Aug 24, 2012 | Immigrate to Canada, In the News, Legally Speaking, Permanent Residency, Skilled Workers, Why you need an immigration specialist
The Canadian government has been incredibly busy this year making major changes to it’s immigration system. With the pause of the Skilled Worker program, sponsorship of parents and grandparents, and the hold on investors and business class immigration, it has been an incredibly active year for minister Jason Kenney.
Recognizing that immigrants are an integral part of the Canadian economy, and growing labour shortages in the country overall, Minister Jason Kenney has made plans to improve the system as a whole.
As the Skilled Worker program is one of the most important in bringing in skilled immigrants, we are hearing that the government has a proposal to re-instate the Skilled Worker program, but this time without a list of priority occupations. In 2008, Citizenship & Immigration Canada (CIC) implemented a requirement that one must have work experience in a priority occupation to qualify for the program. In 2009, CIC limited the number of Skilled Worker applications to a maximum of 20,000 per year and the following year reduced it once more to 10,000.
We are now hearing from the Federal government that the Skilled Worker program will be redesigned to better accept the applicants that Canada wants. There will be changes to the points system and when it comes to the occupation list, there will be none! Those who would like to submit applications under this category will need to meet the minimum points based on 5 categories and their work experience will need to be of a management or skilled position (NOC O, A or B).
We do understand that the sponsorship program for parents and grandparents may reopen in 2014, but until then the Super Visa is the way to go. If you are a Canadian citizen or permanent resident and want to sponsor your parents or grandparents to Canada you will have to apply for a Super Visa. The Super Visa is a multiple entry visa that will allow your parents and/or grandparents to live (but not work) in Canada for a period of up to 2 years at a time.
Investors, entrepreneurs and business class applicants will have to wait for further information on these programs as there has been no update at this time.
If you are interested in immigrating to Canada we strongly suggest that you contact our office to speak with our immigration counsel for the most accurate and up to date information. You may complete our free online assessment form to determine whether you are or will be eligible to immigrate. Feel free to call and speak to us directly at 1-416-665-3939 or toll-free within North America at 1-888-808-7338.
Jul 6, 2012 | Immigrate to Canada, In the News, Legally Speaking, New Laws, Permanent Residency, Skilled Workers
On June 29, 2012 Citizenship & Immigration Minister Jason Kenney announced that they will stop accepting and processing applications under the Federal Skilled Worker category. July 1st, 2012 was supposed to reset the quota for the immigration year, however the federal government decided to stop accepting new applications all together in order to try and tackle the backlog. This does not affect applicants who have pre-arranged job offers.
Those applicants who had submitted their applications prior to February 27, 2008 should read the chart below to determine if their application will continue to be processed or whether CIC will return their application along with the fees.
Processing Instructions
| If the officer… |
and |
Then… |
| has not established whether the applicant meets the selection criteria prior to March 29, 2012 |
|
- the application is terminated; and
- fees paid to CIC are to be returned to the person who paid them.
|
| has established whether the applicant meets the selection criteria prior to March 29, 2012 |
the application has not been finalized before June 29, 2012… |
- processing of the application continues to a final decision; and
- fees paid to CIC will not be returned to the person who paid them.
|
| established whether the applicant meets the selection criteria on or after March 29, 2012 |
the application has not been finalized before June 29, 2012… |
- the application is terminated; and
- fees paid to CIC are to be returned to the person who paid them.
|
| established whether the applicant meets the selection criteria on or after March 29, 2012 |
the application has been finalized before June 29, 2012… |
- the final decision on the application stands;
- processing continues to visa issuance or refusal; and
- fees paid to CIC will not be returned to the person who paid them.
|
Jun 28, 2012 | In the News, Legally Speaking, New Laws, Permanent Residency, Skilled Workers, Why you need an immigration specialist
It is now official. Citizenship & Immigration Minister Jason Kenney announced in Calgary today that beginning July 1st, 2012 the Federal Skilled Worker program is frozen. No new applications under this program will be accepted until further notice. The temporary freeze does not affect those applicants who have arranged employment offers or those who are applying under the PhD eligibility stream.
“We have been making lots of changes to our economic immigration system,” said Minister Kenney. “We will take the next six months to do a lot of the heavy lifting to get us closer to a fast and flexible immigration system.”
This temporary, yet indefinite, pause to the program will allow the government to catch up and process over 120,000 files in the backlog. Applications filed before February 27, 2008 have been stuck as a result of the ministerial instructions implemented in 2008.
The Minister promised that Citizenship & Immigration Canada will be consulting with provinces, territories and stakeholders on ways to reform the current immigrant investor program which is also currently frozen.
Programs currently frozen; Federal Skilled Worker program, Federal Investor Program, Parents/Grandparents sponsorship, and the Federal Entrepreneur program.
For more information regarding these changes we strongly suggest that you contact our office. Let one of our immigration advisers provide you with a free, no obligation consultation to determine your chances for immigration to Canada.
Tell us what you think about the news today. Write your comments and concerns below.
