In between belonging: New ICC report sheds light on how newcomers feel about Canadian citizenship

2024/05/23 Leave a comment

Good informative analysis of those who have participated in Canoo, generating what I consider to be sensible recommendations (disclosure: I continue to work with ICC on citizenship data questions). I would however recommend a greater shift towards in-person ceremonies with specific public reporting on virtual and in-person with a performance target ideally at 80 percent or close to it:

Our analysis combines survey and interview data from newcomers participating in the Canoo Access Pass who shared their perspectives on Canadian citizenship and the various factors that influence their views on whether to naturalize.

To read the full report, click here.

While a majority of the permanent residents (PRs) surveyed express positive views on Canadian citizenship and either intend to apply or have already done so, a significant 21% remain uncertain or reluctant to apply. Through in-depth follow-up interviews with 40 respondents, we found the following factors play a role in shaping newcomers’ views on naturalization:

  • Dual Citizenship Restrictions and Economic Opportunities: For newcomers from countries with robust economies and stringent dual citizenship regulations, the allure of Canadian citizenship may be overshadowed by the advantages of retaining their original nationality. Economic prospects within and beyond Canada play a pivotal role in shaping individuals’ decisions.
  • Unmet Expectations and Integration Challenges: The journey to integration is often fraught with obstacles, from navigating the labour market to grappling with cultural nuances. Mismatches between preconceived notions and the realities of life in Canada can lead to feelings of isolation and hinder newcomers’ sense of belonging.
  • Challenges Accessing Support Services: Many newcomers report feeling adrift amidst the numerous integration services, highlighting a pressing need for specific accessible resources that foster a sense of community and facilitate a smoother transition to life in Canada.

In response to these findings, the ICC proposes the following recommendations to increase newcomer access and improve Canada’s citizenship program overall:

1. Establish Meaningful Naturalization Targets: Set ambitious yet achievable benchmarks for PRs to obtain citizenship within a specified timeframe, fostering a sense of purpose and belonging.

2. Enhance Accessibility of Citizenship Ceremonies: Make citizenship ceremonies more inclusive and publicly accessible, celebrating the diverse tapestry of Canadian identity.

3. Invest in Citizenship Promotion Programs: Allocate resources to initiatives that promote citizenship awareness and engagement, empowering newcomers to embrace their Canadian identity.

4. Prioritize Immigrant Satisfaction and Retention: Uphold immigrant satisfaction as a cornerstone of national policy, nurturing a welcoming environment that encourages long-term residency and civic participation.

Source: In between belonging: New ICC report sheds light on how newcomers feel about Canadian citizenship

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Adam Legge and Irfhan Rawji: Our immigration strategy is failing to deliver on its most important promise

2024/05/23 Leave a comment

Apart from proposing a shift in selection criteria (EE CRS) to provide more points for the trades, not specific recommendations. And arguably, the existing wealth of immigration-related data is adequate to assess overall impact on immigration’s contribution to the Canadian economy along with socioeconomic outcomes of immigrants:

Canada is a nation that has benefited tremendously from immigration. At its core, the promise of immigration is this: that new Canadians can come here from around the world, contribute to our economy and society, and build a great life for themselves, and that when they do, we will all collectively be better off for it.

The problem is, we have not been delivering on that promise.

In recent years, Canada’s immigration system has strayed, and while there are still many positives, it hasn’t been delivering as well for established Canadians and newcomers alike. Perhaps most importantly—and most frankly—is that it’s not making everyone better off, and Canadians are getting poorer.

Right now, Canada’s economy has stagnated. In fact, Canadians are no better off today than they were in 2014. And, with future productivity expectations in the gutter, our economy will not grow at the pace required to deliver opportunities for a growing population. All this has created frustration among Canadians, both long-established and new ones. Less than one-third of Canadians believe that our current approach to immigration is effective, and one-third of immigrants are unsure of their decision to move to Canada.

