Immigration Canada

Crackdown on crooked consultants needs sharp teeth

Guest Article by:

METRO CANADA

June 14, 2010 11:05 a.m.

It was supposed to herald the end of the wild west days of immigration consulting.

In June 2002, the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) became law, and for the first time in Canadian history, allowed our federal cabinet to regulate immigration consultants.

At that time anybody, and I mean anybody, could describe themselves as an immigration consultant. And many did.

Many, if not most, had no formal training whatsoever. Some had criminal records. Some barely spoke English or French. Some were neither Canadian citizens nor permanent residents of Canada. Others didn’t even have legal status in this country.

Yet they were all legally allowed to print up a business card describing themselves as experienced immigration consultants, counsel, advisors, or whatever. They were permitted to hang up a shingle in a glass tower, over a convenience store, or at their place of residence.

They all had a hook. With little in the way of real credentials or experience to trade on, many endeared themselves to potential clients through their common cultural backgrounds, language, and familial ties. It seemed that some familiar sounding banter from back home was all that would-be immigrants needed to choose someone to represent them in what could be the most important move of their lives.
In April 2004, IRPA was amended so that those who, for a fee, advise and represent potential immigrants before Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC), the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB), and the Canadian Border Services Agency (CBSA) had to be either a member of a provincial bar or licensed by the newly-formed Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants (CSIC).
CSIC evaluated consultant’s technical and language skills, screened their criminal backgrounds and licensed them when appropriate.
Now that consultants had to be licensed, immigration officials didn’t have to deal with any representatives who were not licensed by CSIC.

Unfortunately, that did not stem the tide of the shyster consultant industry. It just pushed it underground. Those who couldn’t get licensed or who weren’t willing to pay annual dues to CSIC simply bypassed it altogether.
These “ghost consultants” didn’t surrender their business cards, close up shop, or cease operations. In fact, as you read this, perhaps thousands of unlicensed immigration consulting offices continue to freely advertise and ply their trade. Interestingly, they can’t be prosecuted for doing so. While it is true that they must be licensed in order to correspond with immigration officials, it is not an offence to advise immigration clients or to prepare their applications without a license.
Since immigration officials wouldn’t deal with them directly, they simply prepared applications in their clients’ names only, without ever identifying themselves as the applicant’s representative or the person who prepared the application. Often they would give their own address as the applicant’s mailing address so they could maintain control over all important correspondence received from immigration officials.
These days may now be over.
On June 8, Immigration Minister Jason Kenney tabled the Cracking Down on Crooked Consultants Act which would finally make it an offence “To advise a person for consideration – or offer to do so – in connection with a proceeding or application” under IRPA. Proposed penalties are two years in jail and/or $50,000 in fines.
Will this work?
It will certainly give some of these ghost consultants some food for thought. However, the only way to shut them down permanently is to target these criminal enterprises where they feel it most -- in their bank accounts, here and overseas. Kenney should make sure that federal prosecutors have the legal authority to immediately freeze any bank accounts of these organizations, their officers, and employees as soon as charges are laid and make sure that this is done routinely rather than in limited circumstances.
Otherwise the business of swindling and messing up the lives of potential newcomers to Canada will continue to flourish.

