About how and at what pace the review of old applications at the Canadian embassy in Moscow (where, as is known, quite a few immigration cases of Ukrainians also pass) is proceeding, the Consul General of the Canadian Embassy in Moscow, Mr. Brian Casey, told on the pages of the weekly "Inostranets".
- More than a month has passed since Canada's Minister of Immigration Denis Coderre announced the cancellation of retroactivity of immigration legislation. Has this decision been translated into practical actions, or is the minister's decision still traveling through bureaucratic channels?
- The bureaucratic stage was completed very quickly. We have already begun working with those who submitted immigration applications before the introduction of the new immigration legislation was announced. And, in accordance with our ministry's instructions, we are processing these applications under the old rules. Interviews with applicants are already in full swing.
- Do the people you are inviting know that the retroactivity of immigration legislation has been cancelled? Did you notify them of the changes when your minister made the decision, or was the invitation to the interview a surprise to them?
- Naturally, readers of your newspaper are aware of the changes that have occurred. Others are pleasantly surprised.
- Have many old applications accumulated at your embassy?
- About 3,000. That means, together with family members of the main applicants, about 8,000 Russians are waiting to immigrate to Canada.
Today and tomorrow, interviews are being conducted with those who applied in mid-2000. By the end of this year, we hope to meet with all who applied then. Some of them - very few - date back to 1999, and we forwarded them to the consulate in St. Petersburg. These days they are also receiving invitations to interviews. I am confident that their cases will be reviewed no later than November.
Even before the retroactivity of the legislation was cancelled, we sent all old applicants whose cases had not been processed under the previous rules new application forms and offered them to take a language test. Obviously, now they neither need to take the test nor fill out new forms. However, we ask them to update the information provided by the applicant two, three, or four years ago.
Also, if old applicants did take the language test, it would be useful to report the result - after all, it is additional information about the applicant that will help us make a decision on the case. In old applications, the immigration applicant had to self-assess their language proficiency, and often the applicant's own assessment did not coincide with the opinion of the immigration officer formed during the interview. Quite often it also happened that the applicant could not conduct a conversation in English or French. Therefore, an objective assessment from the language test will help eliminate such misunderstandings.
So as soon as we receive updated information from an old applicant, we immediately begin working on his case.
- Among our readers were old applicants who last spring already had interviews under the updated rules. They scored enough points - in accordance with the old law, but they were asked to take a language test because the retroactivity of the law was still in effect at that time. What should they do now - go through the interview again?
- No. However, everyone who finds themselves in this situation must be sure to remind us of themselves - write a letter, send a fax or e-mail and draw our attention to the fact that the application must be reviewed under the old rules. Without such a reminder, no one will deal with this case: it is marked as awaiting the language test result, and until the test result arrives at the embassy, no official will take it off the shelf. We are not able to review 3,000 cases to find the few hundred applicants in this situation. They need to help us. And we will respond immediately - we will review the case.
- Most people consider the new legislation to be more open and transparent, whereas the old practice left the decision to the discretion of the immigration officer. Could it happen that immigration officers, who again gain power when considering old applications, will want to protect the honor of the uniform and demonstrate that there were sufficient grounds to change the legislation, and that the whole fuss about canceling retroactivity was in vain, and begin issuing refusals?
- No, I rule out such a possibility. At our embassy, we have always strived to be fair and benevolent toward applicants. This position is fundamental for us, and we adhere to it. We have had reasons to issue refusals on more than one occasion, but we have always looked for any opportunity not to do so. Suffice it to say that during the entire period of the retroactivity of the new law, we did not issue a single refusal to old applicants. And now we are trying to review old cases as quickly as possible. We have thrown all our efforts into this. It is our duty, and we gladly fulfill it. Our goal is not to hinder immigration, but on the contrary, to attract as many worthy people to Canada as possible.
- Before the introduction of the new law, people waited for years for an interview invitation. This was explained by the embassy's limited resources. Now you express readiness to consider all the old applications that have accumulated in the shortest possible time. Even though, as far as I understand, the embassy staff has not been increased. Will you have to postpone the processing of new applications for a while?
- You won't have to. We are processing old and new cases in parallel. The old and current selection systems, as you yourself noted, differ greatly from each other. The new system is absolutely transparent: a completed application form, accompanied by all necessary documents and supplemented by the language test result, does not require much work from the immigration officer; he can make a decision quickly. And the applicant himself knows perfectly well whether he meets the requirements or not. Under the old system, however, one really had to wait a long time for an interview, based on the results of which the officer made decisions.
Moreover, the number of applications has now dropped sharply compared to what we received before - about 20% of what came in in 2000 and 2001. With this number of applications, we are quite able to cope without delays - within three months, an immigration applicant will receive either an invitation to an interview or a decision on his case. It is important that applicants understand this. Previously, they knew that while applications were under consideration, they had plenty of time in reserve - enough to finish their affairs, to study the language, and to try to find a job in Canada. They will no longer have such a time buffer: they need to apply with full commitment and readiness to emigrate.
- Minister Coder announced not only the abolition of retroactivity, but also the reduction of the passing score - from 75 to 67. Did such a concession increase the flow of applicants?
- It increased, but very slightly. There is nothing surprising about this: people need time to get their bearings, decide on emigration, and submit an application to the embassy. This process is very, very slow-moving.
Nevertheless, I think that in the near future the flow of applicants will increase noticeably.
- You said that today you receive only 20% of the applications that came to you in 2000 and 2001. How much is that in absolute terms?
- Currently, the embassy receives about 30-40 immigration applications per month, while two or three years ago their number reached 200.
- In what mood do old applicants come to you? Are they still annoyed by all these delays, revisions of rules and criteria, or do they feel satisfaction that their cases were resolved positively?
- I have not conducted interviews myself. But I observe them every day in our office, and I have the impression that they are very pleased. They are glad that they can move forward in life as they wish, and nothing is holding back that movement. Of course, everyone would have liked their case to have been concluded two or three years ago, but as they say, better late than never. I have not noticed any irritation or bitterness in them. Neither have my colleagues.
- Do you often have to refuse?
- Yes, we issue refusals almost every day. Some applicants, during these very two or three years of waiting, have made no progress in English or French. They cannot hold a conversation in either of these languages. And sometimes an applicant provides us with false information. We are forced to refuse such people.
- Don't you verify the information provided to you before the interview?
- If, while reviewing the case, the officer has doubts, he conducts a check and, upon finding a fake, issues a negative answer without any interview. And it happens that doubt arises only during the interview, and then checks have to be carried out after the interview. But most often the truthfulness of the information is verified before it.
- A few weeks ago I met with an immigration consultant who helps people who want to move to New Zealand for permanent residence. His help, in particular, consists of finding jobs for people of certain specialties. Are there similar consultants for Canada? Can this be seen from immigration applications, from the number of employed immigrants?
- You see, many of those who come to us for a visa undertake job searches themselves, contact companies, study the labor market. However, only a few have a job offer approved by the Ministry of Labour. It is highly useful to search for work on your own, to understand the requirements imposed on workers in a particular specialty. However, the probability of getting a job by correspondence is very low; not many Canadian firms respond to requests coming to them from abroad. In any case, we advise exercising extreme caution with offers from intermediaries, no matter how enticing their services may seem - the risk of fraud is too great.
In conclusion of our conversation, I would like to emphasize once again: we at the embassy are very glad that we can fairly resolve the cases of those who inadvertently found themselves in a trap due to the change in our immigration legislation. We are glad that we did not refuse anyone and waited for the resolution of this problem.
- You apparently foresaw such a turn of events, since you waited so long without refusing old applicants?
- I would not make such statements publicly.