Police Certificate confusion: lived vs short visits -- no opinions, real cases only please

[motsmu]

Hello everyone,

I am trying to find an answer to this question but throughout the forum I see nothing but opinions and hearsay, and I want to hear real reports of people who had an official response from IRCC on their case.

The scenario is:
- applicant has lived in a country (not his home country, but this should be irrelevant) for over six months. A PCC is required for Express Entry.
- PCC was obtained after applicant's period of residency in that country. That is, after the applicant last lived in that country.
- applicant is living in another country (e.g., Canada) when filing e-APR
- applicant goes back to PCC-required country for a short visit: be it 1 day or a couple of weeks. This short visit happens BEFORE submitting e-APR (after e-APR, visits won't matter).

Many members state that IRCC's page on Police Certificates (http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/information/security/police-cert/intro.asp ) is "clear" on this matter, and that if you go back for a visit your PCC becomes invalid. However, there is no formal definition for the term "lived" on any of IRCC's pages. There is nothing to indicate that a short visit constitutes "living".

The fact that they require a PCC for a country for which one accumulates 6 months or more of physical presence even though they were just on work or tourism (without establishing residency there) is a separate test that leads to the PCC being required or not, but there is nothing explicit that indicates that this same rule applies for the validity of the PCC.

Of course, one would be safe obtaining a newer PCC after that short visit. But the question is not whether it would be safer, but whether it is required at all - that is, if short visits truly invalidate a previously-obtained PCC, given the trouble and costs and delays involved.

Thus, for the sake of many in the same situation, I would like to hear from people that actually experienced one of the 3 cases below:
1) applicant or dependents were in the scenario above, did NOT obtain a new PCC after a short visit, and had their application for permanent residence in Canada APPROVED.
2) applicant or dependants were in the scenario above, did NOT obtain a new PCC after a short visit, and had their application for permanent residence REJECTED.
3) same scenario, but IRCC contacted the applicant and requested them to provide a new PCC for that country.

Kindly reply only if this happened to you - no opinions or assertions without a case to back it up, please.

 

[prakash419]

dude, your attitude is disrespectful and derogatory and with this attitude you expect help? remember you are asking a favor here and not demanding a service. I thank people even when they give wrong info. because even they are trying to help, it is a forum where people seek and provide help, it is not a service provider and you are not a client/master.

 

[jes_ON]

Hello everyone,
I am trying to find an answer to this question but throughout the forum I see nothing but opinions and hearsay, and I want to hear real reports of people who had an official response from IRCC on their case.

The problem with what you are asking is that rules can and do change all the time. People who have had an official response to their case applied months ago, before the rules were clarified. Your application will be assessed by the rules in place at the time you apply.

 

[21Goose]

I'll post a pedantic answer to this rather pedantic question.

This is a question of statutory interpretation. You are attempting to understand how IRCC defines the word "lived". It's not precisely statutory interpretation, since you're looking to interpret a rule, and not the words of an Act of Parliament, but similar rules should apply.

I'm not a Canadian legal scholar, but a quick search tells me that the Canadian Supreme Court follows what is known as Driedger's 'Modern Principle'

This states:

Today there is only one principle or approach, namely, the words of an Act are to be read in their entire context and in their grammatical and ordinary sense harmoniously with the scheme of the Act, the object of the Act, and the intention of Parliament.

Given that IRCC does not provide a specific definition for "lived", I would fall back to this rule. In context, in the grammatical and ordinary sense, and harmoniously with the scheme of the Act, the object of the Act, and the intention of Parliament, I would say you need a new PCC.

I sense that you will not be happy with this answer, and I know that lawyers can argue over this in the abstract till the cows come home - that's what lawyers do. In the particular case, though, you'll only know if IRCC accepts or rejects your assertion that "lived" is distinct from "visited" when they accept or reject your application.

If they reject it, I would not expect them to be sympathetic to your arguing the meaning of the word lived.

Be fun to see if any Canadian lawyers weigh in here.

 

[Sahussain]

I'll post a pedantic answer to this rather pedantic question.

This is a question of statutory interpretation. You are attempting to understand how IRCC defines the word "lived". It's not precisely statutory interpretation, since you're looking to interpret a rule, and not the words of an Act of Parliament, but similar rules should apply.

I'm not a Canadian legal scholar, but a quick search tells me that the Canadian Supreme Court follows what is known as Driedger's 'Modern Principle'

This states:

Today there is only one principle or approach, namely, the words of an Act are to be read in their entire context and in their grammatical and ordinary sense harmoniously with the scheme of the Act, the object of the Act, and the intention of Parliament.

Given that IRCC does not provide a specific definition for "lived", I would fall back to this rule. In context, in the grammatical and ordinary sense, and harmoniously with the scheme of the Act, the object of the Act, and the intention of Parliament, I would say you need a new PCC.

