"How To Immigrate To Canada In The Family Class: The Authoritative Guide Including Québec And Super Visa Opportunities" coming soon!

My latest book on Family Class immigration

I just finished the companion book to my popular eBook, "How To Immigrate To Canada For Skilled Workers: The Authoritative Guide To Federal And Provincial Opportunities". It is called, "How To Immigrate To Canada In The Family Class: The Authoritative Guide Including Québec And Super Visa Opportunities".

I hope this book will help Family Class immigrants in the same way my previous book is helping Skilled Workers. While most books concerning the immigration process are either out of date, or try and cover every possible class, I have made it a point to search out the most current and authoritative information available for those interested in a specific immigration class.

The purpose of this book is to help Family Class applicants in understanding the requirements to successfully apply for immigration to Canada; in being aware of common issues and problems that can arise in the process, and in making plain some of the hurdles and costs that they can expect to encounter along the way.

Family Class applicants will learn who is eligible to apply; what the application process entails; the range of information that they can expect to gather and provide; the pros and cons of using an immigration representative; expectations for the post-application process and other essential information.

Additionally, this book provides detailed information on Family Class immigration to Québec, which, unique to other Canadian provinces, shares immigration jurisdiction with the federal government. Finally, this book provides detailed information on The Parent and Grandparent Super Visa, which allows parents and grandparents of Canadian citizens and permanent residents to visit family in Canada for up to two years without the need to renew their visa status.

The book will be available at all major eBook retailers online. Please check back for news announcing the release. 

The Star - Would-be immigrants poised to hear about application backlog

Will they or won't they? This week in the Federal Courts, Justice Robert Barnes will decide the fate of 900 litigants who claim the Harper Government is unfairly terminating their applications for Skilled Worker class immigration. It already appears to be too late for the thousands of other applicants who put their applications forward before 2008.

Read the article here 

Harper's new foreign worker pilot program revealed

In a meeting in Bonnyville-Cold Lake (a provincial electoral district in Alberta), Immigration Minister Jason Kenney outlined the future of Canada's temporary foreign worker program. One that apparently has nothing to do with immigration opportunities.

As reported in bonnyville nouvelle:

Highly skilled trade jobs such as welder, heavy duty mechanic and carpenter, are remaining vacant but a new pilot program for skilled temporary foreign workers announced on July 16, could help solve that issue said Kenney during his visit to Bonnyville on July 18.

“We're moving from what was a slow, passive and rigid system with declining economic results and lower levels of employment and income for immigrants and huge shortages in parts of our economy, to a system that is fast, flexible and responsive to the labour market,” declared Kenney.

Essentially the program will enable employers to recruit skilled trade workers in high demand from visa exempt countries, fly them to airports in Edmonton and Calgary and have an immigration officer stamp a work permit into their passports. The work permit is valid for two years and is good for any employer in the sector for which they were hired.

“This collapses what was a six or seven month bureaucratic process into a 30-minute process at the airport,” explained Kenney. “It really says to employers you now have (a) light at the end of the tunnel when it comes to meeting the labour demands, especially for major construction projects.”

Harper and Kenney have no apparent interest in bringing immigrants into the country - they simply want bodies to fill the needs of business, until business needs them no more. Then these workers will be sent back where they came from. Nowhere in Kenney's announcement does he mention the path that any of these workers will have toward permanent residence in Canada, and that is a glaring omission.

Read the article here

Reasons to leave the U.S. - U.S. Customs seized over 60,000 Kinder Eggs last year

The deadly Kinder Eggs!

OK - I couldn't resist this story in today's Star from the AP...

SEATTLE—On a recent visit to Vancouver, two Seattle men picked up some Kinder Eggs to share with family and friends back home.

But they ended up spending more than two hours in a detention centre at the border after U.S. border agents found the “illegal candy” in their car.

It turns out the eggs with the little toy inside are illegal in the United States because young children could choke on the plastic toys.

Importing the eggs can lead to a potentially hefty fine, but Brandon Loo and Christopher Sweeney eventually got off with a warning.

A U.S. Customs and Border Protection spokesman declined to comment about the case last night.

The agency says it seized more than 60-thousand Kinder Eggs last year.

