sponsorship and previous realtionships

[mamacita]

I have posted before about a current situation with my family but now have another question. My cousin and hi foreign worker girlfriend have recently decided to have a child because they were under the impression that this would allow her to stay in Canada while bypassing all the paper work that comes with immigrating as a foreign worker. they have only been dating for 3 months now. They had been seeing each other before, but this was behind the back of another girlfriend he had. He would like to sponsor her to stay, obviously, and will not be able to do this as common law until at least February of next year. There next option is to be married so he can sponsor her. However, I have noticed that there is a question on the sponsorship form that asks about previous commonlaw realtionships. He has had 3 in the past 10 years....one that ended while he was seeing his current girlfriend already. He is thinking about not listing his previous realtionships, as they all ended badly with reports of him being abusive. i have tried to tell him it is best to be honest, but he feels that they will not look into this matter as long as he says no, and it will not be a factor. My question is this...will the immigration officials have a way to find out that he had previous common laws if he does not list this? And if he does list them does immigration follow up with the ladies that he has listed, and will there claims of abuse, adultry, etc be used against him in his ability to sponsor her??? Thanks for any information....this is a very stressful situation for our family. We are worried about what the outcome will be for this baby and trying very hard to make everything work out.

 

[thaiguy]

Wow .. like daytime TV.

To my knowledge, they ask about common law partners so that someone doesn't make it their life's work to help everyone immigrate. Some entrepreneurial people would use it as an occupation and charge foreigners for "common-law immigration" services.

So I think your friend should be honest and tell about his former common-law relationships. The real problem will occur if he ever tries to sponsor another person under the common-law category.

Of course, if he's skipping from one relationship to another and immi thinks this is just another one of those, they could turn him down. He will have a high burden of proof to show that they are really, truly, common-law partners.

 

[mamacita]

Okay thanks. I am not one to judge whether their relationship is genuine or not....I just know his "track record" so to speak. And planning to have a baby this early on in their relationship especially not knowing whether or not she is absolutely able to stay here in Canada just seems like both of them being irresponsible to me. If their relationship IS true, in my mind it would have been more advisable for them to establish a strong relationship and then plan the baby when they knew that they were able to provide a good life for it together. I'm just worried that immigration will have this same view. I do not think that her life will be as good here with him as she believes, as he is controlling, abusive, and a womanizer, and I also worry that once they are together with a baby she will feel that she is stuck with him and will stay and tolerate it. But on the other hand, I would hate to see her have to move back to Phillipines with a small baby and no father. I just wish they had both thought this through a bit more. I'm just worried about the baby.