Police are investigating allegations of fraud at dozens of immigration consultancies across the country, according to government and law enforcement sources.

The probes target unlicensed and unscrupulous immigration consultants who trade in helping foreigners establish themselves in Canada.

While many consultants provide a legitimate service to immigrants, there are mounting concerns about illegal and unethical activity, leading to calls for sweeping regulatory reform.

In Quebec, for example, an immigration consultancy was accused last year of running a multimillion-dollar scheme to establish Canadian residency for citizenship applicants living abroad and illegally profiting from false tax rebates. Another Quebec immigration consultant was recently convicted of fraud for his role in smuggling a Moroccan immigrant into Canada. And a Vancouver immigration consultant was convicted of fraud and dealing in forged documents.

The RCMP investigation of as many as 300 citizenship applicants claiming the same Mississauga address, which The Globe and Mail first reported on Monday, is just one of many similar investigations currently under way, sources say.

Immigration Minister Jason Kenney vowed to crack down on immigration consultants this week. But NDP immigration critic Olivia Chow said the minister has promised reform for more than a year and has yet to deliver.

“He said he would do it. He didn’t do it,” Ms. Chow said.

A spokesman for Mr. Kenney said more detailed proposals will be unveiled in the months ahead, adding that “too much is at stake” to make reform a partisan issue.

Ms. Chow said her office sees too many tragic examples of prospective immigrants being ripped off by “ghost” consultants, who provide advice they know is of no use, that’s often fraudulent, and amounts to stealing between $2,000 and $5,000 from a prospective immigration applicant.

The current system of regulating immigration consultants is completely ineffective and needs to be dismantled, Ms. Chow said. The Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants was established in 2003, but membership is voluntary and enforcement amounts to a slap on the wrist, she said.

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A home based program to help parents prepare their children for school and better utilize local community services is expanding its family literacy program in a number of Canadian cities. $3.5 million of funding is being provided by Citizenship and Immigration Canada, which provides the vast majority of the funding, and Human Resources and Skills Development Canada.

The HIPPY (Home Instruction for Parents of Pre–School Youngsters) program this year celebrated its 10–year anniversary. HIPPY Canada helps immigrant families better understand Canadian language, life and culture from home.

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A report by Scotiabank, a major Canadian financial institution, has found that immigrants are a major force driving the Canadian housing market.

According to the report, recent immigrants are making a faster transition from renting homes to owning homes than in the past. Homeownership rates among all immigrant groups increased between 2001 and 2006.

“The biggest increase was among those living in Canada for less than 10 years,” said Scotiabank senior economist Adrienne Warren.

Homeownership rates among immigrants rose alongside a growth in employment rates for newcomers during the same period, the report said.

This information “may reflect a favourable skills mix, with many employed in high-growth industries such as engineering, construction and skilled trades,” said Warren.

This trend is expected to continue as immigration plays a larger part in Canada’s population growth.

“Given Canada’s aging population and low fertility rates, longer term household formation and housing needs will be largely determined by immigration,” Warren said.

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A few years ago I got into a conversation with cab driver in Toronto. I was surprised to learn that the driver, an immigrant from India, had been unable to find work in his profession during his five years in Canada. His qualifications from universities in both the UK and India, included a Ph.D. All of his qualifications were recognized in Canada. The problem he ran into was a lack of Canadian job experience. Despite being interviewed over twenty times for a position he was repeatedly given the thumbs down. This anecdote along with similar stories I have come across in the media, are fairly commonplace these days.

Immigrants arrive in Canada buoyed with high hopes, intent of giving of their best. How come then so many qualified immigrants end up in low end jobs, some even on the unemployment rolls? How come a high percentage end up leaving, returning home or moving to another immigrant destination?

There is a critical doctor shortage in Canada, something health professionals and administrators have long been complaining about. There are good sized communities in Canada without a doctor. In some cities the doctor shortage has compelled patients to resort to emergency departments or clinics in order to find help. One study predicts that come 2011, Canada may be short as many as 6,000 doctors. The shortfall isn’t only related to GP’s but also to specialists in areas such as obstetrics, radiology and anesthesiology. It’s an acute and growing problem.