That’s a bad sign for Canada’s future. Future prosperity requires that the Canadian economy generates more value, not just because there are more of us, but because each one of us is better off. To get there, we need an enhanced approach and a renewed focus on the actual purpose of economic immigration: to generate prosperity for all. 

There are two main ways we need to do this:

  • Attracting and selecting the best candidates for economic immigration
  • Improving outcomes for newcomers themselves

On the selection of the best economic candidates, the statistics around this may surprise many Canadians. Today, about half of the people admitted into Canada in the economic category were not, in fact, selected for their economic contributions. They are the spouses and dependents of a primary economic immigrant. For every 10 newcomers to Canada, about three are personally selected for their economic contribution. While many of these additional people have great contributions to make to our economy as well, when we’re counting five-year-olds as economic immigrants, it’s no wonder we’re not seeing the level of economic boost we might expect.

Also, there are big gaps in how Canada decides which economic immigrants to select. Take as an example a person with a master’s degree in—because we need to pick something—Latin, versus a person with a certification as a heavy-duty mechanic.

All else held equal, the person with the master’s would receive more points than the mechanic, due simply to years of education, despite the fact that the mechanic has vastly higher average earning potential in Canada today. And, with full respect to both professions, Canada also needs far more heavy mechanics right now than we do TAs in Latin.

A clear needle-moving fix is to reform the points system used to better select economic immigrants, prioritizing those with higher earning potential over other measures. We should also make this system dynamic and update it frequently to account for changes in what skills our economy needs in real time.

On the second front, improving newcomer experience and outcomes, the fixes are clear but that doesn’t make them easy. The process needs to be streamlined and simplified. We need to connect newcomers to supports so they can find a home and a job as quickly as possible. More than all else, we need to make it much easier for newcomers to use their skills in the Canadian labour market. We must view it as economically and morally unacceptable to have people delivering Skip the Dishes who are trained as—and would prefer to be working as—physicians and engineers.

Finally, as every business person knows, what gets measured gets done. For our immigration system, we need to enhance it to deliver on its stated goal of making everyone better off. That requires tying our strategy to clear indicators of prosperity such as GDP growth per capita and directing our resources to best increase those metrics.  

There is a mandate for change. In a poll from Abacus, nearly 70 percent of Canadians feel the current immigration targets are too high. We owe it to all Canadians, from those who have been here the longest to the newest, to deliver on the promise of immigration and make everyone better off from it.

Source: Adam Legge and Irfhan Rawji: Our immigration strategy is failing to deliver on its most important promise

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Tasha Kheiriddin: Liberals stuck in vicious cycle of rising immigration and housing shortages

2024/05/23 Leave a comment

Self-imposed and hard to extract even if Minister Miller is making some progress. Kheiriddin and the Post supportive of unions:

…The policy incoherence here is mind-boggling. The Liberals’ high-volume immigration, international student, and foreign worker policies created a massive demand for housing, which they have attempted to fix by bringing in more foreign workers, pushing down wages for domestic labour and thus making life (and housing) more unaffordable for everybody. They need to fix this, starting by respecting union workers and incentivizing Canadians to enter the trades rather than importing cheap labour.

Otherwise, their circle isn’t just vicious — it’s cruel for domestic tradespeople and foreign workers alike, who see that under this government, the Canadian dream increasingly is just a mirage.

Source: Tasha Kheiriddin: Liberals stuck in vicious cycle of rising immigration and housing shortages

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Patrice Dutil: Parks Canada chooses identity politics over giving Sir John A. Macdonald his due

2024/05/23 Leave a comment

Valid critique. Parks Canada used to have a balanced approach in its interpretative displays that invariably provoked controversy from some groups for not totally accepting their narrative from my experience with the Canadian Historical Recognition Program.

Just as Canadian Heritage had trouble adjusting to the Harper government, seems like Parks Canada will be due for a reckoning should the Conservatives, as is likely, form the next government:

Parks Canada launched its new characterization of Sir John A. Macdonald over the Victoria Day long weekend when it reopened Bellevue House in Kingston, Ontario after six long years of restoration. The spectacle, steeped in identity politics, has rightly been criticized for portraying our founding prime minister as among Canada’s worst-ever villains. 

