Canada Suspends Parent and Grandparent Sponsorship Applications for PR
Canada has announced it will temporarily stop accepting new applications for parent and grandparent permanent residency sponsorship, as per a ministerial directive. Published in the Canada Gazette, the directive emphasizes the government’s commitment to family reunification while prioritizing the processing of applications submitted last year.
The directive reflects Immigration Minister Marc Miller's view that this approach will "best support" the government’s immigration and family reunification objectives.
New sponsorships in other immigration streams have also been paused to address the existing backlog.
As part of the government’s three-year immigration levels plan, which includes an overall reduction in immigration, the target for this year is to admit over 24,000 individuals through the parent and grandparent sponsorship program.
The new directive sets a cap of 15,000 applications to be processed in 2024 under the family reunification program.
In 2024, 35,700 individuals were randomly selected to apply through the parent and grandparent program, with a target of approving 20,500 applications.
According to the 2024 Annual Report to Parliament on Immigration, presented by Minister Miller, the inventory of parent and grandparent sponsorship applications exceeded 40,000 as of late 2023.
The report also notes that the average processing time for sponsorship applications was 24 months.
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