2023 Citizenship Applications
- Thread starter GFLiam
- Start date
Heard about an application with October 2023 AOR received a new request for FP.. Not sure if this means their SS done or not
Ok let's hope that now that everyone will be coming back from summer vacation soon it will flies faster.
that is not true, we have paid "RIGHT OF CITIZENSHIP FEE" After PR it is a right, as a visitor it is a privilege
The borderlines podcast is at
https://borderlines.ca/episode-list/
I don't recall exactly which episode, may have been this one -
https://borderlines.ca/152-revoking-elon-musks-canadian-citizenship-with-amandeep-hayer/
I’m interested of this question and would like to share my experience hopefully getting answers. My SS started on September 08/2023, so almost 2 years. And off course stuck in BG and prohibition. Can we say I will see any movement soon?
AOR July 2023
Your post is not true. @Ali.arshady is correct.
For clarity:
(In case there is any real interest in understanding how things work in a way that might actually help navigating the process, rather than spouting erroneous rhetoric.)
There is NO right to citizenship as such in the Canadian Charter of Rights, which defines the rights of people in Canada, some rights that everyone has, some that Canadians in particular have (such as the respective mobility rights of permanent residents and citizens), and some which only Canadian citizens have (such as the democratic rights of citizens).
Many other so-called "rights" are statutorily prescribed, and as such are subject to revision or even elimination by Parliament. These are legally known as "privileges" (even if labels refer to them as a right), distinguishing them from Charter rights.
Even those rights guaranteed by the Charter are subject to limits imposed by law, limits which however must be reasonable and demonstrably justified (noting, for example, when it is justified Canadian citizens can be forcibly confined to small spaces with bars on the windows, if there are even windows).
In contrast, statutory rights, that is those "privileges" prescribed by law, can be subject to almost any limitations imposed by Parliament, or just plain eliminated by Parliament. One might note that who is statutorily entitled to citizenship (which is prescribed by Section 3 in the Citizenship Act, defining who is and who can become a citizen), has been revised many times in the last half century, in some cases including making changes that take away the statutory right of citizenship from certain groups of people.
And the comment by @Ali.arshady is well-taken; it is prudent to temper expectations based on . . . well, how things actually work, recognizing in particular that the process for obtaining naturalized citizenship is subject to some hurdles and can take time, and for some that can involve bigger hurdles and longer processing times.
By the way, labels, like the label "right of citizenship fee," and even those labels or titles in statutory provisions (like the subject title of Section 3 in the Citizenship Act, titled "The Right to Citizenship") rarely have much more than very little if any substantive import. The fact the word "right" is used in the subject title for section 3 in the Citizenship Act does not elevate citizenship above being a statutorily prescribed privilege. See sidebar below.
Note for others and in general; the "right" to privileges: The fact that someone is entitled to a privilege, which tends to be understood as merely a privilege, is no trivial thing. Even though, as the comment by @Ali.arshady reminds us, the fact that the grant of citizenship is a privilege, not a right, and given that some of the more hyperbolic expectations (some outright demands) are not reality based, the statutory provisions governing the grant of citizenship to Permanent Residents are the law and the Canadian government is bound by this law, and it must grant citizenship to those who qualify and properly follow the procedure for obtaining the grant of citizenship as prescribed in the law. So, for example, there are situations in which it is indeed appropriate to seek judicial intervention and an order (a Writ of Mandamus) compelling the government to finalize an application for citizenship. That is, even though the grant of citizenship is a privilege, the Charter right to the equal benefit of the law applies and the process must comply with principles of procedural fairness.
Meanwhile not all statutory privileges are created equal. Citizenship is unquestionably at the upper end of the spectrum.
Sidebar regarding "right to citizenship fee":
There was an attempt to have the "right to citizenship fee" (referred to by both the Federal Court and subsequently the Federal Court of Appeal, as what the "parties describe" as the "Right to be a Citizen Fee") declared unconstitutional. This was rejected by the Federal Court in Brink v. Canada, 2022 FC 1231, https://canlii.ca/t/jrp5l and the appeal of that was dismissed in Brink v. Canada, 2024 FCA 43, https://canlii.ca/t/k3cgk . . . in the latter there is a discussion about the well-known Ontario case, Bjorkquist et al. v Attorney General of Canada, 23 ONSC 7152, and the Crown's submission that Bjorkquist was "both distinguishable and incorrect," and the judge writing the FCA decision stated: "I agree."
As has been discussed here in this forum at some length, since there was no appeal of the Bjorkquist decision, the government has been under pressure to revise the Citizenship Act in regards to citizenship by descent for those born outside Canada, to avoid a ruling that the current law that does not confer citizenship on those in the second-generation born abroad is unconstitutional. It is not clear that the judge, Anne L. Mactavish, is explicitly stating that the Bjorkquist decision is wrong, and would be rejected if appealed, but she does go into some depth explaining how the Bjorkquist decision misinterpreted or misapplied the particular case it relies on in reaching its conclusion about the law excluding the second-generation born abroad from citizenship.
One of the other two judges concurring in this FCA decision is Donald Rennie, the judge who has, in another case, explicitly ruled that citizenship is not a right but rather a privilege.