Should we declare a potential conjugal partner at any point before we enter Canada as a permanent resident?

[djnutz26]

I am looking to sponsor my boyfriend under conjugal partner category.

I arrived in Canada in June 2022 as a PR. I initially applied for PR before the pandemic under FSW in July 2019 (almost 3 years before I landed).

While my PR application was under process I commenced the relationship with my boyfriend in December 2019. However, we never married, nor did we ever live together. If we married or if we lived together I was aware I should have declared him to IRCC on a webform, but we were neither as it was not legal for same-sex couples to marry or live together in my home country. It was a mere romantic relationship, and we in fact lived separately with our individual families (parents/siblings etc.)

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic my application ended up in the backlog, and I was not approved until April 2022, and subsequently I landed in Canada as a PR in June 2022.

Now I am looking to sponsor him as a conjugal partner. I am in a romantic relationship with him close to 3 1/2 years now.

I am doubtful if I should have declared him as a conjugal partner at any point before I entered Canada, and therefore if I am unable to sponsor him at this time.

Could you please advise what you think?

The below link from IRCC merely states that "partner" needs to be declared, however it is vague if they are ONLY referring to common-law partners, or BOTH common-law and conjugal partners.

https://www.cic.gc.ca/english/helpcentre/answer.asp?qnum=256&top=28

 

[Ponga]

I am looking to sponsor my boyfriend under conjugal partner category.

I arrived in Canada in June 2022 as a PR. I initially applied for PR before the pandemic under FSW in July 2019 (almost 3 years before I landed).

While my PR application was under process I commenced the relationship with my boyfriend in December 2019. However, we never married, nor did we ever live together. If we married or if we lived together I was aware I should have declared him to IRCC on a webform, but we were neither as it was not legal for same-sex couples to marry or live together in my home country. It was a mere romantic relationship, and we in fact lived separately with our individual families (parents/siblings etc.)

Due to the Covid-19 pandemic my application ended up in the backlog, and I was not approved until April 2022, and subsequently I landed in Canada as a PR in June 2022.

Now I am looking to sponsor him as a conjugal partner. I am in a romantic relationship with him close to 3 1/2 years now.

I am doubtful if I should have declared him as a conjugal partner at any point before I entered Canada, and therefore if I am unable to sponsor him at this time.

Could you please advise what you think?

The below link from IRCC merely states that "partner" needs to be declared, however it is vague if they are ONLY referring to common-law partners, or BOTH common-law and conjugal partners.

https://www.cic.gc.ca/english/helpcentre/answer.asp?qnum=256&top=28

Why were you not able to live together (anywhere) for at least one year, to have been deemed Common-Law?
Why could you not have gotten married (anywhere that recognizes same sex marriage)?

If the answers to these questions are anything other than "We couldn't because of an immigration barrier", you're probably correct that your partner did not need to be declared; you were just a couple in a long distance relationship.

 

[djnutz26]

Why were you not able to live together (anywhere) for at least one year, to have been deemed Common-Law?
Why could you not have gotten married (anywhere that recognizes same sex marriage)?

If the answers to these questions are anything other than "We couldn't because of an immigration barrier", you're probably correct that your partner did not need to be declared; you were just a couple in a long distance relationship.

We were not able to live together or marry before I immigrated to Canada because it was not safe or legal to do either of them in my home country (Sri Lanka).

Although we didn't live together or marry we still had a romantic relationship ongoing for 2 1/2 years before I landed in Canada. We didn't live in the same house, but we still had a relationship. It was not a long distance relationship back then, because both of us lived in the same country / city. But we just lived separately with our individual families (parents/siblings), and we didn't want to draw their attention to this relationship or risk persecution.

I didn't declare him as a conjugal partner before I arrived, merely because I did not marry him, nor lived together with him. The relationship is still ongoing as a long distance relationship even after I landed in Canada.

Could you please explain your answer again, as I don't think I understood it correctly?