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Jun 28, 2012 | In the News, Legally Speaking, New Laws, Permanent Residency, Skilled Workers, Why you need an immigration specialist
The federal government is possibly going to place a hold on accepting new federal skilled worker and immigrant investor program applications. While many applicants are expecting to file their federal skilled worker applications beginning July 1st, they may be disappointed at the news. Immigration Minister Jason Kenney is expected to make an announcement later today.
Minister Kenney is planning to hold consultations with stakeholders on how to better improve these programs. He calls for a faster, more flexible immigration system that is economically driven and designed to attract workers with stronger language skills, and employment credentials that are in demand by the current labour market in Canada.
We will continue to post news on this blog as it happens. Stay tuned for further information.
As always we encourage you to share this article on Facebook, Twitter and other social media websites. Posting your comments below, is always appreciated!
Mar 29, 2012 | Family Immigration, In the News, Permanent Residency, Processing Times
The government of Canada has decided to redesign the parent and grandparent sponsorship immigration program. With long processing times and an ever increasing backlog, Citizenship & Immigration Canada (CIC) is now consulting with stakeholders, including the public on how best to solve these issues.
On March 23, 2012, CIC Minister Jason Kenney announced that he will hold online consultations as well as multicity in-person meetings for public comment. “Our government is fully committed to helping families reunite,” said Minister Kenney. “The feedback provided by Canadians will guide our government in creating a new program in which future applications will be processed quickly and backlogs will not develop. It will also help ensure the program can operate on an efficient and sustainable basis.”
In November of 2011 CIC announced the Action Plan for Faster Family Reunification. As Phase 1 of this plan, CIC placed a temporary freeze on the parent and grandparent sponsorship program; however, they did increase the number of sponsored parents and grandparent they will approve by sixty (60) per cent to 25,000 for the 2012 immigration year. Also part of Phase 1 was the implementation of the Parent and Grandparent Super Visa, a visa that will allow permanent residents and Canadian citizens to sponsor their parents and/or grandparents to visit Canada for two (2) years at a time, valid for up to ten (10) years.
Family reunification is extremely important for Canada and therefore a revamp of the program is necessary. The current pause until 2014 may help to reduce the processing and wait time as well as help clear the backlog, but unless the demand for parent and grandparent sponsorship to Canada is managed, both the processing wait times and the backlog have the potential to quickly grow again to unmanageable numbers.
Different options are being considered to address a number of questions:
- Should we try to ease the economic impact of parents and grandparents by, for example, requiring sponsors to be financially responsible for their parents and grandparents over the Parent and Grandparent immigration programs lifetime, applying a fee, or requiring sponsors to have a higher income?
- Should we redefine the eligibility of family members who accompany parents and grandparents by, perhaps, focusing on parents rather than on the siblings of sponsors, or by applying a “balance of family test” in which parents and grandparents would be required to have from half to the majority of their children living permanently in Canada?
- Should we emphasize a commitment to Canada on the part of sponsors by, for example, making it mandatory to be a Canadian citizen (and not just a permanent resident) in order to apply?
- Should we focus on special needs or exceptional cases by, for example, requiring that the parent and grandparent be widowed or have other exceptional needs?
What is your opinion on the above questions? Do you have any recommendations for the Canadian government on how to better improve the parent and grandparent sponsorship program?
Mar 22, 2012 | Immigrate to Canada, In the News, Legally Speaking, New Laws, Permanent Residency, Skilled Workers
If you submitted your application prior to February 27, 2008 your application may never be processed. Minister Jason Kenney expressed that he is considering wiping out the current immigration backlog by introducing new legislation. This is similar to what New Zealand had done in 2003 to wipe its backlog.
In 2008, Minister Kenney gave priority to those applicants with specific work experience, and those who have job offers in Canada. This did help to reduce the number of overall applications, however it did not help those who applied prior to 2008. Those applications have been put on “hold”, if you will. The Minister said that at 80 per cent of skilled workers are being pulled from the backlog, 20 per cent are newer applications chosen under the new criteria.
As of September 2011, the current backlog includes 472,549 skilled worker applicants, 96,085 business class applicants and their dependants. The current worldwide wait for processing skilled worker applicants is approximately 8 years. Some applications are taking nearly 15 years to process.
Minister Kenney is considering creating legislation that would wipe the current backlog and allow for more timely processing of newer applications from people who can improve Canada’s economy. He proposed a “just-in-time” immigration system, one that would give me businesses a more important role in selecting immigrants. New Zealand created a “pool” from which it selected those applicants who benefited the current economy. Minister Kenney is planning to create a similar “pool” from which individual provinces could sift through applications for their own provincial nominee programs.
Hundreds of thousands of people have been waiting patiently for years for their applications to be processed. In October of 2011, 128 upset skilled workers launched a law suits in the Federal Court pleading the court to order CIC to process the dusty files. Now over 650 applicants from the following visa posts are involved: London, Vienna, Accra, Pretoria, Nairobi, Colombo, Singapore, Damascus, Bogota, Warsaw, New Delhi, Seoul, Port of Spain, Manila, Hong Kong and Beijing.
We’re interested to hear what you have to say about this. Comment below and share!
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