Evidence of meeting #32 for Citizenship and Immigration in the 40th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was long.
A recording is available from Parliament.
9:20 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative David Tilson
Thank you for your presentation.
Ms. Long, you have up to 10 minutes.
November 3rd, 2009 / 9:20 a.m.
Elizabeth Long Barrister and Solicitor, Partner, Long Mangalji LLP, As an Individual
Thank you very much for having me here today.
While my views do not reflect the views of the Canadian Bar Association, in preparing my submission for today I did canvass my colleagues, many of whom are in the Canadian Bar Association, for their input and experience. Today I'm presenting experiences and recommendations that have been shared with me by many of my colleagues.
I would like to speak to three topics today with regard to the issue of family reunification wait times. The first is the processing time in relation to the immigration appeal division. The second is wait times for parents and grandparents. The third is the issue of reunification for live-in caregivers.
My colleague, Jennifer Pollock, has spoken eloquently about some of the abuse of discretion by visa posts when determining whether sponsorship applications should be processed. There is an avenue of appeal to the immigration appeal division in the act, but let's look at the processing times for the immigration appeal division.
Even if a family has the money to hire a lawyer to help them go through the process, the entire process will take approximately three to five years. After the application is denied at the visa post, the minister will usually take about 120 days, or four months, to send materials to the immigration appeal division. If the family is lucky enough to go through alternative dispute resolution, the entire process at the IAD will take approximately nine months. If they are not and it goes to a full hearing, it would take 18 to 20 months to get to the end and have a decision.
And that's not the end.
Once they actually get to the end of that decision, if it is a positive decision by the immigration appeal division, it will take three months for the visa post just to acknowledge that there has been such a decision. Afterwards, it's another four months or more, depending on the visa post, to get the PR finally issued.
So we're looking at people being separated from their families for anywhere from three to five years because of a wrong decision by the officer. I'd like to present some solutions to this problem.
Plan A is to appoint more board members. Waiting 18 to 20 months to get a decision is just too long.
Plan B, if that can't be done, is to at least have the visa posts act when the decision is made by the immigration appeal division. We live in an age of e-mails and faxes. It should not take three months for the visa post to acknowledge that a decision has been made by the immigration appeal division.
When a decision is made by the IAD, the case is supposed to have priority processing. That means that it's supposed to be processed--not wait in line to be processed. The more than eight months of waiting time it takes for the decision to be made is longer than it would normally take for a spousal application to be processed in the first instance. That's not reasonable.
I will now move to parents and grandparents. I don't need to tell you how important parents and grandparents are to the emotional well-being of Canadians. On an economic basis, they provide wisdom and experience that comes with age, and they provide child care in our country, which is without a national child-care program. They are very important.
It's currently taking 32 months--and this is advertised on the CIC website--for grandparents to receive just first-stage approval of the sponsorship, and another two years or more to be processed at the visa station. It takes about four to five years for these applications to be processed. To separate families for this long, and for children to grow up without their grandparents, is unacceptable.
There have been some short-term band-aid solutions proposed and enacted during this time. In April 2005, Minister Volpe issued instructions to visa posts to invoke a more flexible approach in issuing visas to parents and grandparents who are waiting for the PR applications to allow them to come to visit their families.
While this is a positive step in allowing them to visit Canada, there are many practical problems in this. First of all, many parents who are coming here are in their fifties or sixties. They are willing and able to work, but they can't because they only have visas. They are still dependent on their families to support them during this time. This puts a strain on their families. Parents who come here don't have medical coverage and the families can't afford for them to get sick. So really, in the long term, it's not a solution for most families to have them stay here for four to five years without medical coverage and without an ability to work.
There are some solutions to this problem.
Plan A would be to increase the number of parents and grandparents who are allowed to come to Canada each year so that the processing time can be shortened.
Plan B, if this can't be done, would be to at least shorten the time it takes for them to get first-stage approval. It currently takes one month for Mississauga to approve a sponsor for a spousal application, so it can be shortened. It doesn't need to take 32 months to get approval.
Then, once they have received approval, at least provide the grandparents with work permits and access to health care when they come over. The grandparents can undergo medical assessments before they come over so you can assess whether they would be medically inadmissible and represent an excessive demand on the system at that stage, but when they come over at least they would have health care coverage, so that if they break a leg or get the flu they're not afraid to go to the hospital.
They can then actually stay here and work. They would have the ability to transition smoothly into the Canadian workforce when they actually become permanent residents.
Thirdly, I'd like to speak about live-in caregivers. Currently in this program persons who apply are meant to eventually become permanent residents. However, the program specifically prevents spouses and children from joining the caregiver when they're working in the program, and really, the system prevents them from being reunited for at least four to five years.