For fans of Canadian architecture and home design and for friends of history, this was an important event. Bellevue House is a gem in the Canadian urban landscape. It was built in 1840 for a prosperous Kingston merchant in an improbable Italian Villa style that features a square central tower and two wings deployed on either side. Think of it as a proud Canada goose standing and opening its wings, inviting visitors inside. It is as welcoming today as it was when I first visited it as part of a school field trip in grade 7, well over 50 years ago.

Macdonald rented the place for about a year in 1848-1849. Back in those days, it was located in the suburbs of Kingston and he had picked it as a place of rest for his wife Isabella who had given birth to their first child John Jr. It was a big house—far too big for a small family—and it was expensive. Sadly, it turned out to be the place of terrible tragedy for the young couple, as their son died there before he was barely a year old. 

In Macdonald’s long and impressive life, Bellevue House is nothing but an asterisk. His stay was short, no big decisions were hatched there, he never owned it, and he did not even write about it. Two other places in Canada are far more important: the Macdonald-Mowat House on St. George Street in Toronto, which has been beautifully restored by the University of Toronto, and Earnscliffe, Macdonald’s grand home overlooking the Ottawa River in Ottawa, which has long been owned by the British government (it serves as the private residence of the British High Commissioner). 

Ottawa bought Bellevue House in 1964 in preparation for Canada’s Centennial. It was opened as a historic park three years later. Because of its association with Canada’s first prime minister, a connection between exquisite architecture and politics was cemented. 

The Trudeau government had choices to make when it closed the house for long-overdue repairs in 2017 (it had suffered neglect and its visiting hours had been reduced by the Harper government). It could have sold it for redevelopment. It could have negotiated an arrangement with Kingston so as to offer much-needed museum space to a beautiful city that has done everything to show it no longer wants any association with its most famous resident. 

It could have approached nearby Queen’s University to make the place useful all year round to students (instead it will be mothballed for eight months each year). It could have made it a museum dedicated to Indigenous Peoples or to Canada’s multiculturalism. Why not a museum dedicated to Canada’s workers? Instead, it decided to keep Bellevue House fixated on Macdonald. The website for the national historical site now opens with telling lines. From the second word, the link is made between Macdonald and the First Nations: 

Hello, Shé:kon, Aaniin. At Bellevue House National Historic Site, many voices present the complex legacy of Canada’s first prime minister, Sir John A. Macdonald. Come for the experience, engage with the stories, and join the conversation about Canadian history.

It continues:

Don’t miss this opportunity to experience the history of Sir John A. Macdonald in the 1840’s setting, while engaging in conversations about the complex and lasting legacies of Canada’s first prime minister.

There is no hint of official bilingualism. Nothing about nation-building, about the achievement of institutionalizing Confederation, or about the hardships of politically uniting a difficult country. Not a word about the economic difficulties that marked Macdonald’s time, or about the massive emigration from Canada in those years. Nothing about the hardships of women in the 19th century, or about the children who were lucky to survive past age 10 and who were typically sent to work from that point onwards. 

Instead, the re-opening of the historic Bellevue House provides yet another embarrassing display of national flagellation, triggered by the adoption of the Trudeau government’s Framework for History and Commemoration (2019), a short-signed guideline not designed to enlighten but instead to demonize Canada’s past and those who (mostly volunteered) to preserve it. 

The opening ceremonies were clear: the mission of the reborn national site is not to celebrate Kingston’s most important (by far) citizen, a man who led a national party to six electoral majorities and who was joyously celebrated in his own lifetime even by his adversaries, but to trot out the usual tropes: he was a racist, a drunk, a man who hated Indigenous peoples to the point of starving them or forcing them to go to school. A man who probably did not like women or immigrants either. Couched in terms of a “timely conversation” the Parks Canada staff’s apparently closed-door consultations with local Indigenous groups recrafted the focus to be Macdonald-Bellevue. 