 

[armoured]

However, we never married, nor did we ever live together.
...
Could you please advise what you think?

If you were not married and did not live together, you were neither married nor common law - nothing to declare. Those couples who are 'fiancéd' or engaged don't declare them either. [**Note - there MAY be some other common law criteria of which I'm not aware offhand - eg common law under laws of another country, or - for example - something to do with having children together. Doesn't apply here so I'm not going to invent scenarios.]

I don't think immigration barriers or any of the rest of that has anything to do with whether you should have declared.

BUT: there is one issue, which is this - has your boyfriend applied for a visa to come to Canada? That is where the immigration barrier is relevant - without that, high probability the application will be refused. (Because he could travel here for you to marry). It's one of the key criteria for conjugal partner sponsorship.

 

[djnutz26]

If you were not married and did not live together, you were neither married nor common law - nothing to declare. Those couples who are 'fiancéd' or engaged don't declare them either. [**Note - there MAY be some other common law criteria of which I'm not aware offhand - eg common law under laws of another country, or - for example - something to do with having children together. Doesn't apply here so I'm not going to invent scenarios.]

I don't think immigration barriers or any of the rest of that has anything to do with whether you should have declared.

BUT: there is one issue, which is this - has your boyfriend applied for a visa to come to Canada? That is where the immigration barrier is relevant - without that, high probability the application will be refused. (Because he could travel here for you to marry). It's one of the key criteria for conjugal partner sponsorship.

OK that Makes sense when you said couples who are engaged do not declare either.

And I am sure that there would not be any option called "conjugal partner" to select on the IRCC website for an application that is already under process - however, this has to be verified with someone whose application is currently under process.

My boyfriend applied for a visitor visa twice after I came here and both got refused. Previous two times we stated the purpose of visit only as tourism. Now we are thinking of applying for a third time for the purpose of marriage. I am planning to get a marriage license from the Toronto City Hall and submit it along with the visitor visa application to back the purpose of marriage - so that this way we are explicitly stating to IRCC that we intend to marry. If it gets gets refused the third time as well, we will file a conjugal partner sponsorship.

 

[armoured]

As a side note: for anyone considering whether they need to declare a spouse or partner, generally simple rule - if in doubt, probably best to declare the partner. As non-accompanying if not certain. Note, this doesn't mean the partner will be accepted but at least avoiding the problems of not having declared.

Improtant note: this question is not really about family sponsorship, but about declaring a spouse in the context of some other type of PR application (eg economic). It comes up here in family sponsorship because someone didn't declare their partner/spouse - usually because they thought their common law relationship "didn't count." But sometimes for other reasons, or just weren't aware.

At any rate, this causes huge problems - like the partner/spouse not being eligible to be sponsored, ever.

An example scenario to be aware of:
-partners living together when NOT partners and then the relationship developing (eg students sharing a flat and then starting a romantic relationship). Bottom line is that IRCC may consider the start of residing together when the housing was shared. Best to be careful. If they lived together, for more than a year, probably IRCC will consider that common law.
-partners resided together but their relationship was 'illegal' or not recognized locally. Again, IRCC will probably consider this was residing together, even if not recognzied locally. Even if the relationship was hidden from others. Have to be careful.

I'm sure others may suggest other scenarios.

 

[armoured]

OK that Makes sense when you said couples who are engaged do not declare either.

And I am sure that there would not be any option called "conjugal partner" to select on the IRCC website for an application that is already under process - however, this has to be verified with someone whose application is currently under process.

My boyfriend applied for a visitor visa twice after I came here and both got refused. Previous two times we stated the purpose of visit only as tourism. Now we are thinking of applying for a third time for the purpose of marriage. I am planning to get a marriage license from the Toronto City Hall and submit it along with the visitor visa application to back the purpose of marriage - so that this way we are explicitly stating to IRCC that we intend to marry. If it gets gets refused the third time as well, we will file a conjugal partner sponsorship.

