Canada: Backlogs

Immigration Dept: Mr. Kenney said the backlogs have made Canada s immigration system dysfunctional. If it takes seven or eight years to render a decision, that person s skills may no longer be needed in the labour market, he said. At the moment, potential immigrants must all be assessed by Canadian immigration officers, who receive roughly two applications for every available visa, according to Globe and Mail. On Wednesday, he emphasized the need to clear Canada s backlogs, which are huge. If no new applications were accepted, there are enough people waiting in the system to fill our skilled worker targets for the next five years. He also announced that provinces will be able to sift through the current pool of skilled worker applicants to cherry pick candidates for their provincial nominee programs. At this point, we re looking at all options for dealing with these backlogs and coming up with a faster, more responsive system. We owe it to newcomers to do that, Mr. Kenney said. I do think that we can t continue to tell people that they re going to wait for eight years for a decision on whether they can come to Canada. It s not fair to them and it s not fair to our economy. Mr. Kenney s speech outlined some of the major changes to immigration policy he plans to enact later this year. Last week, he proposed creating a just-in-time immigration system, one that would grant businesses a much more important role in immigrant selection. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.