The recent news about immigration raids played out for a reality TV show has drawn attention to the Canada Border Services Agency's interest in strategies of mass appeal, at the expense of individuals' privacy and dignity. But it's not the first example.
Imagine that you have fled your country out of fear for your life. Imagine that you flee to Canada: the country does not accept you as a refugee, but it does recognize that it would be unsafe for you to return home because of the situation of generalized violence there.
Canadians are proud of their healthcare system, and the way in which it endeavours to treat everyone equally and fairly. Refugee healthcare has long been an important part of this healthcare system, reaching out to provide basic, urgent medical coverage to a vulnerable group.
New immigration rules mean some sponsored spouses will have “conditional permanent residence” for two years – and will be subject to deportation if they don’t live with their spouse for the full two years.
The change is designed to combat “marriage fraud” – people getting married in order to obtain permanent residence.
But the new rule seems to assume that a marriage is either fraudulent or destined for eternal bliss.
When the government announced massive cuts to refugee healthcare under the IFH program, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration Jason Kenney boasted that the cuts would save Canadian taxpayers $100 million over five years. But how do the numbers add up?
Recently released statistics show us changing trends in the immigrants and refugees Canada is admitting.
Over the last six years – 2005-2010 – the total number of new permanent residents has gone up. There were 277,575 in 2010, up 10% over the number in 2005 (252,182).
Within this total, there has been a major shift towards immigrants in the economic class, at the expense of Family Class immigrants and refugees.
Snug in the womb of her mother in April 2009, Chloé couldn’t know that a change in Canadian law was about to make her stateless.
Chloé was born in July 2009 in Belgium, to an Algerian mother and a Canadian father. She is denied Canadian citizenship because her father was born outside Canada to a Canadian father. Nor is Chloé eligible for citizenship under
‘Ping’ – that’s the sound of a new message in my inbox. ‘Hooray!’ is rarely the sound you’ll hear from me when opening an email, but yesterday’s news was one of those rare exceptions. We received news that the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) has passed a resolution calling on the Canadian government to absorb the cost of refugee transportation loans. This is a tremendous endorsement for a change that the Canadian Council for Refugees has been pushing for the past few years.&
Imagine that you have fled your country out of fear for your life. Imagine that you flee to Canada: the country does not accept you as a refugee, but it does recognize that it would be unsafe for you to return home because of the situation of generalized violence there.
Snug in the womb of her mother in April 2009, Chloé couldn’t know that a change in Canadian law was about to make her stateless.