Healthcare oberservations

I've had my OHIP coverage for almost 9-months now, and thank God for it. I've been able to get a physical,  tests for a stomach ailment, and recently I was in a bicycle accident that I needed to be checked out for injury from. In the States, all of these care services would've meant cash out of pocket, and I would have had to decide whether I could afford to have them tended to by professionals, or trust WebMD with my health.

I've noticed through these events some differences in how doctors in Canada deliver health services. Mind you, this may just be with MY doctor, but I suspect core differences in how doctors are compensated may be at the root of it. What I've noticed is that if I don't bring an issue up specifically with the doctor, he's generally not going to inquire further.

So when I had my accident, I went in and he asked where it hurt, and I said my wrist, and he looked at it, I told him the rest just felt like pulled muscles (from head to toe), and he was willing to accept this. He didn't start poking and prodding, "how does this feel? Any pain here?" the sort of thing I'm used to in the U.S. - where they LOOK for problems to treat.

My theory is: they LOOK in the U.S. because it's an opportunity for the doctor to bill more time, or create more work for, let's say, the physical therapy department. Here, the province is footing most of the bill, family doctors have a lot of patients to see; there's not a profit motive for further inquiry.

I'm learning I need to be my own biggest advocate for my health in Canada. I go in with a list of questions to be sure I ask the doctor to cover everything I'm concerned about.

In the old world, too many useless questions and tests, procedures and expenses. In Canada, I need to be sure I'm getting all the care I need for any condition.

UPDATE - MORE INFO:
My love had to speak with her doctor about something the other day, so she called the office. The doctor wouldn't speak to her, but briefly answered questions through his assistant while she could tell he was standing right by her. Why wouldn't he just get on the phone and answer himself? Apparently, he only gets paid by the Province if he sees her in the office, in person. So they kept trying to schedule an appointment three weeks away (the first opening) for a question she needed answered now. So its not only the U.S. system that causes healthcare to be delivered in some backward ways. 

Canada Immigration News - Canada Still Open For Immigration

Many Canadian immigration programs remain open, despite the Canadian government’s announcement that it will be taking a ‘temporary pause’ in accepting Federal Skilled Worker applications. In this article, CIC News will briefly explore current open programs, as well as the future of the Federal Skilled Worker Program.

Read the article here

The Globe and Mail - Immigration Minister puts brakes on popular skilled labour programs until 2013

Unbelievable. on June 28, the Harper government, dealt a blow by the courts when it was told it couldn't just drop 280,000 skilled worker immigration applicants from its roles has now put a complete halt to the program for anyone who doesn't have pre-arranged employment. The moratorium is to be in place until 2013, but who's to say the majority Tory government wont just extend it at that time.

Kenney was quick to say after his speech that the move will not mean a drop in the number of immigrants coming to Canada.


How can he say that? My money would be on because he intends to fill the gap with Temporary Foreign Workers, who's numbers have skyrocketed to 182,276 individuals compared to 156,077 individuals who immigrated across all economic class categories in 2011. In 2011 the Skilled Worker program only approved 36,770 people for entry to the country (with additional family members numbering 51,991). At that rate, a qualified backlog of current applicants would take over seven more years to clear.

In my opinion, the Harper government has no intention of offering a broad-based Skilled Worker program in the future. The re-tooled program in January will be one that is almost exclusively employer-driven. This narrow focus won't bring the best and brightest to Canada - it will bring in widgets that fill employment gaps. It will also open the doors to abuse, with the sale of immigration to workers willing to pay unscrupulous employers for the elusive "offer of employment".

Read the entire article here 

4th of July in Canada

My first Independence Day in Canada. I have a U.S. flag flying in the condo window for the construction workers on the high rise across the street to see. Later today, my Love and I will have a bar-b-que of steak and veggies in the high heat of early summer. But this is just another Wednesday for Canadians, and I'm working as usual. I had my long weekend already, for Canada Day (July 1). If I were in the U.S. my brother and I would be going to see friends and fireworks later on, and I do miss my brother a lot, but we had years to prepare for my leaving the states, and both our lives are going happily on. I feel free from heavy handed government, from useless politicians, from a violent police force in Seattle, from taxes that only line the pockets of the wealthy. I am proud to be an American, but I don't feel America is the "land of the free" anymore. Here in Canada, I feel free.