?utm_source=bitly-eng&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=generic

Province wants Ottawa to allow more immigrant...Kenney says increase not planned

http://www2.canada.com/saskatoonstarphoenix/news/story.html?id=9fa60db2-3859-4614-b777-fa68fe3a364f

Joe Couture, The StarPhoenix

Published: Friday, April 20, 2012

Saskatchewan Immigration Minister Rob Norris says there is a "healthy tension" between the provincial and federal governments over a cap Ottawa has put in place that limits the number of immigrants allowed into the province.

"We're not going to be discouraged, nor are we going to be dissuaded," Norris said Thursday in response to comments made by federal Immigration Minister Jason Kenney.

"There is a real momentum here to make sure that (federal leaders) understand that Saskatchewan needs to continue to move forward on immigration."

Among the province's requests of Ottawa is an increase in the number of nominations allocated to the province for the Saskatchewan immigrant nominee program, Norris said.

"We're capped at about 4,000 right now," he said. "What we've said is we'd like 6,000. We can handle that. - With more than 11,000 jobs open and available today, we see that there are broad-based needs - we know there are more improvements we can be making here, but quite candidly, many, many sectors are firing on all burners."

While there is "no intention" to reduce Saskatchewan's allocation, Ottawa doesn't have immediate plans to increase it, Kenney said in a phone interview Thursday.

"Certainly, Premier (Brad) Wall and minister Norris have strongly advocated for that and we take their perspective very seriously," he said. "Our first priority is to address some of the weaknesses in the provincial nominee program."

Those include the nominations "creeping into" areas where other federal immigration programs apply and the need for minimum language requirements, which Norris endorsed earlier this month.

"Provincial programs play an important role," Kenney said. "But we do think there's an important nation-building dimension to immigration and we do want to maintain a significant federal role in selection."

"Once we've seen improvements in the provincial nominee program and once we've reformed our federal programs, we'll certainly be open to looking at possible further increases to the provincial nominee allocation," Kenney added. "It's not easy, though. Every province wants more allocations and overall, Canadians don't want us to raise immigration levels."

Kenney cited polling data indicating 10 to 15 per cent of Canadians support increasing immigration overall.

"For too long we've seen declining economic results for immigrants - bringing in newcomers to face unemployment and underpayment," he said.

But Norris said "the broad brush strokes probably don't apply here in Saskatchewan, because certainly what we've heard from employers, what we've heard from newcomers and what we've heard from communities is actually a very, very consistent spirit of welcome.

"We're seeing the reinvigoration of communities that - were having challenges of decline. Now we know there are challenges associated with growth, but those are the challenges that we welcome."

Kenney said the "employerdriven" federal reforms "will be disproportionately beneficial to a high-growth province like Saskatchewan," with programs to court "economic immigrant" investors, entrepreneurs, skilled workers and graduates of the province's two universities.

With the potential for more federally selected immigrants coming to Saskatchewan, Kenney said he does "anticipate that we'll continue to see an increase" in immigration in the province - though "not as quickly as in the past five years, because you can't sustain that velocity of growth.

English or French language skills may be required for citizenship

Latest fed immigration reform: prove you speak English or French to be Canadian

MONTREAL - Immigrants hoping to become Canadian citizens may soon have to provide written proof of their language abilities.

Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said Friday his latest reform is aimed at requiring citizenship applicants to prove they can speak English or French.

"I've met a lot of Canadian citizens who have lived here for many years who can't express themselves in French or English," Kenney said during a speech Friday to the Montreal Council on Foreign Relations.

"It's not acceptable because it limits their social mobility and their life in Canada."

Kenney announced a change to citizenship rules which would require prospective Canadian citizens to provide what's called objective evidence of their language ability with their application.

Expanding on language changes he's already announced for some immigration applicants, Kenney said people will also have to provide new documents to become Canadian citizens.

They will be asked to submit evidence they completed secondary or post-secondary education in English or French; they could also provide results of approved third-party tests, or proof of success in government-funded language training programs.

Kenney explained he wanted the linguistic proof to "ensure that all of those who join us as full members of our Canadian family in the future are able to fully participate in our society."

Adequate knowledge of English or French has already been a requirement since the first Citizenship Act of 1947 — but these new mechanisms are meant to enforce that requirement.

The government also provides language training free of charge to permanent residents.

Kenney's announcement was interrupted by two women protesters who bought tickets to the luncheon.

As he began his speech, each of the protesters took turns interrupting him and warning that the federal legislation would destroy people's lives.

They shouted at the immigration minister and were both quickly escorted out of the hotel room.

Outside the hotel, about 50 demonstrators staged a noisy protest against the changes to the immigration system.

Activist Jaggi Singh, who helped organize the protest, said the linguistic requirement will make it tougher to become a Canadian citizen.

"It lends itself to discrimination and profiling," he said.

Singh says immigrants can still contribute to society — even if they can't speak English or French.

"We know very well that, in cities like Montreal and Toronto, people from immigrant communities sometimes don't speak a language, but they learn a language as they work," he added.

Singh says his mother and father, who are in their 60s, didn't speak English very well when they arrived from India.

"They would not have been able to pass an English competency test in their first couple of years and it took them time to do that," he said. "It takes years and years."

Singh says citizenship shouldn't be based on how a person speaks a language, but on how they contribute to society.

http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/canada/latest-fed-immigration-reform-prove-you-speak-english-or-french-to-be-canadian-148282885.html