MKCO.CA – Immigration News Update

By Mumtaz Khan

April is almost upon us, and it is that time of the year, when people are busy preparing their taxes. Prior to filing taxes, people are calling me and asking what the minimum required income is, to sponsor family members for Permanent Residence in Canada.

In this post, I wanted to clarify which sponsors need to, and which sponsors do not need to meet the minimum income test.

Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) announced at the beginning of November, last year that they are going to impose a 2 year moratorium on immigration sponsorship applications for parents and grandparents.  Now, if you wanted to sponsor your parents, and grandparents, you did have to meet a minimum income test. The moratorium means the majority of sponsors, who needed to meet the minimum income test, are now out of the picture.

CIC determines if a sponsor meets the minimum necessary income (MNI) by using the Low Income Cut Off (LICO), which is issued by Statistics Canada every year. If you do not meet the LICO, then you are not generally eligible to sponsor family for permanent residence. There are, however, some exceptions, where the sponsor does not have to meet LICO, and is nevertheless eligible to sponsor family members.

These exceptions are:

1. the sponsor’s spouse, common-law partner, or conjugal partner, and has no dependent
   children;
2. the sponsor’s dependent child;

In these cases, the sponsorship application should be approved as long as the sponsor is a Canadian citizen or permanent resident, and the relationship between sponsor and the sponsored person is established as genuine.

The fact that the sponsor does not need to meet the LICO provisions does not mean that finances will not play an important role in the application. The Sponsor, despite the above exception, cannot, be an un-discharged bankrupt or in receipt of social assistance (welfare).

If the sponsor cannot show an ability to support themselves, then they may also be stopped from sponsoring as well.  This means that the sponsor must show some ability to support both themselves as well as the sponsored applicant once they arrive in Canada, even if that is something less than the LICO minimum income levels.

Mumtaz Khan is an immigration consultant and practices immigration law in Surrey at M. Khan & Co. He is certified by the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council, and is an immigration specialist. For more information, visit www.mkco.ca or email: khan@mkco.ca, twitter:@mkcoca

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By Mumtaz Khan

Now that we are in 2012, and the year 2011 has gone into the annals of history, I wanted to review the year that was for you with some of the major changes made to our immigration laws and regulations.

Minister of Immigration, the Rt. Hon. Jason Kenney, has been very active, nay, prolific, and laws have been changing at a breathtaking pace.

This constant evolution has been a little difficult to keep track of, but I have tried to highlight some of the changes. Please note that they are in no particular order of importance, but just my choice of order.

1. Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants replaced by the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council

Of course, I would start with this, was the best thing that could have happened for consultants, as 2011 saw Jason Kenney enacting legislation to remove the Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants as the regulator of immigration consultants in Canada and replacing it with the ICCRC – the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council. CSIC’s most serious problems had to do with poor governance and a wilfully unaccountable leadership, in particular the six-year chairmanship of John Ryan. He ran CSIC as though it were his own private fiefdom.

2. Changes to Family Class Immigration Rules

There have been four major changes in this area. Jason Kenney has already stopped sponsorship of parents and grandparents, for two years, apparently, but I suspect it will not be reopened.
Firstly, a new “Parent and Grandparent Super Visa” was introduced as a multiple entry visa with a maximum validity of 10 years (renewed every 2 years). Processing times are expected to average 8 weeks and parents/grandparents will be required to obtain private health care coverage and meet other admissibility criteria.

Secondly the Minister has made changes to spousal sponsorship, which includes a new category of permanent residents. That is persons who are sponsored to come to or remain in Canada as a spouse, common law or conjugal partner will have a “conditional” permanent residency status for two years, after acceptance. If the new spouse, common law or conjugal partner leaves their sponsor during the two years following immigration, the new spouse, common law or conjugal partner resident will face removal and deportation proceedings where Immigration authorities determine that the relationship behind the sponsorship was not genuine. It has been a long time coming. This, I hope, will put an end to marriages of convenience orchestrated for the purpose of gaining entry into Canada that have been so prevalent in the community.

Thirdly, the persons, who themselves have been sponsored to Canada as a spouse, common law or conjugal partner, will be barred from sponsoring a new (second) spouse, common law or conjugal partner for a period of five years following the date the now new sponsor originally gained permanent residency. This will apply even if the person has become a Canadian citizen. This just does not make sense to me. I expect that the government will be challenged on this in court, under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

And lastly, the government is enlarging the list of violent crimes which will make a person ineligible to sponsor any family member, not just spouses, for a period of five years following completion of sentence for the conviction. This will put a stop to criminals sponsoring. There should be some repercussions for convicted criminals.

