I really appreciate your detailed response to almost all of the queries here on this forum but in my opinion if you could be little short and sweet with your replies you be more effective and reach a vast majority of people on this forum.Lawyer said: "I can not go for mandamus because 2.9 years (33 months) is not enough to start an mandamus."
For grant citizenship applications the passing of time is NEVER enough to establish successful grounds for mandamus. Probably been stated a hundred or three hundred times in this forum alone. Maybe more. So, for sure, it is absolutely true, 33 months in processing "is not enough to [properly sue for] mandamus."
REMINDER: A writ of mandamus is a judicial order to a government official mandating that the official do what the law clearly mandates the official has a duty to do. Since there is no timeline within which the law mandates IRCC grant citizenship, there is no amount of time which will clearly mandate IRCC grant citizenship, and thus, the passage of time alone will NEVER be sufficient grounds for a writ of mandamus.
Lawyer said: "I do not have to call IRCC three times a week . . ."
This part is another FOR-SURE truth. Not three times a month. NOT once every month.
They say the squeaky wheel gets the grease. First, that's an American saying, and a lot of American "proverbs" are horse pucky. And these days it is more like the squeaky wheel gets replaced," at best . . . because it is one thing for the wheel to be squeaky because it really needs lubrication and another thing if the noise is about something else. Like something wrong with the wheel.
Like being unreasonably obnoxious. Not sure why there is much of a contingency in this forum favouring not just unreasonable but downright abusive behaviors. But it's here. Loud. Unreasonable. "Noisy" perhaps an understatement. Actually popular in some topics. Does not justify it. Generally, beyond getting attention (which can be a bad thing . . . will get to that), unreasonable noise rarely has a positive impact. Basically it just reveals who the noisemaker is, someone acting badly. Which leads to . . .
Lawyer said: ". . . that will upset them and make the process longer . . . . they are punching me because I bothered them."
It is interesting that responses immediately focused on improper retribution or discrimination.
For those who are interested in figuring out how things actually work, it usually (not always) helps to approach with the assumption that things work within a relative range of how they are supposed to work (not so efficiently, often, no where near perfectly, with some bumps in the road). Retribution would be improper. Probably a good place to start is to assume that this is not about government officials doing something improper or a lawyer cavalierly confessing that is the government's modus operandi. Contrary to the trollesque depictions, no, generally the modus operandi of government officials is not to engage in improper behavior. Oh sure, it happens, too often. But it is not the rule, not the general way things are done, not close. And those who persist in railing about IRCC officials acting with mal intent are almost always more about making disruptive noise than engaging in a discussion aimed at sorting out how things actually work or how individual applicants can best navigate their way.
One could quibble with the words, the terms the lawyer uses. But I suspect those reported here are not verbatim. Lawyers are usually better with words than these. "Upset them," for example, that is not how most jurists, lawyers, professionals, are likely to frame things. And "punching" even less so.
But regardless the actual words employed, assuming the lawyer is making an effort to EXPLAIN things, it should not be all that difficult sorting these statements out in the context of real world practical consequences.
As I noted, it was the observation about how unreasonably obnoxious it is for an applicant to repeatedly make utterly unnecessary inquiries, that leads to the consequences part of this. Make no mistake, this is acting badly. Sure, it is within a person's "rights," but it is nonetheless acting badly.
If the context was personal, sure, one person acting badly can very easily cause someone respond with retribution. But bureaucracies are notoriously NOT personal.
In contrast, what is written very large into the handling of information by immigration officials is a very critical if not suspicious or skeptical approach to weighing things. If the applicant is acting badly, the question is obvious: WHY? why is this applicant behaving so badly, so unreasonably? What is the applicant hiding? What has the applicant done? What's the real story?
Repeated inquiries for no good reason are almost bound to raise questions. Questions mean the file going from one queue, the routine queue, into another non-routine queue where a processing agent can further examine things.
I do not know, not at all, how many calls or webform inquiries or ATIP requests will trigger elevated scrutiny. Probably does not even happen for many applicants who nonetheless go well over the line in making unreasonably frequent inquiries. But it is kind of "duh" that that is the RISK. In whatever language the lawyer describes it. And I'd guess that three times a week, odds are good that is well past the tipping point.
More Re Mandamus and Time:
REMINDER(again): A writ of mandamus is a judicial order to a government official mandating that the official do what the law clearly mandates the official has a duty to do. Since there is no timeline within which the law mandates IRCC grant citizenship, there is no amount of time which will clearly mandate IRCC grant citizenship, and thus, the passage of time alone will NEVER be sufficient grounds for a writ of mandamus.
This is not to say time is irrelevant. It can be an important factor in weighing other elements of the case for asserting the Minister has failed to do something the law clearly mandates the Minister do. And there is an *argument* (tends to not carry nearly so much weight as some think it warrants) that the passage of a certain amount of time can amount to a de facto decision denying the application, which would be contrary to law for an applicant who meets the qualifications.
In the best of times, in the most normal processing milieu, this is nonetheless a very tough argument to make convincingly. THESE ARE NOT NORMAL TIMES. Timelines for processing are off the charts.
An Aside: Most lawyers are used to dealing with unreasonable clients. Goes with the territory. That said, lawyers are like donkeys. Carrots, sweets even, tend to stir some action more than sticks. And of course lawyers are going to be extra wary dealing with an obviously unreasonable client. Which leads to the other leg in the three-legged stool on which lawyers will sit a case (money being the most obvious leg of this stool), a case in which the lawyer can be successful. Lawyers tend to be an arrogant lot, pretentious, pompous even, so they do not like to lose. Sure, money can sometimes make up two of the stool's legs. Which can, for example, make up for being an unreasonable person. But losing cases tends to cost money, cost clients, hurt the lawyer's reputation.
Otherwise, overall, my guess is that to the extent the lawyer's language may have been a bit intemperate, the lawyer was simply trying to say smarten up, go about this more reasonably.
No disrespect intented here...