All Eyes On New Immigration Minister Marc Miller To Fix IRCC

Last Updated On 31 July 2023, 10:42 AM EDT (Toronto Time)

New Immigration Minister Marc Miller took over the reins of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) on July 26, 2023.

We are writing this article to raise the voice of our readers so that it reaches Justin Trudeau as well as the new Immigration Minister Marc Miller.

The similarity between Marc Miller and Sean Fraser is that both were lawyers before entering politics and have a good understanding of how the legal system works.

Previous Immigration Minister Sean Fraser and his predecessor Marco Mendicino did their best in their capacity to fix IRCC, but still, the Canadian Immigration Department is falling behind to keep up with the demand.

We asked our Instagram family what they would like the new immigration minister to improve in IRCC, so here is the genuine feedback that we received as well as our perspective on what should be improved among all the IRCC business lines.

Note: These suggestions are from our readers. Actual commitments for the new immigration minister to work on will be sent by Justin Trudeau in a mandate letter.

Improvement In Tech

IRCC has been awarding IT contracts to multiple Tech firms to improve the systems and streamline applications’ processing, but we are still to see the up-to-date 21st century Tech system in the department.

Just prior to leaving the role of Immigration Minister, Sean Fraser awarded contracts with an initial cost of $85.4 million for the new IRCC Client Experience Platform to provide a more user-friendly interface for applicants to access IRCC’s programs and services.

This new Client Experience Platform is expected to be implemented as early as fall of 2023.

All the immigration lawyers/consultants, as well as individual applicants do hope that this time we see a platform that is not glitchy as the current IRCC portals.

Most of the time, the representative portal is down, limiting the representatives ability to submit an application.

The IRCC budget is extremely large but does not accurately reflect the calibre of services that customers receive.

IRCC Transparency and Communication

Although IRCC claims to be transparent with clients, almost all the new IRCC changes and announcements come by surprise with insufficient clarity.

IRCC needs to be more transparent and proactive in communicating new changes as well as effectively delivering the information around the new changes.

Contacting IRCC by phone or mobile is in itself a day’s task, and there is no guarantee that you will get hold of an agent.

You could be in line for 3–4 hours, or even now, IRCC is just disconnecting the call, saying their agents are busy and you should try back later.

Even if you connect with the IRCC customer service team, they often do not have up-to-date information and only provide general information.

Another way of contacting IRCC is via webform, but there have been myriads of webforms awaiting responses, or some just get an automated response.

Accountability for responding to applicants’ queries effectively and timely is much more needed from the IRCC.

Currently, the grant of citizenship has a processing time of 19 months, which is way too long and discourages eligible candidates from even applying.

For any immigrant, applying for Canadian citizenship is a life-changing emotional decision, but waiting in processing makes it a bad experience.

A person residing in Canada as a permanent resident, providing all the proofs upfront to show that they meet the requirement, should not wait for 19 months to get Canadian citizenship.

These applications should have a processing time similar to Express Entry, at a maximum of 7-8 months, since these eligible permanent residents have almost all the information already with IRCC from previous TR or PR applications.

Similarly, other citizenship services provided by the IRCC should have a faster processing time than they do at this time.

Permanent Resident (PR) Card Renewals

One of the Canadian permanent residents (PR) raised the issue of hassle in PR card renewals.

He said PR card renewals as per the IRCC have a current processing time of 95 days as per the latest update, so they have to put their travel plans on hold for at least 3 months.

Furthermore, while applying for PR card renewals, they have to provide all the details of entry and exit dates, which is time-consuming, although CBSA has all the information about it.

And if the applicant enters incorrect dates or details, they may face misrepresentation charges for not providing correct information.

This permanent resident says that the PR card renewal process should be automated given that CBSA has all the information about their entry and exit.

PRs should be asked for consent to share information with IRCC.

Then, this information should be shared with IRCC, and they should automatically send a new PR card at least a month prior to the expiration of the current one if such a permanent resident meets the residency obligation based on dates provided by CBSA.

If IRCC needs more information, just contact that individual or request the information in the GCKey account, asking the applicant to confirm if the information is correct before processing the PR card renewal.

This is similar to what we saw in the PGWP extension ‘opt-in’ process.

Although family sponsorship processing times have improved a lot post-pandemic, it is still not enough to keep the family apart.

Sean Fraser did reform the visitor visa policy recently, offering a shorter 30-day processing time for spouses and dependents awaiting a decision on their PR application.

However, it is still not seen in sufficient measure by the applicants awaiting a decision on their application.

This just adds another hassle to applying for a temporary resident visa after receiving the AOR (Acknowledgement of Receipt) of their PR application.