Canada draws a growing number of Filipinos

Image by Chris Lancaster via Flickr

By Joanne Lee-Young, Vancouver Sun

Alma Davac tried stalling, but her grandfather wouldn't let it go. He kept nagging. " 'What's your plan? What's your plan?' I said, 'We're happy here. We're okay.' He said, 'So, you're just going to be happy? What about helping your family? Look at your cousins. They have made a good life abroad.' "
And so, Davac, who managed to stay in her native Manila, the Philippines, for a few years after graduating, caved.
"It's like a herd. Everyone was leaving. An opportunity came up and I said, 'Okay, Granddad, I applied.' He said, 'I am going to die happy.' "
Davac moved to Burnaby 11 months ago on a temporary visa to work as a nurse at Surrey Memorial Hospital. By then, she had logged eight years in Portsmouth near London in the U.K. Her sister, Joan Magtanong, took a more direct route to Canada. In May 2008, she moved from Manila to Fort McMurray, Alta., also on a temporary visa, for a crew member's job at McDonald's.
Quietly and without fanfare, the Philippines has become Canada's largest source country for immigrants and temporary foreign workers, combined.
The two sisters are part of a bulge of skilled and non-skilled temporary foreign workers that is key to the Philippines outpacing China and India as our largest source of newcomers.
These Filipino workers have been coming to Canada via an array of new federal and provincial programs. When Ottawa rolled the first of them out in 2001, the focus was on filling labour shortages in the technology sector. They were expanded to other fields, including nursing, construction trades, truck transportation, fast food services, hotel management, retail and more.
Along with provincial governments, Ottawa then extended a huge carrot -- the ability to apply for citizenship and stay for good.
Filipinos rushed at the opportunity through programs like the B.C. Provincial Nominee Program, which offers an accelerated path to immigration for skilled workers, and the Canadian Experience Class, which started in 2008 and allows some temporary foreign workers to apply for permanent residence after working for two years.
No other popular destinations for Filipinos -- not Hong Kong, Dubai, Australia, nor the U.S., -- offer the same opportunity.
And this has made Canada the dream destination for Filipino workers, according to Prod Laquian, a Vancouver-based academic who studies Filipino-Canadian history.
A desire to stay
Temporary workers are coming in droves, and many hope to stay.
While temporary foreign workers from the U.S., Australia and Mexico tend to come, work and go as the label "temporary" implies, most Filipinos aspire to immigrate.
They come believing there is nothing temporary about their venture, no matter what any first contract might say, says Winston Chan, a Filipino expatriate who has lived in Vancouver since 1973 and has helped to place temporary foreign workers from the Philippines.
The labour exodus from the Philippines is a well-known story. It's one of the poorest countries in Southeast Asia and some eight million Filipinos work abroad, sending home $17 billion US in remittances that prop up the country's economy. As well, power is entrenched in the hands of a few, leaving ordinary folks with little reason to even dream of change if they stay.

In Canada, astute mainstream businesses have spotted the migration trend and are mining the potential of these not-so-temporary foreign workers.
At Scotiabank, vice-president of multicultural banking Rania Llewellyn says Filipino customers in Canada are a key target for the company's newly tweaked StartRight program, which offers credit cards, savings accounts and mortgages for newcomers. At first, the bank marketed StartRight to landed immigrants, international students and immigrant investors, "but we found if we included temporary foreign workers, the market was much bigger," said Llewellyn.
She emphasized the bank isn't interested in customers who are mere seasonal workers, but "if a temporary foreign worker has a one-year contract to be in Canada, he or she qualifies for StartRight. It means they are being recruited for a specific skill set. As an institution, we can't look at this group as temporary because they come and want to stay."
In fact, Llewellyn has edited the misnomer right out of her marketing materials. "We have moved away from the term 'temporary foreign worker' and we just say 'foreign worker.' We do this intentionally because we know things have changed."
To understand this desire to stay, meet Michael Cruz, a power line technician hired by BC Hydro to climb poles and restore power.
Cruz arrived here in January 2008 on a three-year temporary work permit, but he has applied for permanent residency via B.C.'s provincial nominee program.
He and his wife, Erin Gray de la Cruz, who has a job at a sushi restaurant in Lynn Valley, are renting a house in North Vancouver.
"It's a big difference. In the Philippines, we work hard, but earn less money. Here, we work hard and make lots of money," said Cruz.
Over at Bean Bros., a longtime Kerrisdale establishment that bakes from scratch and serves homemade breakfast, lunch and dinner, 23-year-old Jessica Kalao is trying to establish herself in Canada.
Kalao grew up in the Philippines' Samar province and arrived in Vancouver nine months ago, along with two other workers from the Philippines. She had already worked abroad at a Starbucks in Kuwait for four years, and with that experience, she returned to the Philippines in order to relaunch herself in Canada.
"Because in Arab countries, the salary is also good, but it's only for Kuwaiti people, only for Arab workers. We don't have permanent residence and don't have a chance for that. You can just stay there and renew your contract, renew and renew."
Lots of Filipino food
Here, she's hoping she might get lucky and become a permanent resident.
For the two sisters -- the nurse and the McDonald's worker -- moving to Canada has also given them a way to be closer to each other again.
"There's not a single day that we don't talk to each other now," said Magtanong. "Sometimes, I have to make something up like 'I have to go to the washroom now,' because she just doesn't stop talking. Or we joke, 'Hey, that's the same thing we talked about yesterday.'"

