If it was a significant consideration, that is if it would make any difference, perhaps I would
suspect or
guess that the number of PRs referred to Secondary Review this year is less than last year. But no matter how true that might be, that the number is lower for 2016 than it was in 2015, that would not illuminate anything of use or import.
For example, it would be totally irrelevant to anyone who is issued SR.
It would be of no use in predicting who will be issued SR going forward.
SR is a fact-based, criteria-driven process.
Who gets SR is not about probabilities related to what percentage of PR card applicants have gotten SR in the past, or what percentage are now getting referred to SR.
Who gets SR is about the particular history, facts, and circumstances of that individual PR's case. And how it goes, including how long it takes once referred to SR, is about the particular history, facts, and circumstances of that individual PR's case.
While those bogged down in SR may commiserate in their shared travails, how it goes for one will vary according to that individual's specific case. And what is happening for the others in SR is barely relevant, not much illuminating, about what is happening in any other individual's case.
heeradeepak said:
In this forum we can see that in 2015 there were so many applications under secondary review but in 2016 very few.
Just curious to know from other members they are also feeling same or not.
Short answer:
There is little or no basis for drawing general conclusions based on quantifying information from forum posts about Secondary Review.
Despite widespread, obstinate, and almost militant insistence to the contrary, especially among those who have reported being bogged down in SR, it is virtually certain that
SR is a fact-based, criteria-driven process. Thus, who gets SR and how it goes, including how long it takes, is dominated by the facts and circumstances in the individual case.
The number of PRs referred to SR probably varies from time to time, relative to a range of factors. That acknowledged, it is impossible to discern meaningful patterns in such variations based on the scant reports posted in this and other similar forums.
Explanation and observations:
The reporting sample in this forum, like other forums, is way too small to support drawing general conclusions about SR based on quantifying information from forum posts, even if the reporting sample was representative.
But the reporting sample is not representative. There is little evidence that reporting samples in this forum (similarly in other forums) is significantly representative of anything other than the process for
some PRs applying for a new PR card. That is, such reports illustrate how things
might, possibly go, since that is how they have gone for at least one or five or ten, among hundreds or more. Such reports do not illustrate how things are likely to go, let alone how things will go for sure.
And the reporting is sporadic at best, relative to both quantitative aspects, and qualitative (that is as to the credibility of the content). The latter, how sporadic the credibility of the content is, looms large relative to any cause and effect elements.
These factors combined mean that it is impossible, not just improbable but
impossible, to discern much at all about general patterns based on the reports posted in this forum.
But we should be clear about what that, in turn, means. What it means relative to making quantitative inferences, for example, is that it means very little if anything at all except that yes, some PRs applying for a new PR card in 2015 were referred for Secondary Review, and yes, some PRs applying for a new PR card in 2016 have been referred for Secondary Review. It does not mean, looking at the other side of this example, there were more SR referrals in 2015. But it does not mean, either, there were not more in 2015.
That is, this information, the reports in this forum, do not support any reasonable inferences about how many SR referrals there were in either 2015 or so far in 2016, let alone how one year compares to the other,
EXCEPT there are enough reports to conclude that yes, in both 2015 and in 2016, some PRs applying for a new PR card have ended up in SR.
I go into such detail underlying the reasoning process because this forum, very much like others, is rife with poorly reasoned conclusions drawn from scant evidence, with mere coincidence way too often (erroneously) looming as evidence of a causal relationship.
Perhaps the most common reasoning structure in this forum is, essentially, a correlation between one factor and an outcome.
Jack was X and Y happened, so if Dick is X it is likely Y will also happen for Dick.
Example: Five or ten report they were subject to SR and the process lasted fifteen to eighteen months, thus the next person who gets SR will be processed in fifteen to eighteen months. No. No. Maybe, yes. Just as likely, however, it will take either less time, and perhaps a lot less, or more time. And it also could be around the same amount of time. That is, it could be less, about the same, or more, and no one can reliably predict any more precisely than that.
The reality is that there are almost always many, many other factors which will influence how it goes, what happens. So even if there are twenty or thirty reports in the forum, from PRs who were
X and for all of them
Y happened, without knowing more about how and why this and that happens, there is
NO basis at all, NONE to conclude that
Y will also happen to the next PR who is
X.
Yes, of course, if one is analyzing a statistically representative sample
and potential variables are accounted for, the more often it is reported that
when X then Y happens, especially if the only exceptions are readily explained, some correlation may be inferred, the accuracy of which will still depend on the representative significance of the sample.
But forum reports are overwhelmingly
NOT representative. Moreover, forum reports notoriously fail to consider, let alone account for, numerous other highly relevant variables.
The information in forum reports is, nonetheless, still useful.
As already noted, reports about what happened to one PR do, at the least, indicate what could happen for another. And this information can be compared with and analyzed in consideration of what we learn from the various other sources of information we have, ranging from what IRCC publishes or has otherwise publicly divulged, to official sources like the applicable statutory and regulatory provisions, and also including official accounts of actual cases as illuminated in published IAD and Federal Court decisions.
For many, SR appears to be a
black hole, that once the PR's card application is sucked into SR, the process is out-of-sight and effectively lost for some indeterminate amount of time which tends to go long, very long.
It is true that once the process is in SR, what is actually being done is little known and is largely not discoverable. ATIP requests cannot and do not penetrate investigatory methods.
What we do know is that the SR process happens when IRCC identifies certain fact-based criteria in the individual PR's case which triggers the SR process, and that generally this is about investigating the PR for reasons rooted either in security concerns or suspicion of misrepresentation. These reasons are
NOT necessarily directly involved in assessing the PR's eligibility to be issued a new PR card, but can be about concerns arising relative to previous circumstances, including suspicion of fraud in an older transaction with IRCC or CBSA.
Which leads back to a possible reason why the number of SR'd cases could, indeed, be down.
It is well apparent that many, many of the PRs referred to SR, were targeted due to some direct or indirect association with the focus of the fraud investigations initiated while Jason Kenney was Minister of CIC. Whether the association was identified in the investigation of consultants known to have engaged in some fraud, or a familial, employment, address, or telephone number which is in common with someone previously identified in the course of those fraud investigations, or some other incidental connection to some aspect of a previous investigation into fraud, or even just a pattern of circumstances similar to those identified in those investigations, no matter how the connection or association was perceived at IRCC, many of the SR cases fall into this category.
That is, many SR cases are likely about following leads from the scores of fraud investigations initiated between 2008 and 2013. And, as time goes by, more and more of those leads will have been investigated and resolved, one way or another. So, as time goes by, fewer new PR card applications will be suspect based on such leads.
That, however, will have no impact on the other criteria IRCC employs to identify which PR card applicants should be investigated in SR. So SR will continue to drag some new PR card applicants into its apparent
black hole. But again, this will continue to be fact-based, criteria-driven, distinctly specific to the particular individual affected, dependent on each individual's own particular facts and circumstances and history.
The truth is, once in SR, the PR is basically on his or her own. How it goes, how it is going for others in SR, will not have much if any impact on how it goes for the individual. The numbers will not matter.
