RHYME & REASON

Filipiniana News   -   December 2017 IRCC Vows to Clear LCP Backlog     On 3 December 2017, the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) Ahmed Hussen, announced at a press conference in Toronto that the IRCC will be: Finalizing at least 80% of the cases that were in the Live-in Caregiver Program (LCP) inventory as of October 1, 2017 by the end of 2018; Processing 80% of new, complete LCP applications submitted on or after October 1, 2017 within 12 months; and Admitting high numbers of LCP caregivers and their family members as permanent residents until the remaining cases are processed. These measures are being taken to address the notoriously long processing times for permanent residence applications under the LCP which have resulted in many years of physical separation between LCP participants and their families.    Aside from addressing the backlog, Minister Hussen also said that the long p

Filipiniana News – November 2017 Immigration Appeals The first question that is often asked by someone who had just received an immigration application refusal is: can we file an appeal?    Many are surprised or disappointed to learn that the answer is not a simple yes or no.      First, an appeal in the immigration context has a specific technical meaning.   It is a right generally given only to permanent residents (PR) and which can be brought before the Immigration Appeal Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) in specified cases.    These include family sponsorship refusals, non-fulfilment of residency obligation   and issuance of removal orders.   The only exception to the PR requirement is in the case of failed refugee claimants who may file an appeal with the Refugee Appeal Division of the IRB.     In most other instances, a negative immigration decision may be elevated to the Federal Court via an application for leave and judicial rev

Filipiniana News – October 2017 PR Card Renewal Issues After having gone through hoops to obtain their much-coveted status in Canada, many immigrants sadly remain ill-informed on some important issues relating to their status, including the renewal of permanent resident (PR) cards.    For instance, permanent residents who are planning to travel outside Canada but whose PR cards are about to expire are not always aware that the PR card renewal processing times can be lengthy, and must therefore be planned for well in advance.    The longer processing times for PR card renewals had been partly attributed to stricter scrutiny being conducted by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada   (IRCC) of the applicant's compliance with PR residency requirements.   The prevalence of applications with fraudulent residency claims have unfortunately prejudiced everybody else, even those not guilty of similar activity.     While CIC (now IRCC) used to process PR card re

Filipiniana News   -   September 2017     Latest Immigration Updates Summarized below are a few more changes which have recently been implemented by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) that may be of interest to those who have pending applications or are planning to submit one for themselves or their family members.   Parent-Grandparent Sponsorship Applications Since   IRCC did not receive 10,000 complete applications by 4 August 2017, it has decided to issue a second round of invitations to potential sponsors for permanent residence applications of their parents or grandparents.     Please note however that these additional invitations will be taken from the same randomized list that was opened early this year.   Hence, if you did not register in that list, then you will not be invited at this most recent round.   The new potential sponsors will receive an email inviting them to submit an application to sponsor their parents and grandparents