Not surprisingly, there is a display about residential schools. Academic Channon Oyeniran gave introductory remarks at the reopening ceremony and talked about how the event was a “testament” to the “rewriting of this history.” She was being honest. No known historian of Macdonald, Kingston, or Victorian Upper Canada was even invited.

Dan Maracle, the chief of the Mohawks of the Bay of Quinte, was quoted as saying that Bellevue “Now does a better job of encompassing all of Macdonald’s legacy,” urging Canadians “to learn more about the country’s Indigenous Peoples and their culture.” He continued: “If you learn about the history of the country, then that might actually create a desire to do better in the future.” One has to ask: what would Chief Maracle do without Macdonald the villain?

The reality is that Bellevue House is a fake, as it has always been. Its architecture was borrowed from a place far away and its association with John and Isabella Macdonald was tenuous at best. There are no Macdonald artifacts on display (except, maybe, a crib) because the family was house-poor and had little in the way of furniture—Macdonald was 34 years old, barely earning a living as a lawyer, with no money to buy the expensive items that are now on display and presented as totems of privilege. 

To add insult to injury, Bellevue House will now be used to heave all the ills of the Victorian era on Macdonald’s shoulders. Ignoring the fact that he was the product of democracy, today the government of Canada, which he helped create, continues to ransack the history of the country and goes out of its way to ensure Macdonald gets a kicking. 

The debacle at Bellevue House shows just how Prime Minister Trudeau continues to lead the march of the historical boodle brigade. His first step was to jettison Sir Hector Langevin, Macdonald’s favourite minister (a stalwart Quebec federalist who was as loyal and he was hard-working as minister of public works). The prime minister then did nothing to denounce the vandalism of Macdonald statues on his watch. Instead, he continuously disparages the politics and policies of his predecessors (Liberals included). 

Among his final gestures will be this fiasco at Bellevue House. For this government cannot miss an opportunity, however small, to kneecap its first prime minister’s reputation. On the other hand, there will be plenty of opportunities to boycott Bellevue House.

Source: Patrice Dutil: Parks Canada chooses identity politics over giving Sir John A. Macdonald his due

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Active presence of immigrants in Canada: Recent trends in tax filing and employment incidence

2024/05/23 Leave a comment

Interesting and relevant way to measure integration and assess emigration rates. Findings make intuitive sense:

…Increased tax-filing rates of immigrants across arrival cohorts

The tax-filing rate in the first full year is a key indicator of immigrant retention, as an earlier study found that over half of immigrants who emigrated did not file income tax in their first year after arrival. This suggests that many immigrants make decisions about leaving shortly after immigration (Aydemir & Robinson, 2008).

Among immigrants aged 20 to 54 at landing, the rate of filing an income tax return in the first full year after landing remained stable from the 1990-to-1994 cohort to the 2000-to-2004 cohort. However, it increased for cohorts that arrived since the mid-2000s (Table 1). About 90% of the 2015-to-2019 and 2020 cohorts filed a tax return in the first full year after immigration, compared with 85% among the 2005-to-2009 cohort. …

The rise in first-year tax-filing rates since the mid-2010s was widespread, spanning both men and women, age groups, educational levels, official language profiles, and most source regions. This increase was also observed across admission programs, except for a slight decline among immigrants in the Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) from the 2010-to-2014 cohort to the 2020 cohort. 

The tax-filing rate in the fifth year after immigration increased steadily from the 1990-to-1994 cohort to the 2010-to-2014 cohort. Again, this uptrend was observed across immigrants with diverse sociodemographic backgrounds. However, among PNP immigrants, the filing rate in the fifth year remained relatively stable from the 2000-to-2004 cohort onward, following a decline from the 1995-to-1999 cohort. Additionally, there was a marginal decrease among immigrants from Northern Europe in the 2010-to-2014 cohort.

