The Citizenship and Immigration Minister of Canada seems to be playing a fine balancing act. He is seeking to cut down on a heavy backlog involving immigration, without compromising on the support that his government enjoys amongst the new Canadians.
That careful balancing act was visible recently when Jason Kenney placed a two-year freeze on the number of applications received from parents and grandparents keen on reuniting with their family members in the country. The moratorium is targeted to make the backlog on family-reunification slim.
Although close to 6% of all immigrants happen to be parents and grandparents of the migrants already staying in the nation, applications submitted for the purpose of family-unification have surpassed the spaces which are there, in the process, leading to a huge backlog of 165,000 applicants, apart from the waiting times of as much as seven years.
And, this may stretch to as much as a decade by 2018 in case certain useful changes are not introduced. The freeze is expected to bring the backlog to about 50,000.
Still, with a view to address the worries that Kenney was attempting to restrict the re-unification of family, his government has brought forth a fresh and liberal visa for parents and grandparents wishing to stay with their family in the country.
As part of an all-inclusive move to increase the pace of family reunification and decrease an ever-growing backlog, the nation will accept an extra 10,000 parents and grandparents during 2012. The quota reserved for parental and grandparental admissions will swell by as much as 60%, to 25,000 admissions annually.
The said plan, disclosed recently introduced the Canadian Super Visa for parents and grandparents. The said visa will be legal for as much as 10 years. The multiple-entry visa will enable the senior people to remain in the country for as much as two years at a time without them having to renew their status.
At present, visas are only valid for a period of six months. As mentioned before, part of the plan necessitates up to a two-year pause on the new applications so that the involved department can at first clear the backlog.
Under the new initiative, Ottawa hopes to get rid of all the pending files within a period of five years. The Super Visa will be on offer to those already waiting for permanent residency, and who have shown that they are financially secure in the country, have health insurance of their own, and who also have been subjected to an immigration medical check-up.
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