Any thoughts on this? opinions from both ends; Sponsor and Sponsored Spouse

[pav92]

Is it the new rule applies after the spouse come to canada or they should have 2 years legitimate relationship before the spouse come to canada with the sponsor ( canadian citizen or permanent resident)?

 

[tavora]

Is it the new rule applies after the spouse come to canada or they should have 2 years legitimate relationship before the spouse come to canada with the sponsor ( canadian citizen or permanent resident)?

Anyone who applies for spousal/common law sponsorship from now on, if they have been in a short relationship (i.e. less than 2 years) and have no children in common, once the sponsored person lands in Canada, they will have conditional status for two years, not full permanent resident status.

"The spouse or partner must live in a legitimate relationship with their sponsor for two years from the day on which they receive their permanent resident status in Canada. The status of the sponsored spouse or partner may be revoked if they do not remain in the relationship."

This measure was enacted to deter marriage fraud where the sponsored person stays with their sponsor for weeks or sometimes only days before leaving the relationship. In some cases, the Canadian sponsor was scammed, in other cases, there was an agreed upon transaction so the sponsored person could attain permanent resident status in Canada.

 

[pav92]

thank u for ur reply. i think its a great step. it is good for genuine couples. And hopefully it will decrease the heart breaking rate which is good for canadian citizens.

 

[rjessome]

Can you show me where it says "married less than 2 years"? All I can find is "The new regulations apply to spouses or partners in a relationship of two years or less and who have no children in common with their sponsor at the time they submit their sponsorship application"

Nowhere do I see has to be married 2 years!

Your quote actually says it in a legal sense. "spouses or partners in a relationship of two years or less" There are 3 qualifying relationships for sponsorship in this category; spouse, common law partners, conjugal partners. Each of those are defined by the Act. So first you must meet one of those definitions. Then, you look at which qualifying relationship you used to apply for PR. That will determine how your relationship will be assessed at the time of awarding PR and whether or not any conditions will apply to your PR.

For example, the way it is written and strictly in the legal sense, if a couple lived in a CL relationship for 5 years, got married and then 3 months later the Canadian sponsor applied to sponsor their new SPOUSE, they are choosing spouse as the qualifying relationship. It could be argued that they have only been married for 3 months at the time of application so conditions should be placed on the PR visa. If the couple broke up less than 2 years after landing in Canada, the sponsored person may lose their PR. I imagine this would by the type of case where an appeal of the revokation of the PR would be likely.

Fraud will still happen. We all hear about "victims" in marriage fraud but this is also a business where an exchange of money takes place. The couple have no love or feelings for each other, just want to make some money. So they get married, WAIT 2 years to apply to sponsor the spouse. No conditions in place if PR is granted.

These next few years are going to be very interesting times. And busy too.

 

[Leon]

Note that they say that PR "may" be revoked. That still leaves it open for immigration to allow people to keep their PR even if they leave their spouse within 2 years.

There is also a clause in there to protect victims of spousal abuse.

A cold hearted marriage fraudster can still succeed if they really want to. Either by running into a wall and accusing their spouse of abusing them or by sticking around and playing nice for 2 yrs.

 

[Ja_Sy]

Whatever new rules they will make for as long as you have a genuine relationship, you love each other and you knew your spouse flaws then all rules will be fine even if they give us conditional visa its ok with me.. their problem not mine im a sponsored spouse, still applying for PR.. Good morning Canada God bless!

 

[computergeek]

These next few years are going to be very interesting times. And busy too.

Indeed, my first thought upon seeing this was that it would lead to quite a bit of additional work for attorneys.

 

[BlackandBlue]

I'm all up for this... But I wish this would speed up the process for us in genuine partnerships somehow.... Seems this could just slow things down even more...

 

[amikety]

I wouldn't expect to see any change in processing times now. However, in... Say ten years, when they have data built up, Immigration could say "80% of our deportations for conditional pr violations are from X, Y, and Z countries. We should investigate their relationships more, require longer relationships before accepting their applications, etc." That would be the smart thing to do, at least in my eyes.

But when has the government made sense? The more they regulate and try to think things, the more red tape we have to wade through.

 

[computergeek]

I wouldn't expect to see any change in processing times now. However, in... Say ten years, when they have data built up, Immigration could say "80% of our deportations for conditional pr violations are from X, Y, and Z countries. We should investigate their relationships more, require longer relationships before accepting their applications, etc." That would be the smart thing to do, at least in my eyes.

But when has the government made sense? The more they regulate and try to think things, the more red tape we have to wade through.

