Canada’s Nova Scotia Introduces Express Entry Immigration Programme

Canada's province of Nova Scotia has introduced a new immigration programme called Nova Scotia Demand: Express Entry which gives migrants the opportunity to settle down in Canada even without a job offer at hand. The province has set to accommodate 350 applications for this year.

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REUTERS/Chris Wattie
Canada's Employment Minister Jason Kenney (R) speaks during a news conference with Immigration Minister Chris Alexander in Ottawa June 20 , 2014. REUTERS/Chris Wattie

But while a job offer is not a requirement, Canada Immigration points out that an applicant still needs to adhere to a point-based system, where s/he must have a minimum of 67 points out of 100 to be eligible for application. The programme is available to individuals along with their spouse or common-law partner as well as dependent children under 19 years old.

Each applicant will be assessed based on a points grid that measures education, language ability, work experience, age and adaptability factors. The potential candidate will also be evaluated if s/he already has an arranged job offer from a Nova Scotia-based employer.

Before one can apply, s/he must have had at least one year of full-time or equivalent part-time work experience in one of the 29 skilled opportunity occupations considered in-demand within the past five years. Such opportunity occupations include various professions in the engineering, science, healthcare, finance and computing industries.

Language ability in English or French will be assessed and will be subjected to a minimum score in a test recognised by the government of Canada. It could either be the IELTS or CELPIP for English or TEF for French. The applicant is highly advised to attain at least Canadian Language Benchmark (CLB) seven in one of these tests. Nova Scotia may also require a foreign diploma, certificate or credential if a candidate does not have a post-secondary Canadian educational credential.

Potential candidates to the Nova Scotia Demand: Express Entry have two application routes, either:

§  apply directly to the Nova Scotia Office of Immigration (NSOI) and then enter the Express Entry pool with a provincial nomination, which will trigger an invitation to apply for permanent residence; or

§  be selected from the Express Entry pool by the NSOI.

Nova Scotia has at least three types of immigration programmes: The Nova Scotia Demand: Express Entry programme; the Skilled worker programme; and, the Family Business Worker programme. Nova Scotia is forecast to have the third-highest level of economic growth of all Canadian provinces in 2015.

Source: http://au.ibtimes.com/articles/579199/20150115/canada-nova-scotia-immigration.htm#.VLkm3yvF-So

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Open Work Permits for Spouses of Canadian citizens or permanent residents

Effective December 22, 2014 and as part of a 1 year trial, Citizenship & Immigration Canada (CIC) will be issuing Open Work Permits to certain spouses or common-law partners who are applying for permanent residence from inside Canada.  Previously, sponsored spouses would have to wait until first stage approval to be issued open work permits. Since first stage approval is taking nearly 16 months, it creates major hardships in that these people cannot work while living in Canada waiting for their applications to be finalized.

Applicants who have already submitted their application for permanent residence under the Spouse/Common-Law class but have not yet applied for an open work permit should do so immediately.

If an applicant has already received an approval in principal, they have the option of applying for a work permit online.

Applicants who have yet to submit their applications for permanent residence should also complete an application for a work permit and submit along with their application for permanent residence.

Source: http://www.theimmigrationteam.com/2014/12/23/open-work-permits-spouses-canadian-citizens-permanent-residents/

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Ensuring Long-Term Prosperity and Economic Growth

Country of birth of "immigrants and non-permanent residents" in Canada in 2001 Census (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Government of Canada recognizes the importance of immigration in fueling economic growth and is planning to welcome between 260,000 and 285,000 new permanent residents in 2015, an increase of approximately 19,000 planned admissions over last year.

The economic category will account for the largest segment of the 2015 levels plan, at almost 65 per cent of overall admissions. The remaining 35 per cent will consist of family class immigrants, refugees and others admitted under humanitarian programs.

Higher levels in 2015 are an indication of the Government of Canada’s strategy of supporting economic growth by addressing current and future labour needs by increasing admissions in key economic programs. Canada’s future economic growth will require a steady stream of new immigrants to meet labour market demands.  

The increase in levels will also assist Citizenship and Immigration Canada’s implementation of the new application management system, Express Entry, in January 2015 and positions our immigration system to focus more on economic immigration in the future. This first year of Express Entry will be a transition year for economic immigration: while new applications under the Federal Skilled Worker Program (FSWP), Federal Skilled Trades Program, Canadian Experience Class (CEC) and a portion of the Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) will be managed in Express Entry, most admissions in 2015 will be of applicants who applied under the previous system. Increasing admission levels creates the conditions for the success of the new system in 2015 by providing enough space to accommodate pre-Express Entry cases while providing flexibility to admit higher volumes under Express Entry as soon as possible.

Highlights:

• The FSWP admissions will rise slightly in 2015 to up to 51,000. This program will continue to accept the most permanent resident admissions for 2015.
• The CEC has grown rapidly since launching in late 2008, with more admissions expected this year than ever before. To accommodate the rapid growth of this popular program, Citizenship and Immigration Canada will accept up to 23,000 permanent residents through the CEC in 2015. 
• Canada plans to welcome up to 48,000 permanent residents under the PNP in 2015. This represents the highest-ever provincial nominee admissions in history.
• An increase in admissions to the caregiver programs will take place in 2015. The increase of up to 30,000 caregivers will help to accelerate reduction of the existing Live-in Caregiver Program backlog.

