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New rules put immigrant family reunions on hold in Canada
The New Year did not augur well for those hoping to reunite with their wards in Canada in the next couple of years.
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Representative Image / Canva
After slashing down the immigration quotas and discontinuing Labour Market Impact Assessments (LMIAs) points in the Express Entry scheme, the Government of Canada has delivered yet another blow to parents and grandparents of immigrants. It has now decided to suspend the application process for sponsoring parent and grandparent permanent residency.
The latest directive published in the Canada Gazette reiterates that the government remains committed to family reunification but will not accept any new applications under the scheme. Instead, it will focus on processing applications received last year.
The directive states that the application process will be suspended in order to "best support" the government's goals regarding immigration and family reunification, which is in line with the opinion of Immigration Minister Marc Miller.
It is not only the family reunification; other immigration streams have also seen new sponsorships paused to help clear the existing backlog.
Mixed Responses
Recent changes have met with mixed responses from politicians, social scientists, economists and immigration specialists. Mayors of some of the smaller towns in Ontario and British Columbia have been voicing their concerns over the changes and want the Federal Government to reconsider them. They have argued that while they have been encountering negative population growth, they have no takers for the jobs they have to offer. In addition, new immigrants contribute immensely to the local economies.
They insist that the federal government should abide by its original immigration levels.
Decrease in Immigration
The recent changes, however, see an overall decrease in immigration over the next three years. Since the government has been under immense pressure from the Opposition parties and various other organisations, it has been constantly reviewing its plans and targets. Under the family reunification scheme, especially in cases relating to parents and grandparents, the goal was to admit more than 24,000 people through this stream this year.
The new directive says a maximum of 15,000 applications made in 2024 through the family reunification program will be processed, thus leaving a huge gap. Under the parent and grandparent program, 35,700 randomly selected people were invited to submit applications in 2024, to accept 20,500 applications.
According to the 2024 annual report to Parliament on immigration, tabled by Miller, there were more than 40,000 parent and grandparent permanent residency sponsorships in the inventory as of the end of 2023. The report puts the average processing time for a sponsorship application at 24 months.
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