OLLO – Top Issues – May 16, 2022

Official Languages Act

• We fully support the new measures introduced in the modernized Official Languages Act (OLA), including the creation of a policy on Francophone immigration to support the vitality of Francophone minority communities.
• Our Department takes its obligations under the OLA seriously and remains committed to promoting bilingualism in Canada, and increasing the demographic weight of Francophone minority communities.
• IRCC continues to implement measures to support our Francophone immigration objectives, including the 4.4% target of French-speaking immigrants admissions outside Quebec by 2023.

Francophone Settlement Commitment

• The Francophone Integration Pathway under IRCC’s settlement program allows Francophone communities to offer settlement services in French and aimed at facilitating reception, support, integration, and creating lasting ties between newcomers and Francophone communities.
• In 2021-2022, IRCC has invested approximately $61M, including $8.2M from the Official Languages Action Plan, into the Francophone Integration Pathway.
• Since 2018, we’ve increased number of Francophone service providers across the country from 50 to 80.
• 14 communities and cities across the country (except Quebec) are also piloting the Welcoming Francophone communities initiative.
• IRCC also funds language training in both official languages to better meet the needs of French-speaking newcomers settling in a minority context.
• IRCC continues to work closely with key Francophone stakeholders to ensure programming is tailored to the needs of communities and French-speaking newcomers.

Foreign Credential Recognition

• IRCC will be working closely with Employment and Social Development Canada as the federal lead on the foreign credential recognition program, as well as with provinces and territories, to improve foreign credential recognition in Canada.
• Within the federally funded Settlement Program, IRCC is working to improve newcomer access to information about foreign credential recognition and better connect newcomers to federal and provincial/territorial programming that will help them enter the Canadian labour market.

French Teachers

• We know French teachers are needed to meet the demand for French education across the country.
• A number of permanent residency programs are open to French teachers, who are considered to be “high-skilled” for the purposes of immigration.  Between 2016 and 2020, IRCC has welcomed 342 French-speaking teachers through it economic programs to provinces outside of Quebec.
• In response to recommendations made by the former Minister of Official Languages, the Department intends to collaborate with its provincial and territorial partners to explore mechanisms to increase the number of French teachers who immigrate to Canada and settle in provinces outside of Quebec.

Forward Planning for Future Francophone Immigration Targets

• Work for post-2023 Francophone immigration targets is already underway.
• In May 2021, IRCC and Francophone community stakeholders established a working group that is currently finalizing its recommendations on a potential post-2023 approach.
• IRCC is also closely studying proposals for future targets developed by community stakeholders, particularly a recent demographic study published by the FCFA and the study on the 4.4% target released by the Commissioner of Official Languages in November 2021.
• Detailed options on new targets will be developed based on consultations within IRCC and with stakeholders to ensure that the final targets are both ambitious and attainable.

IRCC’s Work with Provinces and Territories, in Reference to Francophone Settlement Agreements

• So far, IRCC has signed Settlement and Integration Memorandum of Understandings (MOU) with 10 provinces and territories. All settlement MOUs have references to French-speaking immigrants and Francophone communities.
• In these MOUs, both sides commit to work together to ensure settlement and integration services for French-speaking immigrants are available in their communities, and that French-speaking immigrants have sustainable connections with their communities and Francophone Community organizations.
• Four provinces and territories have established their own target for Francophone immigration:
  • Ontario: 5%
  • New Brunswick: 33%
  • Newfoundland & Labrador: 5% increase, since 2018
  • Northwest Territories: 5% increase, since 2018

Overseas Remote Interviews

• IRCC is piloting a new service that will allow IRCC officers to conduct virtual interviews with applicants at select Visa Application Centre locations.
• Highly trained IRCC officers will conduct the remote interviews with applicants through a secure channel at a Visa Application Centre.  Visa Application Centre staff will not be involved in conducting the interviews.
• The service will be piloted at the following eleven Visa Application Centre locations by the end of June:
  • Kinshasa, DRC;
  • Rabat, Morocco
  • Bogota, Colombia;
  • Kingston, Jamaica;
  • Karachi Pakistan;
  • Dhaka, Bangladesh;
  • Lagos, Nigeria;
  • Yaoundé Cameroon;
  • Addis Ababa, Ethiopia;
  • New Delhi, India; and
  • Port-au-Prince, Haiti
• Protecting the personal information and privacy of applicants is paramount in all that the IRCC does, and IRCC performed its due diligence in performing the appropriate checks to ensure the personal information of applicants accessing Interview Facilitation Services will be secure.

