I want to add about the police certificate that the previous condition was to live 4 years in Canada out of the 6. I believe the 4 there is an error. It should say 3. I looked in to apply for police certificate for Pakistan and the questions are posed as if they are for a PR holder not a national. I am going to write a letter explaining my understanding and will ask them if they still need a certificate, I can provide.
No. The reference in item 10.b to the previous
FOUR (4) YEARS is correct. It is NOT a mistake.
Item 10.b is about verifying there is no prohibition arising from charges or convictions in a country other than Canada during the four years prior to the application.
In particular, the applicable statutory provision is 22(3)(a) in the
Citizenship Act (see
http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/C-29/page-6.html#docCont ), which explicitly refers to "
the four-year period immediately before the date of the person’s application" (emphasis added).
This has NOTHING to do with the applicable physical presence requirement.
The Anatomy of Forum Errors; An Autopsy (a FWIW tangent):
This issue, the relevant time period for identifying which applicants need to submit a police certificate with the application, offers a good illustration of how, sometimes, an erroneous or false position can be commonly and repeatedly stated in a forum like this.
There were many forum participants who were adamant that this time period would be reduced to three years when the new physical presence requirement (the 3/5 rule versus the 4/6 rule) came into effect, and a couple of them insisted that IRCC call centre agents verified this. Since the statute specifies the relevant time period during which charges in another country would constitute a prohibition, and does NOT specify what proof is necessary to show this, IRCC's criteria for who must submit a police certificate is discretionary (so long as it is reasonable). So it was possible, merely
possible, that this part of the application could have changed.
BUT it was highly unlikely, because the prohibition period, again, is FOUR years, and that part of the Citizenship Act was NOT changed in Bill C-6.
And, indeed, IRCC did not make such a change. It could have, and still could anytime. But there was no reason, none at all, to think that IRCC might change this. Nonetheless, many forum participants insisted otherwise, and again a few insisted that IRCC call centre agents actually confirmed this would change to three years. (And, as seen above, there are still occasional (erroneous) assertions that it should be three years.)
I cannot say for sure who was wrong, what caused the error. Perhaps --
-- the forum participants reporting the call centre agent's statement that this would change to three years were trolls, deliberately giving false information, OR
-- the forum participants misunderstood what the call centre agents said, OR
-- the call centre agents misunderstood the question, OR
-- the call centre agents were simply giving wrong information
I can say with great confidence those reports in the forum, that IRCC was going to change this to three years, were in error. They were wrong. There was never any reason to so much as suspect such a change would happen.
While it is possible (as outlined above) that call centre agents gave erroneous information, otherwise all accounts or reports suggesting this would change to three years were clearly based on the MISUNDERSTANDING that the requirement to submit a police certificate was related to the physical presence requirement. (Again, it is NOT.)
I doubt the call centre agents gave erroneous information about this. Which is to say I believe the source of error in the forum was one of the other reasons (actually, could have been different reasons for different participants who were posting there would be a change to three years, more than a few insisting).
Which leads to the diagnosis of a common pathology in forum reports purportedly based on information obtained from a call centre agent: it is clear that many times the person reporting what a call centre agent answered in response to questions like this (versus standard FAQ like questions) has in some respect advocated a response (typically based on a hypothetical scenario) rather than asking the call centre agent a straight-forward, direct question. Forum reports based on such exchanges with call centre agents are inherently
NOT reliable.
This is not to suggest this is common let alone dominant. Many reports in this forum based on call centre agent answers are credible and useful.
So the trick is discerning what reports are helpful versus those which are potentially misleading or outright untrue,
separating-the-wheat-from-the-chaff.
Unfortunately I suspect more than a few prospective citizenship applicants were misled. I suspect that among some who were waiting for the 3/5 rule to come into effect, which would then make them eligible for citizenship, may have not prepared, may not have obtained a police certificate, relying on the erroneous forum reports that they would not need to submit a police certificate. So when the new rules took effect, they did not have a police certificate to send.
I doubt they are prejudiced much by this, beyond a delay . . . a delay either upfront, while they obtained the certificate to send with the application, or later if they elected to proceed without the certificate and are later required to submit one. But this nonetheless illustrates the genesis of misleading or erroneous information which, unfortunately, occasionally populates the forum. I hope this illustration will help others hone their critical thinking skills, to help discussions in the forum, in particular helping to
separate-the-wheat-from-the-chaff . . . .
In general, reports based on purported call centre agent answers for complicated questions should be approached with much caution. The call centre is good mostly for two things:
-- FAQ type questions, meaning questions which can be readily answered by looking at a script of sorts, and
-- specific details related to an individual application, matters the call centre agent can look up in the GCMS record for the individual and report about
Beyond that, there tends to be a sliding scale in the reliability of reports based on call centre agent conversations. This has as much, if not more, to do with the form of questions and answers which can too easily lead to misunderstanding. That is, it is not so much that the call centre agents give an erroneous answer. It is more that erroneous answers are due to some misunderstanding, either as to the question, or as to the answer. The more complicated the question, the less reliable the reported, purported answer.