I sense that you will not be happy with this answer, and I know that lawyers can argue over this in the abstract till the cows come home - that's what lawyers do. In the particular case, though, you'll only know if IRCC accepts or rejects your assertion that "lived" is distinct from "visited" when they accept or reject your application.

If they reject it, I would not expect them to be sympathetic to your arguing the meaning of the word lived.

Be fun to see if any Canadian lawyers weigh in here.

Hi Goose,

I am a field service engineer based in Abu Dhabi UAE serving the gulf region. My job of field services requires me to travel to the GCC countries quite often. I have been doing this job for the past 4+ years now.
I happen to visit saudi quite often due to my job assignments and i am pretty sure that i have stayed for more than 180 days (6 months) on saudi soil.
I travel on a multiple entry business visa and the number of continuous stay has never been more than 30 days as the visa does not allow me to stay for more than 30 days in any single visit.
Please advice do I need to get a PCC for Saudi in this scenario.

Thanks

 

[21Goose]

Hi Goose,

I am a field service engineer based in Abu Dhabi UAE serving the gulf region. My job of field services requires me to travel to the GCC countries quite often. I have been doing this job for the past 4+ years now.
I happen to visit saudi quite often due to my job assignments and i am pretty sure that i have stayed for more than 180 days (6 months) on saudi soil.
I travel on a multiple entry business visa and the number of continuous stay has never been more than 30 days as the visa does not allow me to stay for more than 30 days in any single visit.
Please advice do I need to get a PCC for Saudi in this scenario.

Thanks

If you have spent more than 180 days there, then yes, you do. It doesn't have to be a continuous stay - it just needs to add up to 180 days.

 

[Sahussain]

If you have spent more than 180 days there, then yes, you do. It doesn't have to be a continuous stay - it just needs to add up to 180 days.

Hi
I got the following information from the CIC website

"If you do not have current legal residence status in Saudi Arabia, you are not required to provide a Saudi Arabian police certificate. If you are asked for a police certificate from Saudi Arabia, write: “I cannot provide a police certificate for the time I spent in Saudi Arabia because certificates are only available to people who have current legal residence status.”
Below is the link for the same.....

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/information/security/police-cert/mid-east/saudi-arabia.asp

It might be required for all other countries but not applicable in case of Saudi.
Since the information is available on CIC i believe it to be authentic and reliable.

Thanks for your reply.

 

[motsmu]

dude, your attitude is disrespectful and derogatory and with this attitude you expect help? remember you are asking a favor here and not demanding a service. I thank people even when they give wrong info. because even they are trying to help, it is a forum where people seek and provide help, it is not a service provider and you are not a client/master.

Apologies if it came out that way. I want to compile reports of people who experienced one situation or another so that there are at least some real-case-based stats on this point, which seems to be a point of contention throughout the forum.

 

[motsmu]

Hi Goose,
I actually liked your answer quite a lot, thank you. I am not looking into arguing the definition of the word "lived" vs "visit". In fact, that is precisely what I am trying to avoid.

Instead of arguing over the term, I want to base myself on real cases which match the conditions so that we can infer IRCC's general trend in evaluating it.

 

[motsmu]

The problem with what you are asking is that rules can and do change all the time. People who have had an official response to their case applied months ago, before the rules were clarified. Your application will be assessed by the rules in place at the time you apply.

That is true - for example, it seems (from some forum posts from not long ago) that one of the official document checklist pages ( http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/resources/tools/perm/express/intake-complete.asp ) had wording that stated the country's PCC was valid unless you went back to said country for "at least another 6 months". That language is now replaced simply with "last lived".

But as more people receive their official responses they will be able to indicate what happened in their case.

 

[21Goose]

Hi
I got the following information from the CIC website

"If you do not have current legal residence status in Saudi Arabia, you are not required to provide a Saudi Arabian police certificate. If you are asked for a police certificate from Saudi Arabia, write: “I cannot provide a police certificate for the time I spent in Saudi Arabia because certificates are only available to people who have current legal residence status.”
Below is the link for the same.....

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/information/security/police-cert/mid-east/saudi-arabia.asp

It might be required for all other countries but not applicable in case of Saudi.
Since the information is available on CIC i believe it to be authentic and reliable.

Thanks for your reply.

Yes, follow this - this is why you need to do your own research The general case is that you need a cert for any country you've spent more than 180 days in, but obviously Saudi Arabia is a special case.

 

[motsmu]

A counter-example to the prevailing opinion:
http://www.canadavisa.com/canada-immigration-discussion-board/threads/police-clearance-certificate-validity-confusion.465380/#post-5648747

 

[ayaron]

A counter-example to the prevailing opinion:
http://www.canadavisa.com/canada-immigration-discussion-board/threads/police-clearance-certificate-validity-confusion.465380/#post-5648747

hey have you happened to find out the answer?
I am in the same situation but could not find any answer...I live in US few years ago and I had a PCC after that stay.
But I did visit US one time after the time I got my PCC.
Hope you have the answer now, thanks.