Canada has extended the spousal sponsorship pilot program for one year

January 14, 2016
The Canadian federal government had extended a pilot program to one year to for helping the spouses of the Canadian citizens who are residing in the country but waiting for the permanent residency.

Canada has extended the spousal sponsorship pilot program for one year

This pilot program was extended previous month without much fanfare except a notice which was posted on the website of the Immigration Department.

According to the spokeswoman from the department, IRCC had extended this pilot program which allows open work permits to the qualified spouses or partners in Canada, and whose applications for sponsorships has already been submitted, providing them the freedom to do the job while their applications for the PR are being processed.

She also informed that this pilot program ensures that the applicants could work, provide for their families and could also contribute to the economy of Canada while waiting for the applications to get processed.

Around 7,600 job permits were granted between the start of the program on 22nd December 2014 and 31st October.

According to the latest information on the website of the federal government, the present wait time for spouse sponsoring who is residing in Canada is more than two years.

John McCallum, Immigration Minister said previous week that the liberals are committed for minimizing the overall time and had also called such holdup as way too high.

The processing time for the Canadian citizens who look to sponsor their spouses are more than 17 months but the pilot program do not extend to them. Citizens of Canada wish to sponsor their parents and grandparents had been waiting for more than four years. 

Liberals had budgeted an extra $25 million for minimizing the processing time of the applications in the year 2016-2017, followed by an extra $50 million every year for coming three years.

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