I read with interest this article in Canadian Business that shows how our current roll of immigration red tape hurts high-tech start-ups:

gerry july photoHon. Gerry Weiner – Pace Immigration: Al Pace and I recently had the chance to attend a meeting with MP Julie Dzerowicz, the chair of the Liberal caucus on immigration. We commended the government on their commitment to immigration and their efforts in helping Canadians understand the value of diversity.

Jim Metcalfe – Director of Immigration: In the past four weeks we’ve been contacted by several people who have had problems obtaining visitor visas. One of the calls involved an individual who applied for the latest innovation of Canadian immigration: the electronic Travel Authority (eTA).

Jim Metcalfe – Director of Immigration: The Canadian government has announced a plan to reduce the backlog of existing sponsor applications and speed up processing times for spousal sponsorship and family sponsorship cases. They have also said that they will increase the number of sponsored persons allowed into Canada:

Jim Metcalfe – Director of Immigration: I recently came across an interesting Federal Court decision that involves the Saskatchewan Immigrant Nominee Program (Naeem Ullah, docket number 2016 FC 607). The case involved appellant Naeem Ullah, who successfully challenged the decision of a visa officer who refused his application for permanent residence in Canada.

Jim Metcalfe – Director of Immigration: One important announcement that came out of the “Three Amigos” summit between the leaders of Canada, Mexico and the US is that Canada will scrap the Mexican visa requirement. As of December 1, 2016, visitors from Mexico will no longer need a visa before coming to Canada.

Jim Metcalfe – Director of Immigration: I had the opportunity to hear Immigration Minister John McCallum’s speech at the Toronto Board of Trade last week. The speech touched on a few different aspects of Canadian immigration policy.

Jim Metcalfe – Director of Immigration: The Government of Canada has acknowledgedthat Canada has an infrastructure funding problem. Our bridges are crumbling, major highways need expansion, commuter rail and subway systems need upgrading and a host of other expensive public works are underfunded.

The Quebec Investor Immigration Program (QIIP) is currently the only passive immigrant investor program in Canada. It has been in operation for the past 30 years.

This is the first in a three part blog series on the federal and Quebec investor immigration programs. This post looks at the history of the programs and the criticism they are receiving. We will cover some possible fixes for the investor immigration system in the upcoming posts.