I think you'll be fine and no need to apply for the third time for TRV - and may be a problem in that multiple refusals - three or more - seem to set off alarms at IRCC. Might lead to slower processing. And the chances of an approval now are very low anyway.

If you do: I'd submit the conjugal sponsorship application first and then submit the TRV application (as described) after getting the AOR. And refer to the conjugal app. Masybe they'll approve and you'll be together in Canada.

[Note, there's a technical issue that if your partner was let in and you got married, you'd technically be ineligible for the conjugal sponsorship - but I'm not aware of any case where IRCC has refused one because the couple got married when they'd (genuinely) thought they would not be able to when the conjugal was submitted.

 

[djnutz26]

I think you'll be fine and no need to apply for the third time for TRV - and may be a problem in that multiple refusals - three or more - seem to set off alarms at IRCC. Might lead to slower processing. And the chances of an approval now are very low anyway.

If you do: I'd submit the conjugal sponsorship application first and then submit the TRV application (as described) after getting the AOR. And refer to the conjugal app. Masybe they'll approve and you'll be together in Canada.

[Note, there's a technical issue that if your partner was let in and you got married, you'd technically be ineligible for the conjugal sponsorship - but I'm not aware of any case where IRCC has refused one because the couple got married when they'd (genuinely) thought they would not be able to when the conjugal was submitted.

As we didn't mention we wanted to marry in the previous 2 TRVs, and only mentioned about tourism purpose do you think it suffices for conjugal partnership? We kept the details of the relationship very minimal, and I mentioned on my invitation letter that he would go back after visiting the places in the itinerary. Just thinking if we should have made them clear then that marriage is not legal in our home country and that is why they should approve the TRV to allow us to get married.

 

[armoured]

As we didn't mention we wanted to marry in the previous 2 TRVs, and only mentioned about tourism purpose do you think it suffices for conjugal partnership? We kept the details of the relationship very minimal, and I mentioned on my invitation letter that he would go back after visiting the places in the itinerary. Just thinking if we should have made them clear then that marriage is not legal in our home country and that is why they should approve the TRV to allow us to get married.

You are overthinking, it's a pretty normal situation. As for previous trv app, probably would have been denied for marriage purposes anyway.

 

[djnutz26]

As a side note: for anyone considering whether they need to declare a spouse or partner, generally simple rule - if in doubt, probably best to declare the partner. As non-accompanying if not certain. Note, this doesn't mean the partner will be accepted but at least avoiding the problems of not having declared.

Improtant note: this question is not really about family sponsorship, but about declaring a spouse in the context of some other type of PR application (eg economic). It comes up here in family sponsorship because someone didn't declare their partner/spouse - usually because they thought their common law relationship "didn't count." But sometimes for other reasons, or just weren't aware.

At any rate, this causes huge problems - like the partner/spouse not being eligible to be sponsored, ever.

An example scenario to be aware of:
-partners living together when NOT partners and then the relationship developing (eg students sharing a flat and then starting a romantic relationship). Bottom line is that IRCC may consider the start of residing together when the housing was shared. Best to be careful. If they lived together, for more than a year, probably IRCC will consider that common law.
-partners resided together but their relationship was 'illegal' or not recognized locally. Again, IRCC will probably consider this was residing together, even if not recognzied locally. Even if the relationship was hidden from others. Have to be careful.

I'm sure others may suggest other scenarios.

Just asking because I am curious - do you think even I should have ideally declared my boyfriend as per this suggestion, when we were never married or lived together? I hope you didn't mean it that way.

 

[armoured]

Just asking because I am curious - do you think even I should have ideally declared my boyfriend as per this suggestion, when we were never married or lived together? I hope you didn't mean it that way.

No, it was not meant for your case. You did not love together at all.

 

[armoured]

No, it was not meant for your case. You did not love together at all.

Oops, live together, excuse the typo. and sorry, should have been explicit that the comment was explicitly not about your case.