Understood. Thank you.
Thank you for the invitation to appear before you today. In addressing the plan for faster immigration, I'd like to speak on the impact of the action plan on our network abroad.
First allow me to provide you with a few numbers on achieving this year's immigration plan, which was tabled in Parliament last fall. As you may know, our network abroad contributes 85% of admissions, with issuance of visas in all three streams: economic, family, and protected persons. By the end of October we were on track, having issued 83% of the visas for this year. We fully expect to be within one or two percent of our visa levels by the end of December.
In relation to the action plan for faster immigration, I wish to address two issues. These are establishing priorities in processing, and opportunities presented with modernization.
With respect to establishing priorities in processing,
visa targets or objectives are assigned to missions in consideration of the annual levels presented to Parliament, the projected intake of new applications, the number of applications in process, the capacity throughout the network abroad, the service standards, the number of temporary residence applications to be processed, as well as political stability and natural disasters abroad.
Until recent years priority processing for missions normally meant family class priorities--that is, spouses and dependent children, and protected persons. Federal skilled workers and other categories in the economic streams were processed on a first-in, first-out basis. Since the implementation of the action plan for faster immigration, priority processing now also exists within the category of federal skilled workers.
As you know, ministerial instructions were developed to reduce inventories and backlogs, to improve processing times, and to respond to labour market needs in a punctual manner.
In addition to priorities for permanent residents, missions must at the same time give priority processing to temporary resident applicants, such as business visitors, tourists, temporary workers, and students. Added to the challenge of managing a large number of priorities at the same time, missions must make additional adjustments for seasonal influxes and for staff changeovers, which usually occur during the very busy summer months.
Additionally, policy or program changes may be added to the mix. You will recall the minister's announcements a few weeks ago on the Action Plan for Faster Family Reunification. While the department will not take in new applications for parents and grandparents, we are committed to issuing a higher number of visas this year to reduce the inventory faster than normal levels of issuance would allow.
In regard to opportunities, with intake caps in the federal skilled workers stream, we will eventually have more manageable inventories globally, which will give us improved processing times.
In addition, in the context of increasing demand for our services and limited resources, we have turned our minds to efficiencies and service improvements through modernization. The implementation of our global case management system, which we refer to as GCMS, coupled with streamlining initiatives—e.g., the use of visa application centres, the rationalization of our application forms, and the use of 2D bar-coded applications—allow us to work much more efficiently. This will help us to improve on processing times, and this is good news for our clients.
Now I will turn it over to my colleagues in New Delhi. Mr. Frank is currently in Islamabad on an area visit. In Chandigarh is Ms. Zadravetz. And in Manila is Mr. Kent Francis. They will provide you with their perspectives on managing the action plan.
Thank you.