July 20, 2010

New Immigration Legislation

Q. I heard that the Minister of Immigration intends to make changes to the immigration regulations. Do you know anything about this?

A. This is such a timely question. On June 26, 2010 new immigration regulations have been published in the Canadian Gazette, effective immediately. The main points of the changes encompass the following:

• Investor program is put on hold until new regulations will be issued;
• Skilled workers category is reduced to two streams: those with arranged employment (AEO) and without AEO;
•  Cap on the number of applications without AEO to 20,000 / year
•  Change of the skilled workers’ list of accepted occupations: from 38 occupations on the previous list, approximately 20 have been taken out and others have been introduced to a total of 29 in total;
•  Restrictions of 1000 applications per each NOC category, per year.
•  Language tests must accompany all applications in the skilled worker and CEC class.
  These are just a few but the more significant of the changes. One thing is sure: immigration practice becomes more complex with each passing day.