The tax-filing rate in the 10th year after immigration was higher among immigrants who arrived in the 2000s than among those who arrived in the 1990s. However, there was minimal change between those who arrived in the early 2000s and the late 2000s. These trends remained consistent across immigrants with various sociodemographic characteristics.

Tax-filing rates, specifically in the 5th and 10th years after immigration, were generally lower among immigrants in the Federal Skilled Worker Program and Canadian Experience Class, compared with family class immigrants and refugees. These rates were also relatively lower among immigrants with graduate degrees and those originating from the United States, and Northern and Western Europe. The literature suggests that highly skilled immigrants are more mobile and tend to explore better opportunities in the international labour market or return to their home countries when they cannot fully utilize their skills in the destination country (Aydemir & Robinson, 2008)….

Source: Active presence of immigrants in Canada: Recent trends in tax filing and employment incidence

Filed under Immigration, Integration Tagged with ,

Federal panel lists 35 ‘plausible’ future threats to Canada and the world

2024/05/22 Leave a comment

Of interest and not necessarily encouraging. Some have noted absence of possible regional or global war (given that at least two significant ones ongoing at present):

In a new report, a think-tank within Employment and Social Development Canada cites 35 “plausible” global disruptions that could reshape Canada and the world in the near future.

The Policy Horizons Canada (PHC) panel drafted the list and then asked more than 500 stakeholders within and outside government to suggest which ones were more likely, when they might happen and how one might trigger others.

The authors of the report point out that the list is an exploration of theoretical — not guaranteed — threats. They say that even “seemingly distant or improbable” calamities can become reality and thinking about them helps governments create “robust and resilient policies.”

Leading the report’s top ten list — those threats that could have the greatest impacts and are most likely to happen — is the threat to truth.

PHC’s report says that in as little as three years, the world’s “information ecosystem” could be flooded with misinformation and disinformation created by both people and artificial intelligence (AI).

It warns that algorithms designed to engage audiences emotionally rather than factually could “increase distrust and social fragmentation,” isolating people in “separate realities shaped by their personal media …”

“Public decision making could be compromised as institutions struggle to effectively communicate key messaging on education, public health, research and government information,” the report says.

The second and third threats on the top ten list are environmental: ecosystem collapse due to loss of biodiversity and extreme weather events overwhelming our ability to respond.

In five to six years, the report says, a collapse in biodiversity “could have cascading impacts on all living things, putting basic human needs such as clean air, water and food in jeopardy.”

It says that impacts on key industries like farming, fishing and logging could lead to “major economic loss,” leaving people unable to “meet their basic needs.”

The report warns the increasing frequency of wildfires, floods and severe storms could destroy property and infrastructure, displacing millions of people and worsening the mental health crisis.

AI could run wild

In as little as four to five years, cyber attacks could disable critical infrastructure and billionaires could use their influence to run the world, the PHC warns.

The report says that cyber attacks on critical infrastructure could leave governments struggling to deliver services and compromise access to essential goods.

And in five years, the report says, the super-rich could use their influence to shape public policy and impose their values and beliefs on the world, “bypassing democratic governance principles.”

“As their power grows, billionaires could gain warfare capabilities and control over natural resources and strategic assets,” the report says. “Some might co-opt national foreign policy or take unilateral diplomatic or military action, destabilizing international relations.”…

Source: Federal panel lists 35 ‘plausible’ future threats to Canada and the world

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Karas: Canada must tackle rising antisemitism and security risks:Karas:

2024/05/22 Leave a comment

Illustration of fears of some regarding the possible security risks, not totally unfounded:

The federal government’s plan to allow Palestinians from Gaza to come to Canada presents serious security risks.

Despite the screening protocols associated with the temporary measures for Gazans who have relatives in Canada, the prospect of a significant influx of Gazans raises legitimate concerns about the exacerbation of rising antisemitism, the incitement of violence against Jewish Canadians, and the escalation of social unrest.

