NEW WATERFORD, NS, Sept. 1, 2022 /CNW/ - Canada continues to be a destination of choice for people looking for a new place to work, study, and build their lives. That's why Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) is striving toward a modernized and digitalized immigration system to further expedite processing and give newcomers the experience they expect and deserve.
Today, the Honourable Sean Fraser, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, visited an IRCC application processing centre in New Waterford, Nova Scotia, to announce new online services across our immigration system, helping to improve client experience and reduce the backlogs.
To help further reduce wait times, and building on the hiring of 1,250 new employees to tackle the backlogs and increase processing capacity, the Minister will exempt permanent and temporary residence applicants who are already in Canada and meet certain criteria from the immigration medical examination requirement. Simplifying this process in the coming weeks will impact approximately 180,000 clients by helping them save time and money on the medical examination process and reducing wait times on their applications.
To quickly process family reunification applications during the pandemic, IRCC began conducting telephone and video interviews with sponsors and applicants. Despite public health challenges, by pivoting quickly, the department was able to welcome more than 69,000 spouses, partners and children in 2021. By modernizing our services and adding support where needed, we have now returned to the pre-pandemic service standard of 12 months for all new spousal sponsorship applications.
Now, as restrictions are eased globally, IRCC has resumed in-person interviews at Canadian and international offices. To provide spousal sponsorship clients with increased flexibility, the department will continue to offer virtual interviews to clients where possible. We are also working at expanding the availability of virtual interviews at our overseas offices, including through a pilot project allowing spousal sponsorship and other clients to take part in virtual interviews at some visa application centres rather than having to travel to a visa office.
IRCC is also taking measures to modernize how we deliver services to applicants for our permanent residence programs. Today, the Minister announced that, as committed in January 2022, access to the online application portal for clients has now been expanded to the majority of permanent residence applicants. IRCC will begin transitioning to 100% digital applications for most of our permanent residence programs on September 23, with alternative formats available for people who require accommodations.
In February 2022, IRCC also launched a new application status tracker that allowed permanent residence applicants, sponsors and their representatives in the spouse, partner and dependent child categories to more easily check their application status online. By spring 2023, we will have expanded this application status tracker to include 7 more permanent residence and temporary residence programs. We also introduced a citizenship application status tracker for clients in May 2021, which will be expanded to include access to representatives this month.
To help clients make their plans with greater confidence, IRCC is making further improvements to our online processing times tool to provide more accurate information. Starting this fall, IRCC will publish forward-looking estimates of how long it will take to process an application, increasing predictability for applicants.
Since the onset of the pandemic, IRCC has also been pivoting to offer more online service options for citizenship applicants, including virtual ceremonies and online citizenship tests. We launched a new tool in August 2021 that allows most citizenship applications to be submitted online. The tool is open to applicants age 18 and over, and has now expanded to allow groups of adults to apply together. IRCC intends to expand this tool to offer online applications for minors under the age of 18 by the end of the year.
IRCC continues to set the bar higher for processing so Canada can keep benefitting from all that newcomers have to offer to communities across Canada. We will keep finding ways to modernize and digitalize our immigration system, giving clients the experience they expect, and reinforcing Canada as a destination of choice around the world.
"Immigration is about people. It's about starting a new job, reuniting a family and creating a new life in this beautiful country we call home. As we look to strengthen our immigration system by updating our technology, people—our clients—must be at the centre of all that we do. By adding resources where they are needed, and leveraging technology to make processing faster and applying easier for our clients, we can give newcomers and new citizens the welcoming experience they deserve."
– The Honourable Sean Fraser, Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship
- In 2021, IRCC set a historic record by admitting more than 405,000 new permanent residents to Canada. Our target for 2022 is to welcome 431,000 permanent residents, and we are well on our way to achieving it. As of August 22, we have welcomed over 300,000 permanent residents to Canada, surpassing the milestone earlier than in any previous year.
- Canada also exceeded its citizenship goals for 2021–2022, with over 217,000 new Canadian citizens. So far this fiscal year (from April 1 to July 31), Canada has welcomed over 116,000 new citizens, compared to 35,000 in the same period last fiscal year.
- On November 26, 2020, Canada became one of the first countries in the world to offer citizenship testing online. By July 31, 2022, over 406,000 people had taken virtual citizenship tests, and we are able to invite about 5,000 applicants per week to complete the test.
- IRCC also started offering virtual citizenship ceremonies on April 1, 2020, and by July 31, 2022, more than 394,000 people had taken the Oath of Citizenship in close to 15,000 ceremonies using a digital platform.
- In March 2022, the Minister announced the launch of applications for the permanent Atlantic Immigration Program. Candidates with a valid endorsement from a business in Atlantic Canada are able to submit applications for permanent residence under the new permanent program. This dynamic program is helping the Atlantic provinces attract more skilled newcomers to fuel our economic recovery and drive further growth in the region.
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- Tackling immigration backlogs to help Canadian businesses grow
- Building a stronger immigration system
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SOURCE Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada
Contacts for media only: Aidan Strickland, Press Secretary, Minister's Office, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, [email protected]; Media Relations: Communications Branch, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, 613-952-1650, [email protected]
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