Citizenship and Immigration committee  No, they qualify at the time they send their application in.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  No, the instruction could be issued after they've applied.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  In fact, it's been done widely since IRPA.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Provincial nominees, Quebec nominees--the individuals who have a job offer in Canada for when they become—

Citizenship and Immigration committee  All of those are prioritized by directive from the minister.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  No, it's unnecessary in that regard.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  That's what I'm saying, yes, except the issue then says...but the minister is justifying the need to do that and is imposing retroactivity to the decision-making process. That's what we object to. The prioritization has been going on forever.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Well, I can argue or not argue: they have the power to do it.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  No.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  It impacts those applications, absolutely. Because if you're sitting in that line-up and you're not one of the group that gets prioritized, even out of the backlog, as the minister has announced, your wait times get longer. And the reason people are waiting.... Everyone talks a

Citizenship and Immigration committee  That's the elephant in the room.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  This is for everybody here: that's the elephant in the room.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Absolutely, but the minister doesn't have to receive the applications. The minister can say to any group at the start that the class is sold out and we can't take any more in this category for the next two years. They can say that ahead of time.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Absolutely.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  They completely will not accept your application. In other words, don't send us your application, this category is closed. That's very easy to understand.