This growing critical mass of compatriots makes Canada an especially attractive place for new migrants.
"My kids have been saying to me, 'Y'know Mom, there are many Filipino kids at school here and they speak our native language and English with an accent.'
They think it's so weird because when we were in the U.K., there weren't many Filipinos," said Davac. "There is lots of Filipino food and shops here. We have actually put on weight. I told my friends, 'Food-wise, you're going to love it.'"
Davac and her husband, a cashier at a 7-Eleven convenience store who is also on a temporary work visa, plan to apply for permanent residency.
In Fort McMurray, sister Magtanong has just hit her two-year mark in Canada. Her contract with McDonald's has already been renewed and she will be promoted to a shift manager, moving her from the non-skilled to the skilled realm, and broadening the ways she might qualify for permanent residency.
For now, however, she is excitedly awaiting the birth of her baby. Her common-law husband also works at McDonald's in Fort McMurray. He came first and bounced around at McDonald's in Red Deer and Calgary before getting reassigned to Fort McMurray when Magtanong arrived there some months later.
She has a young son from a previous marriage back in Manila, isn't too sure yet about the harsh winters of Fort McMurray, and her renewed contract is just for a year. But there is a deep sense of permanence in their plans.
"My common-law husband wants to stay here for a long time. His mind is all settled down here. Maybe when we are retired, we will go back home, I guess. We're kind of thinking if ever given a chance, we would like to buy a house here," said Magtanong. "He's got the same thing going as me; he is helping out with his mom and dad at home. It's a lot of help to them."
jlee-young@vancouversun.com

Manitoba immigration program a huge success

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More Than 13,500 People Chose to Settle in Manitoba in 2009 Under Province's Immigration Initiative: Selinger

The province's successful immigration program has attracted the highest number of new Manitobans since the start of modern record keeping in 1946, Premier Greg Selinger announced today.

"Manitoba's immigration initiative has been very successful, not only because more and more newcomers are coming to Manitoba, but because the settlement and language-training assistance being offered are helping them succeed," said Selinger. "Evidence consistently demonstrates that Manitoba's immigrants experience one of the highest employment rates and lowest unemployment rates in Canada."

Manitoba welcomed 13,520 immigrants in 2009, an increase of more than 20 per cent from 2008 when 11,218 people settled in the province, surpassing the previous record of 11,614 in 1957. Prior to 1946, Canada's immigration records were not broken down by individual provinces.

Preliminary figures also show that Winnipeg received nearly 10,000 immigrants in 2009, more than Edmonton, Ottawa and Hamilton and more than Quebec City, Regina, Saskatoon, Victoria, Fredericton and Red Deer combined. Manitoba regional communities also welcomed more immigrants in 2009.

Compared with 2008, Manitoba provincial nominees increased by 27 per cent, with more than 75 per cent of permanent residents coming through the Provincial Nominee Program. In 2009, the majority of immigrants came from the Philippines, Germany, China, India and Israel.

Preliminary figures also show that Manitoba received 3,214 immigrants in the first three months of 2010, an increase of 11.9 per cent over the same period last year.