Let's look at the time period. First of all, they have to work for two to three years, with the families not allowed to join them at this time, in order to fulfill the requirements of permanent residence. Then it takes eight months for them to obtain approval in principle in Canada. Once they have that, it takes 15 to 22 months in Manila, where most of the applications come from, in order to get approval for the families to join them. That's anywhere from four and a half to five and a half years.
What's the solution?
In plan A, we would propose to allow the family members to join the live-in caregivers. Highly skilled workers are allowed to have their spouses come here and their spouses get open spousal work permits. Why isn't this allowed for live-in caregivers?
In plan B, if that's not possible, we propose to at least speed up the processing time for the families. Allow them to be processed at the same time as live-in caregivers. This is the case for skilled workers and Canadian experience class applicants, and it should be the same for live-in caregivers.
Thank you very much.
9:30 a.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative David Tilson
Thank you. The questions you raised are probably asked in the constituency offices of every member of Parliament who's here.
We'll start off with questions from each caucus.
Mr. Karygiannis.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Jim Karygiannis Liberal Scarborough—Agincourt, ON
Good morning. Thank you for coming.
You mentioned Nairobi and Accra. I wonder if you can walk us through a scenario of spousal sponsorship. If somebody sponsors his wife from either of those posts, what length of time are we looking at for this person, this spouse, to join them in Canada?
9:30 a.m.
Law Student, Caseworker, Immigration and Refugee Law Division, Parkdale Community Legal Services
It definitely varies. As I said about the 20-month processing time at Accra, you have the interview with the visa officer, at which point there is a determination whether the relationship is bona fide. As I mentioned in my previous submission—
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Jim Karygiannis Liberal Scarborough—Agincourt, ON
I'm sorry. Let's say that it's a bona fide relationship.
9:30 a.m.
Law Student, Caseworker, Immigration and Refugee Law Division, Parkdale Community Legal Services
If it's a bona fide relationship, it would be difficult to say if I don't have the exact facts, but presumably at the interview the permanent resident application could then begin to be processed if everything is deemed to be legitimate.
9:30 a.m.
Law Student, Caseworker, Immigration and Refugee Law Division, Parkdale Community Legal Services
Well, 20 months in terms of processing, plus about three months to go to the visa office. That's 23 months in Accra and 28 months in Nairobi. Actually, probably at that point medicals have to be redone, because it's past the 12-month mark. That adds another how many months until medicals—
9:30 a.m.
Law Student, Caseworker, Immigration and Refugee Law Division, Parkdale Community Legal Services
It's hard to determine exactly, but say, for instance—
9:30 a.m.
Law Student, Caseworker, Immigration and Refugee Law Division, Parkdale Community Legal Services
Let's say roughly six months. What happens is that when you go for you medical and it's in Accra, let's say, you have to use a designated medical practitioner. That office then submits everything to the Paris office for the medicals to be examined. Depending on when you do your medical, you might not get those results sent right away. Usually the medical practitioner waits until they have a bundle of results and then they send them to Paris. It's sort of difficult to give you an exact timeline.
9:30 a.m.
Law Student, Caseworker, Immigration and Refugee Law Division, Parkdale Community Legal Services
Yes. It's around that time for Accra.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Jim Karygiannis Liberal Scarborough—Agincourt, ON
That's about three years before a spouse is joined in Canada by their loved one. What happens if it's refused?
9:30 a.m.
Law Student, Caseworker, Immigration and Refugee Law Division, Parkdale Community Legal Services
If it's refused, then it's a whole different battle.
9:30 a.m.
Barrister and Solicitor, Partner, Long Mangalji LLP, As an Individual
If it's refused and it goes to the immigration appeal division, it can be anywhere from three to four years at the immigration appeal division by the time the visa post actually finally issues the visa.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Jim Karygiannis Liberal Scarborough—Agincourt, ON
This is, what, six years before IRB orders the post to—
9:30 a.m.
Barrister and Solicitor, Partner, Long Mangalji LLP, As an Individual
You're looking at around 20 months for the IAD to issue a decision and then afterwards it goes to the visa post; it's around a year.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
Jim Karygiannis Liberal Scarborough—Agincourt, ON
Let's just hold on here. We're getting to about 55 months before the IRB issues direction to the post.
9:30 a.m.
Barrister and Solicitor, Partner, Long Mangalji LLP, As an Individual
Once the decision goes to the IAD, it's anywhere from 18 to 20 months if there's a hearing.
9:30 a.m.
Liberal
9:30 a.m.
Liberal