Thank you, Mr. Kurland.
Thank you, Ms. Kwan, for the question.
I think the situation you outlined happens to a lot of people. There should be some appeal process. For a visa application, I believe an application could be made to the Federal Court for leave and for a judicial review of the decision. That would be determined based on whether the officer who reviewed the visa application fettered his or her discretion. That's an impractical, long and expensive process and it would be, ultimately, based on whether the person met the income requirement. That may not be worth pursuing.
Another idea I had—and others can comment on it—is that the minister could issue a temporary resident permit for someone who didn't meet the requirement. That's one idea.
The third thought is that these visas are issued and the program criteria are developed through ministerial instructions. One of the questions that was considered in the past meeting of this committee on this bill, on May 17, was whether IRPA should be amended, the regulations should be amended or it should be dealt with in another way. Our submission would be that it should continue to be dealt with by ministerial instruction, so that there could be more flexibility. I would suggest that if the research shows it's warranted, the flexibility be built into reducing or eliminating the low-income cut-off or allowing for credit, for example, for the assets and resources that the parents and grandparents have. You can't necessarily post a bond. We might not like to go there, but if there's another way to guarantee that those resources can be accessed, that would be a good idea as well.
There are a range of options, and I think this could be dealt with within the program itself.