Lessons Learned by Citizenship and Immigration Canada in Skilled Worker Category may Extend to Family Class

According to a new backgrounder issued by CIC for purposes of soliciting input on the proper number and mix of immigration to Canada, effective management of intake of new applications is critical to reducing backlogs. This has been applied with success, depending upon your opinion, in the skilled worker category and investor category respectively.

The paper also notes that there are a 165,000 applicants in the family class category of parents and grandparents and a maximum target of 17,500 entries has been set for 2011. Quick math in so far as these numbers can be relied upon calculates to a processing time averaging more than nine years. Are caps on the number of new applicants in this category soon to be introduced?

Let’s be clear soft caps do exist in all categories – a quick review of the Annual Immigration Report confirms a range and the lower and upper numbers in a given category of admissions, but the difference here is like the skilled worker category, an annual cap will be placed on the number of new applications and not admissions. Once the cap is reached the application will be returned and applicants will have to wait another year to sponsor their parent or grandparent. Might well be on the horizon.