Today's announcement was made at the offices of the ENTRY program, an orientation and language program for newcomers. The program was launched by the province in 2004 and is the first place for new immigrants to learn about living in Manitoba, said the premier.

Selinger also announced $415,546 in additional funding for ENTRY to support increased participation in the program. Participation increased to 4,131 students in 2009 from 1,390 in 2005. The new funding will bring total support to ENTRY to nearly $1.4 million in 2010-11, a 42 per cent increase over the previous year.

"Manitoba is making tremendous strides in increasing its population through immigration," said Selinger. "Looking past the numbers, you also see the real success of our immigration initiatives and the positive effects newcomers are having on our economy and communities."

New rules aim to strengthen the value of Canadian Citizenship

Canadian parliament from the Musée Canadienne ...

Image via Wikipedia

Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Minister Jason Kenney introduced legislation that would streamline the citizenship revocation process, crack down on crooked citizenship consultants and better protect the value of Canadian citizenship.

“Canadian citizenship is highly valued around the world and today we are taking steps to ensure it stays that way,” said Minister Kenney. “These changes will help prevent citizenship fraud. As promised in the Speech from the Throne, these amendments will streamline the process to take citizenship away from those who have acquired it by fraud, including by concealment of their war crimes. And it would take decision-making away from politicians and give it to the courts.”

The full package of amendments would strengthen the process of applying for citizenship and crack down on citizenship fraud. Bill C-37: Strengthening the Value of Canadian Citizenship Act proposes to:

* Add legal authority to regulate citizenship consultants and to crack down where they help people gain citizenship fraudulently, in line with the recently proposed amendments to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act – The Cracking Down on Crooked Consultants Act – aimed at immigration consultants.
* Increase the penalties for citizenship fraud to a maximum of $100,000 or up to five years in prison or both.
* Strengthen citizenship residence requirements to specify in the law that people applying for citizenship would have to be physically present in Canada for three of the previous four years.
* Improve the government’s ability to bar criminals, including violent foreign criminals, from becoming Canadian citizens.
* Streamline the revocation and removal process and make revocation more transparent by shifting the decision making on revocations from the Governor in Council to the Federal Court.
* Ensure that the law supports the implementation of the first generation limit to passing on citizenship, ensure that the law does not unintentionally bar applicants who are eligible for citizenship, and ensure that the children of people serving Canada aboard – children of Crown servants – are not disadvantaged by their parent’s service to Canada and are able to pass on citizenship to their children.

“Canadian citizenship is more than a legal status, more than a passport,” said Minister Kenney. “We expect citizens to have an ongoing commitment, connection and loyalty to Canada.”

The HR Space: Obtaining a Work Permit in Canada: The Simplified Process

A North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) ...

Image via Wikipedia

The HR Space is edited by: Dominique Launay, Karen M. Sargeant, and Brian P. Smeenk.
In our January 5, 2010 article, we discussed the usual process for getting a work permit for a foreign employee entering Canada: obtaining a Labour Market Opinion (or LMO). The LMO process can be complex, lengthy, and very demanding for employers. Fortunately, several exemptions exist that can provide you with a much faster, simpler process. Let's have a look at the most common of these LMO exemptions.

Intra-company transfers

This exemption is for workers who are being transferred to a Canadian parent, subsidiary, branch or affiliate of their American or other foreign employer. Two types of workers are covered by this exemption: executives/senior managers, and employees who possess specialized knowledge.
Immigration Canada's guidelines define an executive or senior manager as someone who manages the company or an important part of it, usually through middle managers. When there are no employees under their direct supervision, it must be proved that they manage an important function of the company, at a senior level. Middle managers or first-line supervisors do not qualify for this exemption. In order to determine how senior a position is, Immigration Canada will not rely only on the position title. They will rely mostly on the description of the role in the company's organization chart as well as the detailed job description.
An employee-applicant who possesses specialized knowledge must be very familiar with the company's products, services, processes or procedures. The knowledge must be unusual and different from what is usually found in the industry. It can be proprietary or unique to the company, but it is enough for it to be rare. Specialized knowledge does not include knowledge that could be gained by another employee in the short term. An advanced level of knowledge of a particular industry that is not easily gained without extensive experience also qualifies under this category.
In addition, the employee must:

have worked for the foreign company in a similar position for at least one year in the three-year period right before his or her application, and
be transferred for a temporary period only.