Text version

Graph showing rapid growth of the CEC program from 2009 to 2013, broken down by principal applicants and spouses/dependants.

Year	CEC principal applicants	CEC spouses and dependants
2009	1,775	770
2010	2,533	1,384
2011	3,973	2,054
2012	5,943	3,416
2013	15,304	11,460

The Canadian Experience Class (CEC) is targeting the type of economic immigrant Canada wants: people who have demonstrated success in the Canadian labour market and who have the skills to contribute to our country over the long run. The CEC has grown rapidly since launching in late 2008, with more admissions expected this year than ever before. To accommodate the rapid growth of this popular program, Citizenship and Immigration Canada will accept up to 23,000 permanent residents through the CEC in 2015.

Text version

Two maps, one from the year 2000 and the other from 2013, showing the growth and dispersion of economic immigrants thanks to the Provincial Nominee Program. The 2013 map shows greater dispersion of PNP immigrants throughout the country, particularly in the Prairies and Maritime provinces.

Provincial Nominee Program

The Provincial Nominee Program is Canada’s second-largest economic immigration program and has helped to diversify and spread the benefits of immigration across the country. Canada plans to welcome between 46,000 and 48,000 permanent residents under the PNP in 2015. This represents the highest-ever provincial nominee admissions in history.

Source: CIC

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Reducing Backlogs and Improving Processing Times

Immigrants selon le pays de naissance, Québec, 2001-2005 / Immigrants by country of origin, Québec, 2001-2005 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

As a result of actions taken by the Government of Canada since 2009, the backlog of permanent resident applications has been reduced by nearly 45 percent, paving the way for a faster and more flexible immigration system. The 2015 levels plan is building on the success of the Government of Canada’s efforts to reduce backlogs and improve client service by increasing application numbers in key categories such as the Canadian Experience Class, the Humanitarian and Compassionate categories, as well as categories targeted to caregivers.

Highlights as of December 31, 2013:

• The backlog of applications across all immigration streams has been cut by nearly 45 percent from the end of 2009 to the end of 2013.
• The Economic Class inventory has been reduced by almost 57 percent, including the Federal Skilled Workers inventory having been reduced by almost 92 percent.
• The Parents and Grandparents inventory will have been reduced by over 70 percent by the end of 2015.
• The Humanitarian and Compassionate inventory has been reduced by 43 percent.

Over the years, efforts have been made to reduce the number of new applications received. In 2012 and 2013, the Government of Canada temporarily stopped accepting new applications in the Parent and Grandparent category and greatly increased admissions. Legislation to terminate the Federal Skilled Worker category backlog in 2012 removed more than 100,000 old applications. Economic Action Plan 2014 announced the Government of Canada’s intention to cancel the federal Immigrant Investor and Entrepreneur programs, and the 2014 Budget Implementation Act terminated the vast majority of the investor and entrepreneur backlogs.

The Government of Canada’s continued focus on reducing the application backlog helps to better manage the intake of applications to support a smooth transition to the new application management system, Express Entry, on January 1, 2015.

Source: CIC

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Express Entry: what can I do to prepare for the launch on Jan. 1?

The Centre Block on Parliament Hill, containing the houses of the Canadian parliament (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Creating an Express Entry profile will be the first step to immigrate to Canada permanently as a skilled worker through the Federal Skilled Worker Program (FSWP), Federal Skilled Trades Program (FSTP), or Canadian Experience Class (CEC).

There are a few things you can do to be ready to complete your Express Entry profile and to give yourself the best-possible chance to be invited to apply for permanent residence:

1) You will need to take a language test. CIC will use your test results to see whether you are eligible to immigrate to Canada under one of the federal programs that are part of Express Entry.

2) If you were educated outside Canada, you may need to have your educational credentials (your foreign degree, diploma or certificate) assessed against Canadian standards.

You may not need an assessment if:

• you have at least one year of recent work experience in Canada, or
• your work experience is in a skilled trade (skilled manual work).

Note: Even if you don't think you need to have your foreign education assessed to be eligible under Express Entry, you may want to do so to increase your chances of being invited to apply as including all of your eligible education in your profile can get you more points under the Comprehensive Ranking System.

3) You need to know the skill type of the job your work experience is in (as well as the job you plan to have in Canada, if they are different). You will use Canada's job classification system (the National Occupational Classification, or NOC) to find out whether your work experience is valid under one of the three federal programs.

****IMPORTANT****

CIC will issue candidates an Invitation to Apply by regularly drawing only the top ranked candidates from the pool. The first draw will take place at the end of January 2015.

A candidate's rank is determined using the Comprehensive Ranking System, and not based on when their profile was submitted. In other words, the Express Entry system ensures that only the candidates who are most likely to succeed - and not simply the first to submit their application - are able to apply to immigrate to Canada.

********

Learn more about the application process on the Express Entry website.

We look forward to providing you with more updates on how Express Entry will work for you.

Source: Citizenship and Immigration Canada

Please visit our website and take our online assessment at www.nexuscanadaimmigration.com

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