It’s not even a week since the shipbuilding announcement and we are already talking about more temporary foreign workers in Nova Scotia. More people, more jobs, more money. All good. Unfortunately, the immigration process for temporary foreign workers is often unbelievably frustrating, especially for companies that are simply trying to bring the right people in quickly. The agreement between the federal government and province referred to in this article is not yet in place. Here’s hoping it will be fast-tracked to make the process smoother and faster.

http://thechronicleherald.ca/business/27004-ns-companies-turn-foreign-workers-fill-skilled-trades-shortage

I could not get a link to the entire article which showed up in my email via the CCR, so I am pasting it here:

Embassy
Years from now, Canadians will apologize
By Mary Jo Leddy
Published September 28, 2011

Years from now, a prime minister will stand in the House of Commons and
issue a formal apology to the Tamil community. He or she will “regret”
the arbitrary detention of the men, women and children who landed on our
shores in search of security. The prime minister will “express sorrow”
over the social fury that was whipped up as this little band of
survivors arrived on our western coast.

The MV Sun Sea arrived off the British Columbia coast last August
carrying nearly 500 Tamil migrants. The MV Ocean Lady came the year
prior with 76.

He or she will “deeply regret” that this fury enabled the government to
even think of Bill C-4, legislation that would make it possible to
designate such people as “irregular arrivals,” to detain them for at
least a year and to prevent them from sponsoring their families to come
to Canada for at least five years.

How deeply the prime minister will regret that this punishment will
apply to groups (more than two people) arriving not only by boat, but
also by air and land as well.

There will probably be an excellent documentary movie showing the number
of children who spent months in a detention centre before being sent
back to a country where they perished together with their parents.

We have done this before.

In 1914, the Conservative government of the day turned away more than
300 Sikhs who came by boat from India seeking a better and safer life.
When the Komagata Maru arrived back in Calcutta, 20 people were killed
in a riot. Many others were detained and brutalized.

In 1939, the Liberal government turned away a boatload of 936 Jewish
refugees from Europe. After being refused by Cuba and the United States
they made a final effort to land in Canada. The SS St. Louis returned to
Europe where many of the people on this “voyage of the damned” died in
Adolf Hitler’s murder camps.

Once again we have demonized the people on the Ocean Lady and the Sun Sea.

They are Tamil Tigers, violent, terrorists who pose an extreme danger to
the country, say government officials.

I have talked to some of the people who were on the Ocean Lady and I see
different faces: orphans, women who had been raped, people filled with
shrapnel, two priests, a respected journalist. They worked together to
prevent the spread of disease and held together during the terrible
storms on their journey here. Together they prayed and together they
survived.

When they arrived off Vancouver Island they were immediately placed in
detention and repeatedly interrogated.

In Canada, they have been treated as criminals. One of the passengers on
the Ocean Lady asked me, “Is it a crime to want to live?” He had tried
coming to Canada in the more acceptable way; he had gone to the Canadian
Embassy in Thailand but was told by other Sri Lankans that they had been
waiting 14 years for an appointment.

In desperation, he placed his life and life savings in the hands of some
“smugglers.” Now Bill C-4 will indeed make it a crime for wanting to
live. Bill C-4 is not an anti-smuggling bill, it is an anti-refugee bill
that turns desperate people away now as surely as we have done in the past.

Bill C-4 is another attempt by stealth to prevent refugees from coming
to Canada. A series of pieces of legislation have effectively divided
refugees into two groups: the “bad” refugees who have the audacity to
come to Canada on their own, and the “good” refugees who are in camps
overseas and who will stay there until they are among those chosen to
come to Canada.

The “good” refugees are the ones who have been able to find their way to
a refugee camp and are willing to wait for more than 14 years.

The difference between “bad” refugees and “good” refugees seems to be a
function of the degree to which Canadian officials are in control of
those seeking access to the country. The passengers on the Komagata
Maru, the St. Louis and the Ocean Lady were “bad” refugees.

It is indeed legitimate for a nation state to have control over its
borders. However, Canada began to lose control of its borders quite some
time ago and this loss of control had nothing to do with refugees.

Free trade, the power of communications technology to slip through all
boundaries, the so called “security perimeter” with the United States
and the unfettered flow of global capital have all posed immense threats
to Canadian sovereignty.

It seems as if controlling the small flow of refugees to Canada is a
last desperate effort to prove that we still have a country with borders.

The climate of fear surrounding the loss of control over our borders has
numbed our ability to see that Bill C-4 has made it a crime for some
people to want to live.

In 2008, Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued an informal apology for
what happened with the Komagata Maru.

As far as I know there has never been an official apology for the
rejection of the St. Louis although a memorial for the Jewish refugees
was unveiled on January 20, 2011 in Halifax at Pier 21.

Regrets are not enough.

Mary Jo Leddy is a senior fellow at Massey College and a recipient of
the Order of Canada. She is the founder of Romero House, a Toronto
non-profit organization that houses refugees.

Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised. But the lack of understanding of the general public (I should say the general public that actually has the time and inclination to post comments on news websites) is so depressing! Fact: Service Canada scrutinizes every single one of those Chinese chef jobs to confirm the position cannot be filled from within Canada. If there were Canadians willing to “fry eggrolls” believe me, Service Canada would not issue LMOs to the employer. Fact: The feds have now made sponsoring parents and grandparents pretty well the lowest priority – it used to take around 6 years, now it is expected to take 8-10. So telling people to just sponsor their family is unfair, especially if those family members have been refused visas to visit in the meantime. Imagine not being able to see your parents for 8-10 years. Fact: There is a tremendous variation in how quickly work permit/visa applications are processed depending on the country you’re in. For example, times can vary from a couple of days (visa exempt countries like the US, France, UK, etc) to a a couple of months (India) to over a year (Vietnam, Philippines), depending on the category. It’s unfair to chalk this up only to the feds doing medical and background checks, etc. It’s about resources – how quickly Canadian embassies can process these applications depends entirely on the number of officers they have working there. Obviously, some countries are lower priority than others. Think about it this way: a Chinese chef with an American passport could get a work permit at the border, but a Chinese chef with a Chinese passport has to wait many months.  Anyway, read the comments and see for yourself:

http://thechronicleherald.ca/Front/1264954.html#comments

So, in addition to most-wanted lists and lightening-quick deportations, CIC now has a tip line where you can report someone suspected of obtaining citizenship through fraudulent means. That could be good. But I would like to know how serious CIC is in prosecuting the immigration consultants who, in their “professional” capacity, advised people that this is how it’s done. That would be better.

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/department/media/releases/2011/2011-09-08.asp

At first, it seemed like there was an avoidance (in the mainstream media anyway) of talking about the race/immigration element of the UK riots. This may have been written by a star of Hollywood schlock, but it’s worth a read:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/11/london-riots-davidcameron?CMP=NECNETTXT8187

I wonder if this will have ramification for people in Nova Scotia who used unscrupulous immigration consultants to get citizenship. So far, I haven’t heard of anyone receiving such a letter. The article does not explain that in order to become a citizen you only have to live in Canada for 3 out of a 4 year period (1095 days). Once you are a citizen, you do not have to fulfill a residency obligation (as you do for Permanent Residence, a whole other can of worms).  The article singles out the people from Lebanon who are Canadian citizens and were part of the evacuation in 2006. In fact, a lot of them probably aren’t doing anything wrong or breaking any rules. They became citizens at some point in the distant past when they did live here for a 3-year period and then moved back to Lebanon.  The law allows this.  Maybe the rules need changing, but for now, it seem to me that trying to revoke citizenship is going to be a heck of a lot easier said than done.

http://www.canada.com/Feds+plan+revoke+fraudulent+citizenship/5127302/story.html#ixzz1Sd3pmo35

In our line of work, we notice that many relationships start online between people in two different countries.  The old barriers of geography, age, culture, religion aren’t that important.  Many Canadian embassies reject more than half of the applications (permanent residence applications for people married to Canadian citizens) as not being genuine. Even when the Canadian is in love and willing to sponsor, CIC will say, “we don’t believe the foreign spouse is genuine”. Translation: you are being used. This article takes it to the next level – when someone ends up in a relationship with a fake person. Kind of interesting that one of examples is a guy in Nova Scotia.

http://www.salon.com/life/internet_culture/index.html?story=/mwt/feature/2011/07/15/romance_scam

The feds have shut down theirs and 8 provinces have immigrant entrepreneur categories. Why don’t we?  http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/immigrant-tech-stars-face-hurdles-in-quest-to-start-business-in-canada/article2090504/

New changes to federal immigration programs mean provinces must pick up the slack. Nova Scotia lacks the programs and capacity to do this, and will fall behind other provinces in attracting new immigrants if it doesn’t do something quick.

The federal entrepreneur category has been suspended, and the federal investor category has been reduced to only 700 applications per year. This means independent business people wanting to immigrate to Canada will, by necessity, look to the immigration programs offered by the provinces.

Nova Scotia’s entrepreneur category was shut down in disgrace a few years ago and nothing has been created to replace it. In the meantime, the province has introduced new categories such as “agri food sector” and “non-dependent child of nominee”, which apply to about 2 people per year, as far as I can tell.

Most people who know immigration categories will say that the suspension of the federal entrepreneur program is not a great loss. It was the only category where the immigrant had “conditions” attached to her permanent residency after landing. Meaning, if you didn’t establish a viable business within 2 years of arrival, you could have your permanent residence revoked.

However, since Nova Scotia does not have an alternative immigration category, the federal entrepreneur category was used by people who were serious about starting a business here.  Now that it is suspended (read: done), Nova Scotia needs a proper provincial entrepreneur program. And here’s one more reason why Nova Scotia needs one: New Brunswick has one, and theirs is getting more and more attention.

The federal government has cut in half the number of “independent” skilled workers it will process per year. That category is for those who are skilled in jobs where there are shortages in Canada (for example, nurses), but who do not necessarily have a job to come to in Canada before they immigrate. Cutting this category of skilled worker numbers in half probably means that the federal government wants immigrants to rely more on provincial immigration programs. 

The Nova Scotia skilled worker immigration category is limited to higher-paying and higher skill-level occupations and shuts out a segment of people who are working here now or who are overseas and have confirmed job offers here. I have seen welders, cooks and aestheticians, all who have jobs here, be refused processing by the Province because the skill level does not qualify them for the category or their education is not sufficient, or a combination.

In the meantime, an announcement was made in January that the Province and Ottawa had agreed to make it easier for some temporary foreign workers to work here. It’s been 6 months and nothing is finalized. The program has not started. Other provinces have had such agreements in place for years. 

Hey, Nova Scotia Office of Immigration: you snooze, you lose.

This is an interesting article in the NY Times, by a well-known journalist, explaining how he has built a life and career in the US despite the fact that he arrived illegally and spent his childhood unaware that he had no status there.

www.nytimes.com/2011/06/26/magazine/my-life-as-an-undocumented-immigrant.html