Citizenship and Immigration committee  I think you are probably as well placed as me to hear what people say with regard to that.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  We're one of the very few countries that do that. Australia has a quota of 200 next year or something like that, so we are in a different situation. The rationale that we hear most often is more for humanitarian reasons than for any other reason.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I don't know about the complete application, but certainly part of the process can be done in Canada, possibly more efficiently. We're talking about, for instance, file creation. With regard to making a decision, the people who are the best fit for making a decision are those who know the clientele better.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  You're talking about the difference between a mission overseas versus in Canada?

Citizenship and Immigration committee  It's 85% abroad and about 15% in Canada.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I'm not sure that I could make a comment in this forum here. One thing I could say with regard to the experience of other countries is that Australia, for instance, centralized a lot of their processing, and now they are in the reverse process of decentralizing. So depending on when you get the information, it makes a difference between the two....

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Maybe one that is more generic with regard to parents and grandparents is that the reply to request is much slower than in any other category. Also, the use of visas is done more slowly than most categories. It often has to do, as somebody mentioned, with the medical. For instance, many parents and grandparents have to do a furtherance of the medical.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  One thing I should clarify. I don't know which communities you're referring to, the sixteen years or the seven years, but I think the extrapolations are based on a fixed target and would be the same every year. Actually, the set of targets that you have in hand was done in early January.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  We certainly encourage all the missions to do it. Maybe my colleagues can talk about their own experiences.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  That's correct.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  That's correct. It's also to try to make processing times among missions more even. It is very long, but we try to make it even as much as possible.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  That's correct.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I'm not sure with regard to really different challenges. Definitely, it's a question of the layout of the offices. Some constraints have to do with offices, more specifically. Communication is probably the key thing. One of our major problems in Africa, for instance, is communication with clients.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  What is set by the minister's office is not the actual 11,200. The levels are set in the report that is tabled in Parliament in November. I am sure you have a copy of that. Following the levels tabled to Parliament, then the machinery looks at, okay, in order to get 12,000 grandparents to Canada in 2011, how many visas would we need to issue?

Citizenship and Immigration committee  That's correct.