Red tape and entrenched regulations are part of the challenge faced by immigrant doctors. Canadian Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons require all graduating doctors to complete a residency of two years or more. While many immigrant doctors are fully qualified, their residency stints in their homelands don’t count since only Canadian and American residencies are accepted. So you have situations where highly qualified individuals are compelled to work in a fast food joint or clean floors, because they find it next to impossible to get a residency.

Foreign trained doctors are quite literally caught on the horns of a dilemma. In order to be eligible for residency they have to have at least a year of medical practice behind them … but in order to practice in Canada they have to have residency. It is in fact a classic Catch-22
scenario.

It’s surprising this problem has been allowed to get to this point. Quite aside from the importance of doing the right thing by new immigrants, there are also economic benefits to Canada that would accrue with more active recruitment of immigrant doctors. It would save provincial taxpayers a whack of cash since they wouldn’t be paying toward the cost of educating as many medical professionals. Concerns about maintaining standards are important, but the assumption that foreign standards don’t match up is overblown, especially given the advances in clinical care with the greater availability of medical technology.

The whole process needs to be fast-tracked. Most importantly, the residency hurdle needs to be quickly addressed by recognizing foreign residencies (other than American) that meet provincial standards, so that these valuable individuals aren’t left to languish in the wings.

Qualified immigrants in the US seem to fare better when it comes to finding work in their field. The American “melting pot” approach is a great equalizer in certain respects. There has been the suggestion that Canadian employers who cite “lack of experience” or other in-house regulations as reasons for turning down immigrant applicants are in effect practicing cloaked discrimination, and even racism. There are also claims that some professional sectors have for want of a better term a sort of ‘old boys’ club’ mentality and exercise a form of protectionism when it comes to hiring protocols. If this is in fact going on in some cases, all the more reason for the government to act in order to ensure that red tape isn’t being used as an artificial barrier to discriminate against immigrant applicants on the basis of their race or cultural heritage.

In this era of international trade, both Canada and the US have reciprocal trading relationships with other nations. The outsourcing of operations to countries in Asia is an example of this. When you consider this new economic relationship together with the high sounding words of praise the Canadian government routinely lavishes on new immigrants and the skills they offer, it is becoming increasingly unacceptable that these employment anomalies are being swept under the rug. At least the Tories have undertaken a $3 million dollar study to try and get to the roots of the problem. Let’s hope it results in some real action.

The Canada I know is about fair play and decency, and that ethic should be extended to all Canadian job seekers irrespective of origin.

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On New Year’s Eve, a baby was born on an international flight as the plane flew over Canada.  When the Ugandan mother and her baby landed in Boston, American officials deemed the baby a Canadian citizen to speed their passage through customs.

At first, Canadian officials were unsure whether the child qualified for citizenship, as there was no know precedent in Canada for such a situation.  Federal immigration lawyers reviewed the case and ruled that the baby is indeed eligible for Canadian citizenship.

“Our government believes that Canadian territory – and, as a result, the full reach of Canadian sovereignty – extends to our airspace,” stated a spokesperson for Citizenship, Immigration, and Multiculturalism Canada (CIMC) Minister Jason Kenney.  “This means that a child born in Canadian airspace is a Canadian citizen.”

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In recent years, the top students at any given board in Greater Toronto have been just as likely to be immigrants as Canadian-born.

In the Toronto public board, all three top students this year are immigrants. Top student Wang enrolled in ESL when she arrived from Xian, China, in 2002.

The Peel District School Board’s top spot was shared by four students – all born outside Canada. More…

Source:  Toronto Star

Two-thirds of Canada’s rapid population increase over the past five years came from immigration — a force that in coming decades will account for almost all of the country’s growth, according to census figures released Tuesday.

Unlike the United States, where an influx of legal and illegal immigrants has fueled heated debate, there is little public discussion in Canada on the issue.

The data released by Statistics Canada show the country’s population grew 5.4 percent, the highest rate among the Group of Eight industrial nations. MORE…

Yes. Canada welcomes qualified artistes and performers .  As the field of arts and culture is very wide, you should consult a licensed full-time immigration consultant to explore this option.

This article  “Signs of an immigrant” by Izabela Jaroszynski features the story of a Singaporean dancer who had immigrated to Canada.