Minister lauds Canadian immigration changes

Mr Kenney, who has overseen many of the changes in the past 12 months, has repeatedly stated his intention to make the Canadian immigration system more suited to the country's needs and his changes have attempted to reflect that intention.

"Our government has a plan for a faster, more flexible, responsive and secure immigration system that will better meet Canada's economic needs while continuing to uphold our humanitarian commitments," said the minister.

"With our changes, immigrants will see their lives improve and Canadians will see the economy grow."

In the past year, Mr Kenney has pushed through several changes including:

• Eliminating almost 80% of Canada visa applications in the system's backlog
• Introduced the Parent and Grandparent Super Visa which allows foreign parents or grandparents to visit Canadian residents for up to two years
• Introduced tougher marital rules to combat sham marriages
• Clamped down on fraudulent or unscrupulous immigration advisers
• Introduced a new scheme to attract PhD students
• Introduced schemes to allow provinces and states to bring in skilled workers to combat acute labour shortages

Not all the changes have been positive; the decision to cancel hundreds of thousands of visa applications made prior to 2008 was met with significant controversy but the government has remained defiant in the attempt to bring the system under greater control, and Mr Kenney says there will be no letting up.

"We are continuing to make changes to create a faster, more flexible immigration system.

"We have made great strides in the past year but we know there is always more work to do and look forward to even more improvements and reforms in the year ahead."

Nigel Smith, casework manager at the Canadian Visa Bureau, says the new system will benefit visa applicants.

"The old application system could be slow and tedious, leaving plenty of applicants waiting years for their applications to go through.

"And while eliminating the backlog of applications came as an understandable blow to many people, we are seeing applications processed much quicker now under the new system."

---

The Canadian Visa Bureau is an independent migration consultancy specialising in helping people make their application to the Canadian Embassy.