Anti-Racism

• Systemic racism in any form is completely unacceptable. We take this seriously and are very proud of the work we have under way to address discrimination and bias. However, we know we have an obligation to clients, employees and Canadians to do better.
• IRCC established a three-year anti-racism strategy, anti-racism commitments, mandatory unconscious bias training, mentoring and sponsorship programs for underrepresented groups, racial impact assessment tools for policy development, and additional supports to create meaningful change in the workplace.
• Unconscious bias training is now mandatory for all managers at IRCC before they can make any financial or staffing decisions.
• IRCC also initiated a three year hiring and retention strategy to address gaps in our workforce diversity to better reflect Canada and Canadians we serve.

Chinook

• Chinook is a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet that draws different fields of existing information to more easily display it on a spreadsheet, which helps IRCC officers complete routine administrative steps more quickly.
• The spreadsheet reduces the amount of time an officer spends on uploading files and clicking screen to screen. This is especially important in countries where bandwidth is low, which would otherwise slow down application processing.
• IRCC officers always make their own decisions based on the information submitted in applications. Chinook does not contain any advanced analytics or artificial intelligence technology.

International Students (African students)

• We are committed to a fair and non-discriminatory application of immigration laws. Temporary resident visa and study permit applications from Africa have tripled from 2016 to 2019 across the top 8 source countries in Africa.
• We understand that applicants and schools are disappointed when an application is refused. However, the approval rates for applicants from French-speaking African countries are mostly the same as the rates from other countries in the region. This is also true for the approval rates for those destined to Quebec compared with other provinces.
• The most common reasons for refusal include applicants being unable to show officers they’re able to support themselves in Canada or that they would leave Canada if they no longer had legal status in the future.

Canada-Quebec – Levels

• During the pandemic, the Department prioritized applications from candidates who are in Canada, including those under the Quebec Skilled Workers category.
• The Department achieved 50.2K admissions to Quebec in 2021, surpassing the original provincial target of 46K. We also came within 2.5% of the low end of the rebalanced MIFI range (51.5K to 54.5K).
• The Department is working with Quebec on new ways to address Quebec’s labour shortages and maintain Quebec’s demographic importance in the country.

Canada-Quebec Compensation

• Under the Canada-Quebec Accord, the federal government provides annual compensation to enable Quebec to provide settlement and integration services in the province. Quebec received $697M in 2021-2022 under the terms set out in the Accord.

Ukraine CUAET and PR pathways

• The Canada-Ukraine authorization for emergency travel (CUAET) is available to Ukrainians and their family members fleeing the conflict in Ukraine. It offers them an extended stay in Canada, as well as free work and study permits.
• The CUAET is the fastest and most efficient way for Ukrainians to come to Canada. It streamlines current visa and travel requirements, eliminates most application and processing fees, and offers accelerated, prioritized processing.
• For families in Canada, IRCC is also implementing a special family reunification sponsorship pathway for permanent residence. Details on this program are coming soon.

Ukraine Travel

• On May 11th, we announced 3 federal charter flights to Canada for Ukrainians and their family members. The flights will be available to people approved through the CUAET program on a first come, first served basis from Poland:
  • to Winnipeg on May 23
  • to Montréal on May 29
  • to Halifax on June 2
• Once in Canada, we will provide temporary accommodations for up to 14 nights to people on the charter flights who do not already have suitable accommodations in place.
• In the coming days, Ukrainians who have received their visas to come to Canada through the CUAET will be contacted by email with information on how to register.

Ukraine Settlement Support

• We are offering temporary federal support to help Ukrainians settle in their new communities, such as language training and enrolling children in school.
• Federally funded settlement services are normally only available to permanent residents. This is an extraordinary measure aimed at supporting Ukrainians arriving under CUAET.
• We are also working to implement transitional financial support to cover basic needs, and to organize temporary accommodations for Ukrainians arriving in Canada who do not already have suitable accommodation in place.

