Operational Bulletins 083 – October 30, 2008

Guidelines for Priority Processing in the Event of Disaster Situations

Background

In the event of natural disasters, Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) may receive requests for expedited processing of clients in the affected area. At this time there is no special program or other priority processing in relation to any disasters. However, as situations change, CIC will continue our practice of responding in a humane and expeditious manner.

Current policy and procedures

In the event of a disaster, visa offices are reminded to continue to pull the applications of affected persons to the front of the queue for review, and advise the appropriate Geographic Desk, International Region, of the situation. Given the variety of situations which can occur as a result of any disaster, it remains the applicant or sponsor’;s responsibility to demonstrate that they are negatively affected by the situation.

Equally, Case Processing Centre – Mississauga may encounter individuals who, in submitting new applications or while already under active processing, request special consideration claiming that they or their dependents have been negatively affected by a disaster abroad. Officers should carefully consider such requests and, when necessary, seek information from Centralized Processing Region and Operational Management and Coordination Branch.

The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act provides sufficient discretion to respond in a flexible and humane manner to emergency situations. Although files from clients in affected areas may be put to the front of a queue, this is neither a special program nor priority processing, and messaging should not reflect otherwise.

Where warranted, due to the severity of a disaster or surrounding issues, NHQ will issue specific instructions indicating what special programs or measures are to be implemented. These specific instructions would be provided to the applicable visa offices, inland offices and Case Processing Centres, as well as the Call Centre. In the absence of disaster-specific instructions, visa offices are to respond in the manner outlined above.

Contact

For further information on the procedures outlined in this document, please contact Operational Management and Coordination Branch at OMC-GOC-Immigration@cic.gc.ca.