3. The Federal Skilled Worker Program
In 2011, the Program further limited the number of new applications to 10,000 a year, with a maximum of 500 new applications in each of the current 29 priority occupations. The government is trying very hard to control immigration levels and use this as a tool, but they have not been successful. Some occupations filled up in a few days, whilst others have not filled at all.

4. The Federal Immigrant Investor Program
The Investor program was closed temporarily until next year after a new annual cap of application numbers was imposed. The Federal Entrepreneur Program was also suspended until further notice. I expect the Investor program to be re-opened, but the Federal Entrepreneur Program has died a death, and will not be resurrected.

5. Provincial Nominee Programs
In 2011, the Government continued to allow the provinces to select immigrants who best meet their region’s labour market needs. With the Federal Programs becoming more and more restrictive, the Provinces are taking up the slack. I expect that to continue this year.

6. Reform to Refugee Laws
The law was enacted in 2010, and was supposed to take effect in December, 2011, but is now scheduled to take effect June 2012. It gives civil servants the power to make decisions with regards to Refugee Protection, and the whole decision making process is supposed to be completed within 60 days. There will be a paper appeal available to the Refugee Appeal Division (RAD), but generally it is proposed that failed claimants will be deported within 6 to 8 months. The Minister is also going to designate countries that are “Safe Country of Origin (SCO)”. You can make a claim if you are from these countries, BUT an Appeals process will not be available people claiming from these countries to the Refugee Appeal Division. The Minister, did not come up with this by himself, but has copied from the American and Australian Systems.

7. Niqab Rules introduced to ban Muslim Face Coverings during Citizenship Ceremonies
The government introduced on December 12, rules which prevented Muslim women from wearing face coverings during citizenship ceremonies. The reason given was that they are they are aberrant. I expect that that there will be a Charter of Rights challenge to this law.
These are just a few of the changes that occurred in 2011.

Looking forward to this year, my predictions for 2012 are:
a) Federal Skilled Worker category being reduced even further to a total 5000 per year;
b) Introduction of a payment of $75,000 to fast track sponsorship applications for parents and Grandparents;
c) Quebec will attract more immigrants in 2012;
d) More deportations of permanent residents;
e) Increase in Provincial Nominee Immigration Programs;
f) This government will introduce mandatory English or French tests for people who want to become Canadian Citizens;
g) Court challenges to a number of Immigration laws;
h) More refusals of PNP cases by the Canadian Immigration Central Intake Office in Sydney;

Mumtaz Khan, practices immigration law in Surrey at M. Khan & Co., and is certified by the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council, he is an immigration specialist. For more information, visit www.mkco.ca or email: khan@mkco.ca

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By Mumtaz Khan

The Conservative Government, and the Minister of Immigration, Jason Kenney introduced the “SuperVisa”, for parents, and Grandparents, on December 1, 2011. So what is it all about, well if you have read any of the headlines, you will know, but here is a summary, on November 4, 2011, Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) announced a temporary pause on all new sponsorship applications of parents and grandparents. In other words, you will no longer be able to sponsor them permanently, for at least 2 years, (I am predicting forever). So to sugar coat the news, they created this visitor category.
An applicant is eligible for a Super Visa if the applicant has:
1. provided proof of the parent or grandparent relationship to the Canadian citizen or permanent resident; 2. undergone a medical examination and is admissible on health grounds; 3. provided satisfactory evidence of private medical insurance from a Canadian insurance company, valid for a minimum period of one year from the date of entry which:
4. covers the applicant for health care, hospitalization and repatriation;
5. provides a minimum of $100,000 coverage; and 6. is valid for each entry to Canada and available for review by the examining officer upon request; and 7. provide a written and signed promise of financial support, e.g. a letter of invitation, from the host child or grandchild for the entire duration the applicant intends to stay in Canada. The letter must be accompanied by evidence of their means of providing such support.

This will normally mean details of the number of persons in the household and proof of income at a level meeting or exceeding the Low-income Cut-off for the total number of persons, including the visiting parent(s) or grandparent(s). This means that you still have to show, that if you have a family of 4, and you want to have your parents over for a visit, then, your joint income has to be, $52,838.This amount will go up every year.

I have spoken to a number of insurance companies, and the minimum cost for this insurance is at least, $3,000 to $4,000. This does not cover pre-existing conditions. You also have to cover the costs of repatriation in the insurance.

My take is if the SuperVisa allowed ANY parent to come for two years at a time if children agreed to cover all Medical Costs, without having to meet LICO, then maybe one could say that the program was “real”. Some questions, will they have to file income tax, and if they do then will they have to declare their world income.

My assessment is that this SuperVisa, is no more than a gimmick, a ruse to stop sponsorship of parents and Grandparents forever.