This always seems so easy, but in fact turns out to be very hard to do in practice. I write instructions for morons (CPUs in computers) and they have to be fool-proof or something goes wrong - and for the bit of the computer for which I'm writing software, when something goes wrong you lose your data and/or your computer crashes. 90% of my work is dealing with the exception cases. New programmers think they're almost done once they've described how to handle all the common "success" cases. But that's really about 10% of the total amount of work. I do this with formal languages and many years of experience.

When it comes to something like CIC, however, the system isn't specified in a formal language (English and French), its requirements are constantly changing ("politics"), and the exceptions aren't particularly well constrained. Thus, what we end up with is a system in which things are left to the judgment of officers and we have a review process. When such processes become bogged down, the entire system clogs up. So some will call for lowering the threshold of review, which in turn leads to a greater increase in the number of innocent people who get chewed up by the system.

There's no perfect solution and it really is a balance between competing interests. A bit like herding cats.

 

[amikety]

Yes, yes, I have hopeful ideas which may make me delusional.

However, I also can herd cats. Not joking...

Politics isn't about finding the best solution. It's about finding the popular solution so you get re-elected.

 

[bagelbagel81]

So why would this not apply to a failed relationship that lasts longer than two years after PR is granted, compared to a relationship that lasts less then two years? Why doesn't this apply 10 years later, for example? You took your chances, it failed, so you have to go home.

The thing people don't seem to be getting here is that two years as a measure of a 'genuine relationship' is completely arbitrary. Plucked out of the air, utterly devoid of any meaning in the real world. It's useful as a benchmark after which CIC can say: "We can assume this relationship was likely genuine because it lasted longer than two years, so we will not entertain allegations of marriage fraud after that point."

Why does 24 months spent in a relationship entitle someone to stay in Canada after separating, whereas 23 months doesn't? It's not difficult for a fraudster to just stay in the relationship for longer if they have to, and then be entitled to stay in Canada, whereas someone who came to Canada in good faith and gave up everything and set up their life here, would be sent home because their relationship didn't last long enough.

In fact, taking this a step further still... say your sponsor dies. The rules state that PR will not be lost in this scenario, quite rightly so in my opinion, but if I am to follow your view on this to its logical conclusion....

So what if you have set up a life in Canada. It was with the intention you would be with your partner, so if you aren't with them anymore, too bad.

They died, you're not with them any more. Right? Too bad, off you go home now. That is, after all, just the way the cookie crumbles.

The two year rule is a deterrent for those considering Canada as a soft option for VISA. It is basically upgrading to the same immigration standard as places such as UK and Australia. In genuine cases of death or abuse obviously that should be looked at as a case by case basis. If, however the sponsor cheats, you break up on the 23 month mark, not 24 months- then yes, that's the way the cookie crumbles. End of story.

 

[computergeek]

What is interesting is that the government has not really offered any actual evidence indicating the scope of this problem. It's very easy to throw out anecdotal cases, but focusing on a miniscule number of cases does not actually indicate the magnitude of the underlying problem.

The press release does cite that CIC rejects 8% of inland and 17% of outland applications (for a total of 16% of spousal applications). I was actually surprised at how high that number was, to be honest, but this number doesn't really do anything to establish the number of cases that slip through this already exhaustive process.

Indeed the lack of objective quantitative data makes me suspect this is really a political issue more than anything else. Indeed, I wonder if this is exchanging one sort of problem for a different sort of problem. No doubt we'll learn more in the fullness of time.

 

[Leon]

It must be looked at on a case by case basis. The US also has a temporary green card thing for spouses and I recall hearing of a case where a relationship broke down in a non-fraudulent way without anybody cheating. The couple had a child by that time but because they broke up before the 2 years were up, the husband lost his green card and was deported. The wife didn't want this to happen but is now faced with raising her child alone with the father stuck in his home country.

With the new Canadian law, this can happen too as there is only an exception made if the couple has a child already when they apply.

 

[computergeek]

It must be looked at on a case by case basis. The US also has a temporary green card thing for spouses and I recall hearing of a case where a relationship broke down in a non-fraudulent way without anybody cheating. The couple had a child by that time but because they broke up before the 2 years were up, the husband lost his green card and was deported. The wife didn't want this to happen but is now faced with raising her child alone with the father stuck in his home country.

With the new Canadian law, this can happen too as there is only an exception made if the couple has a child already when they apply.

This creates a different potential for abuse - a sponsor who puts up with abuse from the applicant because they are afraid of losing economic support from the spouse after deportation. Ultimately, it will be the child in such a situation who pays the heaviest price for these cases.