More immigrant parents, grandparents allowed into Canada

NEWS RELEASES - CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION CANADA

******************** Citizenship and Immigration Minister Joe Volpe announces tripling of the number of parents and grandparents immigrating to Canada in 2005 OTTAWA, April 18, 2005 — The Honourable Joe Volpe, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration [shown], today announced measures to speed up the processing of sponsorship applications for parents and grandparents coming to Canada as family class immigrants.

With these new measures in place, it is expected that in both 2005 and 2006, the number of parents and grandparents immigrating to Canada will increase by an additional 12,000 each year.

This triples the original 6,000 forecasted for 2005.

Minister Volpe is also announcing that Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) will be more flexible in issuing multiple-entry visitor visas to parents and grandparents.

This will allow them to visit their families in Canada while their sponsorship applications are in process, as long as they are able to prove that they are visiting temporarily.

Regular security and health screening will still apply and some parents and grandparents may require health coverage to be admissible to Canada.

"Today's announcement will help CIC ease inventory pressures in the short term while working with the provinces, territories and communities on finding longer term solutions," said Minister Volpe. "I would like to thank stakeholders and the members of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration for their support of our efforts to improve processing times for the reunification of family members."

CIC has welcomed over one million permanent residents since 2000 and has consistently met its annual immigration targets since that time.

However, the number of sponsorship applications for parents and grandparents is growing and more applications are received each day than CIC can process.

To address this concern, the Government of Canada is investing $36 million a year over two years to increase processing of parent and grandparent applications and to cover integration costs once they arrive in Canada.

"We are taking action now to address one of the most pressing issues for CIC and to make our processing system as efficient as possible. Reuniting families is a commitment of the Government of Canada as well as a key priority of Canada’s immigration program," added the Minister.

Additional processing will begin immediately.

In the coming weeks, CIC will add temporary duty officers and support staff at visa offices with the largest number of applications.

******************* Citizenship and Immigration Minister Joe Volpe announces new measures to improve the citizenship application process OTTAWA, April 18, 2005 — The Honourable Joe Volpe, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, today announced an investment of $69 million over two years to process citizenship applications faster.

He also announced that citizenship applicants will now be exempted from undergoing language ability and knowledge-of-Canada tests at 55 rather than 60 years of age.

"Language and knowledge requirements are common in countries with naturalization programs, like the United States and Australia. Both of these countries also automatically waive certain requirements depending on the age of the applicant and the length of time spent in the country. By lowering the age for automatic waivers to 55, Canada’s policy will now be comparable to that of the United States and Australia," said Minister Volpe.

This policy change means that more citizenship applicants will be able to obtain automatic waivers to become citizens of Canada.

Today's changes in no way reduce the rigorous security screening requirements that all applicants for Canadian citizenship must go through before becoming citizens of Canada.

"The $69 million will allow us to restore, by 2007–2008, the processing times to an average of 12 months for a grant of citizenship and four months for a proof of citizenship," said the minister.

"This will be accomplished by directing additional resources to reducing the current high inventory of files and in enhancing technology to modernize processing and increase productivity."

Many clients currently download their applications from the Internet and check on the progress of their file on-line.

CIC will be making further use of technology to add more on-line services and to modernize other internal processes within the Department.

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