Mumtaz Khan, practices immigration law in Surrey at M. Khan & Co., and is certified by the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council, and is an immigration specialist. For more information, visit www.mkco.ca or email: khan@mkco.ca

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By Mumtaz Khan

A month or so ago (9th June 2008), the controversial immigration Bill C-50, got the green light with the Liberals acquiescing passively, by not “turning up” in droves, for the vote (80 absent), because this government made it a matter of confidence, and forced the Opposition parties to either accecpt the changes, or call an election.

A little bit of background, this minority Tory government introduced a series of amendments, to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, buried in Bill C-50, the 136 page “Budget implentmentation Bill” back in April, 2008. This was a very underhand way of introducing critical changes to Immigration policy, without proposing them before Parliament, for full discussion.

Now that the Bill has passed, it will give the Minister of Immigration, Diane Finley, arbitarary powers under the following:

• s. 11, of IRPA, has changed. The intent now is to give the Minister the discretion to arbitrarily reject an application, despite meeting the stringent criteria, to enter Canada as a worker, visitor, or permanent resident. The “shall”, has been changed to “will have the discretion”.
• s. 25, previously stated, the minister “shall” examine a Humanitarian and Compassionate application, which has now changed to “shall” examine the H&C application, if the applicant “is in” Canada, but only “may” examine the application, if the applicant is outside Canada. Altough this Government claims this will have no impact on family reunification, in practice, I would suggest that, it will have a serious impact on family reunification as H&C applications are one of the most frequent avenues for family reunification ( for example, under age Canadian born children of failed refugee claimants).
• s.87.3 of the Act will allow the Minister to issue “instructions” setting quotas on the “category” of person that can enter Canada- including quotas based on country of origin. This is an unprecedented modification of IRPA which harps back to the days of the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1923, the Order in Council of 1911 prohibiting the landing of “any immigration belonging to the Negro race”, and the “None is too many” rule applied to Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi concentration camps in 1945.
• sections 87.3 (4) and (5) of the IRPA now allows the Minister to simply hold on to, return, or throw out a visa application and deny any opportunity to review that decision in Court. This precedent is truly alarming, especially in the context of a deeply flawed appeals process, including the existing lack of implementation of Refugee Appeal Division, despite being provided for under IRPA.

The amendments have given Ministerial power in deciding the order in which new applications are processed, regardless of when they were filed. This means prioritizing immigration applicants based on their ability to fulfill the needs of the Canadian job market, “whether it’s people to wash dishes and make sandwiches, or whether it’s the highly skilled engineers”, as stated by Minister Diane Finley. This is a profoundly racist concept of immigrants as disposable commodities, let alone the issue of fairness and fundamental justice.

This bill has given CIC Minister Diane Finley overreaching powers to “cherry pick”immigrants who fit in with Canada’s labour priorities. I do not trust this government, and suspect that there will be a lot more applicants coming from European countries. These changes will perpetuate a restrictive, exploitative, and racist immigration policy in Canada.

Who is behind these changes? Well, of course it is big business, the predominant supporters of the party in power. The Tories look after their own, so Canadian big businesses will be able to take advantage of the changes, at the expense of the rights of refugees, non-status migrants, or those seeking family reunification, who are seen as increasingly ‘ undesiarable’, by both big business, and this government.

Mumtaz Khan is senior counsel at M.Khan& Company, and is a member of the Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants. Reach him at 604.591.5824. Personal and confidential questions email to khan@mkco.ca.

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By Mumtaz Khan
Well it’s that time of the year again. Tax season! Why do I need an immigration practitioner, you ask? Well, it is because, to sponsor any member of the family class and any dependents of the principal applicant i.e. your mother and father and any siblings, who are 22 and under or are in full time education, you have to meet a financial criteria, and be able to support them. The Immigration department looks at you income from your previous years’ notice of assessment. If that income is sufficient, then the application will proceed, if not then they will look at the previous 12 months. The table below sets out the Income required:
Low Income Cut-off (LICO) Effective until December 31, 2008       

 It is important to note that Employment Insurance is not counted as part of the total income, but special benefits are counted. Even if you do not meet the Minimum Necessary Income (MNI), the forms will still never the less be processed overseas, and refused on the basis of lack of income. Then that decision can be appealed to the Immigration Appeal Division, of the Immigration and Refugee Board. This whole process can take between 4 to 5 years. Why go through all those problems, when a short consultation with an Immigration Practitioner can avoid all the  delay and stress. 

Mumtaz Khan is senior counsel at M.Khan and Company, and is a registered member of the Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants. Reach him at 604.591.5824. Personal and confidential questions email to khan@mkco.ca.

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