HomeAuthor Victor Ing

Canada’s government firmly believes that immigration plays a vital role in our society and its economy. In the past few years, Canada has made clear that we want to grow our immigration levels to offset our aging population and has introduced new program initiatives to attract more skilled talent from across the globe. With unprecedented levels of immigration inevitably come growing pains.

In the past several years, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) have set ambitious immigration targets to attract newcomers to Canada. The majority of these newcomers are economic immigrants who bring human capital to our country and enrich our communities by sharing their unique set of skills, knowledge and experiences from abroad.

As with most things in life, the success of your immigration case will often come down to timing. Having a basic understanding of the immigration application process and how long you can expect to wait to be approved can often be the difference between a successful or unsuccessful outcome because most immigration strategies will require sufficient time to successfully execute. By obtaining advice and becoming familiar with these application processes, program requirements and estimated processing time frames, you will be the master of your own immigration destiny.

At the end of February 2018, the Canadian government announced its commitment of $440 million to help Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (“IRCC”) fulfill its goal of increasing overall immigration levels over the next three years.

The Liberal government election promise of relaxed citizenship requirements have finally arrived! As of October 11, 2017, new rules have come into effect to make it easier for Canadian permanent...

The hard truth is that not all immigration applications are approved.  Clients often come to us asking what their options are for challenging a negative decision.  The course of action to take depends upon the type of application that has been made.

Canada has experienced ongoing labour shortages for many years causing more employers to hire foreign workers to meet their business needs. The growth of Canada's foreign worker program has led to the introduction, in recent years, of strict compliance measures for employers in all aspects of Canada's immigration delivery system with Service Canada, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) and the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA).

Canada's Express Entry Immigration program is a selection system for economic immigrants comprising four distinct immigration streams - the Federal Skilled Worker stream, the Canadian Experience Class, the Federal Skilled Trades Program and the Provincial Nominee Program. Each of these Immigration categories has their own distinct criteria both federally for the first three programs and provincially or territorially for the PNP programs.

Canada’s Express Entry system continues to make headlines with more upcoming changes announced to the points scoring system called the “Comprehensive Ranking System” or CRS. Starting June 6, 2017, additional CRS points will be awarded to Express Entry candidates with strong French language ability and those with siblings living in Canada.