IRCC has a service standard of processing spousal sponsorship applications within 12 months of submitting a complete application, but this service standard needs to be reduced to 6 months.

A law-abiding, tax-paying Canadian permanent resident or citizen applying for spousal sponsorship need not face a processing time of up to 12 months.

If less than 6 months of processing time can be achieved for Express Entry, then it should also be possible for spousal sponsorship.

Express Entry Improvements

Recently, Canada introduced targeted Express Entry draws to aim at occupations that have the most labour shortages, as per Statistics Canada and Francophones.

This is a good initiative, but IRCC needs to divide the Express Entry draws consistently among all the categories, and these rounds of invitations should be kept up with a biweekly schedule.

With every biweekly consistent draw, Canada’s aspirants awaiting entry into the Express Entry pool at least have an idea of their chances of receiving an invitation to apply (ITA).

They have the right to expect their odds of being invited to an upcoming draw or search for alternatives.

Furthermore, Canadian Experience Class (CEC) Express Entry draws should also resume along with the category-based draws to retain the young talent of international students as well as foreign workers.

Meanwhile, Post Graduate Work Permit (PGWP) holders should also be given the opportunity to extend their permits so that they can continue to work and contribute to the Canadian economy while figuring out the permanent residency pathway.

Black Market Of LMIA (Labour Market Impact Assessment)

There is already a black market for LMIAs, to which the Immigration Minister has paid no attention.

In fact, it has flourished according to the requirements of the Express Entry CRS points boost or better odds of receiving a provincial nomination from one of the Canadian provinces.

Employers or even malpractice by certain immigration consultants by purchasing businesses such as Su**ay or other firms to just sell out LMIAs for $20,000–$40,000

Individuals are purchasing more LMIAs in an effort to improve their CRS score in Express Entry, get invitations via any provincial nominee program, or just extend their stay in Canada on a work permit.

Apart from this, fake payrolls of $10,000–15,000 are just being run by employers to give specific experience to temporary residents and increase their odds of getting permanent residency.

As a result, individuals with the right skills deserving of these jobs do not get hired, which also skews the government of Canada’s data on unemployment. Yes, it is that big.

One of our IG family members says the new Immigration Minister Marc Miller must bring in reforms to just end any points for arranged employment for in-Canada Express Entry applicants.

She says that with this reform, more than 60% of the LMIA black market will end.

As a result, the overall CRS score and PNP requirements will fall significantly, giving direct odds of selection based on actual profiles.

New Immigration Levels Plan 2024 – 2026

Canada already has an ambitious immigration plan and is already on track to beat the estimates of welcoming around 1.5 million new permanent residents or immigrants by 2025.

The new immigration levels plan for 2024–2026 will now be announced by Marc Miller in November 2023, and we expect that he may raise the bar even higher.

However, with this new immigration level plan for 2024–2026, Canada also needs to set a bar on the number of international students that we welcome every year.

We are not against welcoming international students, but Canada should have a policy in place to allow a certain number of students that they can retain (at least 80%) by the end of their postgraduate work permit (PGWP).

This planned and logical recommendation was sent to us by our reader from Vancouver, who is a Canadian citizen and initially came to Canada as a student.

He says, on the one hand, Canada is totally open to international students if they get admission to a Canadian college or university and meet the requirements, but the government has no concrete plan to retain them.

Every year’s plan has a little increase in family sponsorship, but the overall quota for the parents or grandparents program should also increase.

Temporary Residency Visa

IRCC has made a significant improvement in processing for temporary residency visas such as study visas, visitor visas, and work visas.

However, there is still a game of luck among the applicants. We have seen applicants with perfect profiles get rejected by the IRCC.

They get an automated refusal letter rather than pointing out the exact reason why the IRCC officer reached that decision.

This is unjust for them and needs to be changed.

IRCC should provide a real refusal reason to the applicants so that they can rectify it and have the opportunity to come to Canada.

Caregiver Processing Improvement

Applicants of Home Child Care Provider Pilot (HCCP) and Home Support Worker Pilot (HSWP) have been raising the concern of quite a long processing time of up to 36 months.

These processing times went up post pandemic and it seems like they were never given any attention.

Processing time for caregivers need to be brought back to pre-pandemic levels; otherwise, this pilot program is losing its actual purpose of allowing support for Canadian families.

These are the few suggestions that INC – Immigration News Canada received from our readers.

There are a lot more ongoing concerns that need the imminent attention of Marc Miller such as opening Parents or Grandparents Program for new applicants this year, dealing with racism within IRCC, granting status to undocumented workers, and more.

We bring above mentioned concerns forward and hope that he succeeds in bringing the IRCC back on track as the new Immigration Minister of Canada.

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