Permits for executives and senior managers allow a maximum period of stay in Canada of 7 years. The maximum stay is limited to 5 years for specialized knowledge employees. The initial work permit may not exceed 3 years.

Young Worker Programs

Canada has signed bilateral agreements with a number of countries, including the U.S.A., in order to facilitate the work permit process for young workers between the ages of 18 and 35. Each agreement has its own specific requirements, but in general, it includes one or more categories that are LMO exempt:

Working Holiday: for young workers who want to work part-time while travelling to another country as a tourist;
International Co-op: for students who would like to gain international work experience in their current field of study; and
Young Professionals: for young workers who want to gain international work experience related to their career.

Each category comes with a yearly quota, so it is best to apply early in the calendar year. Work permit periods vary between 6 and 18 months, and are generally non-renewable. However, a worker may apply in another category (including an LMO-based permit) once he or she has completed the authorized period.

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)

The NAFTA offers simplified work permit criteria and processing for American and Mexican citizens. The most commonly used NAFTA LMO exemptions are for professionals and intra-company transferees.
Professionals
This exemption covers approximately 60 specified occupations, such as management consultants, engineers, architects, teachers, nurses or computer analysts. In addition to being a citizen of Mexico or the U.S., candidates must meet the educational and experience requirements for one of these occupations. They must enter Canada to provide pre-arranged professional services, either as an employee of the Canadian company, or as an independent contractor.
Intra-company transferees
The requirements under this category are similar to the general requirements mentioned above for regular intra-company transferees. The key difference is that managerial positions are not restricted to executive or senior managers. The NAFTA exemption also applies to middle management roles.

Processing times and locations:

The Canadian Government office that will process a work permit application based on a LMO exemption will vary, depending on the worker's nationality and whether they need an entry visa.
For American citizens or others who do not require a visa, the application can be presented to immigration officers at any Canadian port of entry. A pre-approval process is also available. That process will speed up the issuance of the work permit upon arrival in Canada. A written response is usually received within 10 working days from the date an application is submitted.
When a visa is required, on the other hand, the application must be presented to a Canadian Consulate or Embassy in the worker's country of residence. Processing times can vary from 2 weeks to 3 months (or more when an immigration medical examination is required).

Summary

One of these or several other LMO exemptions may apply to a specific case. A careful analysis of the context and circumstances of the employee being relocated is recommended. The review should be done at an early stage of preparation. It will help determine if an LMO exemption may apply and is usually very worthwhile.
Remember that LMO exemptions can save you, as a work permit applicant or employer, lots of time, effort and money. Make sure to take advantage of these rules.

Immigration Canada

Crackdown on crooked consultants needs sharp teeth

Canada draws a growing number of Filipinos

Manitoba immigration program a huge success

New rules aim to strengthen the value of Canadian Citizenship

The HR Space: Obtaining a Work Permit in Canada: The Simplified Process

Intra-company transfers

Young Worker Programs

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)

Processing times and locations:

Summary

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Crackdown on crooked consultants needs sharp teeth

Related articles by Zemanta

Canada draws a growing number of Filipinos

Related articles by Zemanta

Manitoba immigration program a huge success

Related articles by Zemanta

New rules aim to strengthen the value of Canadian Citizenship

Related articles by Zemanta

The HR Space: Obtaining a Work Permit in Canada: The Simplified Process

Intra-company transfers

Young Worker Programs

The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)

Processing times and locations:

Summary

Related articles by Zemanta

Leave us a message

Check our online courses now

Subscribe to our newsletter

Vcita