Client services for Ukrainians

• We are working around the clock to help Ukrainians and their families get to Canada as quickly and safely as possible. We are prioritizing all applications.
• We made the process easier for families by exempting certain cohorts from providing biometrics:
  • 17 years old or younger
  • applicants 61 years old or older
  • applicants who were previously approved for a Canadian visa in the past 10 years.
• For those providing biometrics, we recently opened Canadian Biometric Collection Centres in Warsaw and Berlin. We continue to add biometric capacity to the VAC network, as well as to Canadian missions in Poland, Austria, Romania and Germany.
• Ukrainian clients both in Canada and abroad can call us at 613-321-4243, with collect calls accepted or use IRCC’s crisis web form keyword “Ukraine2022” and their enquiry and it will be prioritized.

Ukraine Impact on Processing Times

• The Government of Canada is investing an additional $117M to implement Canada’s new immigration measures to welcome those fleeing the war in Ukraine.
• This funding will help set up new immigration pathways, including the CUAET, expedite the processing of applications and provide support to newcomers once they arrive in Canada. It will also allow IRCC to procure additional resources to support Ukrainians while continuing to deliver on other important priorities and processing commitments.

Ukraine Compared to Other Situations

• We hear the concerns of perceived racism in how the government responds to different situations and delays in bringing people to Canada, particularly family members.
• These frustrations are real and we understand the sensitivities.
• Any delays are a result of various challenges that are unique to each circumstance. Whatever the challenge, though, we are committed to doing everything we can to help those in need.
• We set up an emergency, temporary program for Ukrainians because those fleeing eventually want to return home. They want to come to Canada as a temporary safe harbour, not as refugees.
• These Ukrainian pathways will not impact the processing of refugees, as they are completely separate immigration streams.

Afghanistan

• Our goal of bringing at least 40,000 Afghan nationals to Canada places us amongst the top countries in the world when it comes to resettling Afghan refugees.
• We are working hard to welcome Afghans as quickly and safely as possible and, so far, over 13,500 Afghan refugees now call Canada home.
• We made a commitment to some individuals and their families on the basis of their work with Canada, and we will not turn our backs on them.
• We continue working to secure safe passage for those in Afghanistan, but the reality is that every step of the way, there are obstacles facing us in Afghanistan that were not present in other large-scale resettlement efforts:
  • By far, the biggest challenge is that many of the individuals selected under the Special Immigration Program are still in Afghanistan, a country controlled by a terrorist organization in which the Government has no military or diplomatic presence.
  • Our ability to move people is also impacted by whether and how quickly we get exit permits and the availability of flights to Canada.
• We will continue to ensure we have the necessary resources to bring vulnerable Afghans to Canada. This has not changed as a result of the ongoing crisis in Ukraine.

Processing and Inventory

• Despite the pandemic, we were still able to make over half a million decisions and welcomed over 405,000 new permanent residents in 2021 – the greatest number of newcomers in a year in Canadian history.
• IRCC surpassed its goal to make 147,000 permanent residence final decisions in the first quarter of 2022 – doubling the number of final decisions in the same period in 2021. From January 1 to March 31, 2022, we made over 156,000 final decisions on permanent resident applications. Through these efforts, Canada welcomed over 113,000 new permanent resident admissions in the first quarter of 2022.
• Supported by additional funding of $85 million from the 2021 Economic and Fiscal Update, we are continuing our efforts to reduce application inventories accumulated during the pandemic. This builds on the work that has already been done to reduce wait times, such as hiring new processing staff, digitizing applications, and reallocating work among our offices around the world.
• To support Canada’s Immigration Levels Plan, the government has also committed $2.1 billion over five years and $317.6 million ongoing in new funding in Budget 2022.

Moncton Immigration Centre

• We will provide updates on the New Brunswick Francophone Immigration Centre as information becomes available.

Ministerial Centre for Members of Parliament and Senators

• The Ministerial Centre for Members of Parliament and Senators is within its service standards for telephone email support.
• The average speed of the telephone response is under 20 minutes and we are responding to emails within 10 business days.
• We changed the service standard for emails to 10 business days to allow for continued support to clients affected by recent humanitarian crises (Afghanistan and Ukraine).

Client Support Centre – Official languages

• IRCC ensures that the public can communicate and receive quality services in French or English.
• According to our 2021 Client Experience survey, 95% of IRCC’s clients agree or strongly agree that they received service in the official language of their choice.
• In an effort to better communicate with our clients, IRCC has conducted usability tests with our clients to improve the clarity and understanding of our forms and correspondence.