Recent anti-Israel and antisemitic organized protests, such as unauthorized campus encampments at universities countrywide, highlight the pressing need for immediate government action and strict security measures.

It is no secret that the Canadian government has faced critical challenges in facilitating the relocation of Palestinians from Gaza. Despite processing close to a thousand applications, as of now, not a single individual has been granted admission under the program.

A primary hurdle arises from the difficulties faced by many visa applicants when attempting to enter Egypt for mandatory biometric screening. According to the former Canadian ambassador to Israel, Jon Allen, individuals from Gaza have used alternative routes, arranging costly departures through private Egyptian firms that allegedly engage in bribery involving Egyptian border guards and possibly Hamas operatives.

Concerns regarding the unofficial methods employed by Gazans at the Rafah border crossing into Egypt have led to visa cancellations on security grounds by Australia and other countries.

Controversy also surrounds the document requirements for Gazans seeking visas. Applicants must have up-to-date passports and provide thorough disclosure of personal backgrounds, encompassing employment records and social media activity. Critics argue that these measures are overly invasive and hard to comply with, and have pushed for more lenient criteria.

However, robust screening procedures are essential for safeguarding national security. If anything, the program’s inability to admit even a single Gazan who passes all security screenings and is allowed entry through legitimate channels emphasizes the immense challenge of vetting individuals from this region. It also highlights the considerable security risks tied to this temporary program initiative….

Source: Canada must tackle rising antisemitism and security risks

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“La France, tu l’aimes mais tu la quittes” : pourquoi des musulmans surdiplômés choisissent l’exil

2024/05/22 Leave a comment

One could likely, for a StatsCan fee, obtain data on the religion and visible minority background of immigrants from France by immigration period and category to further quantify this qualitative study:

C’est un phénomène inquantifiable. De plus en plus de Français de culture ou de religion musulmanes, issus de l’immigration postcoloniale, très diplômés, quitteraient la France pour s’installer au Royaume-Uni, au Canada, aux États-Unis, à Dubaï mais aussi au Maghreb. C’est ce qu’affirme l’enquête “La France, tu l’aimes mais tu la quittes” (éd. du Seuil), un titre en forme de clin d’œil au slogan de l’extrême droite “La France, aimez-la ou quittez-la” en vogue dans les années 1980.

Entre 2011 et 2023, trois universitaires, Olivier Esteves, Alice Picard et Julien Talpin, ont interrogé 1 070 personnes à l’aide d’un appel à témoignages lancé sur Mediapart puis mené 139 entretiens approfondis. Leur constat est sans appel : des Français de confession musulmane, pratiquants ou non, peinent à trouver leur place en France malgré des parcours universitaires accomplis (54 % des sondés ont un bac+5). Victimes de discriminations en raison de leur nom, leur apparence ou leur religion, de microagressions, les personnes interrogées témoignent d’une “islamophobie” devenue insupportable au point de choisir l’exil. Un phénomène exacerbé depuis les attentats de 2015 mais aussi par le discours antimusulman de certains politiques. “L’islam n’est pas compatible avec la France”, affirmait ainsi en 2021 celui qui allait devenir le candidat à la présidentielle du parti d’extrême droite Reconquête!, Éric Zemmour. Entretien avec Olivier Esteves, coauteur de l’ouvrage et professeur des universités en civilisation des pays anglophones à l’université de Lille.

Source: “La France, tu l’aimes mais tu la quittes” : pourquoi des musulmans surdiplômés choisissent l’exil

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Barbara Kay: Radical Islam’s western fangirls

2024/05/22 Leave a comment

Not a great fan of Kay in general but I have to admit having similar questions (as with LGBTQ). Remember a tweet from one asking why Iranian Canadians were not similarly supportive with the obvious reason most of them fled the Islamic Republic of Iran:

….Hamas’s leaders knew that in these quarters, their atrocities would be perceived through a political rather than a moral lens. So they correctly assumed their pogrom would be characterized as “resistance” rather than wanton iniquity.

Hamas terrorists didn’t even shy away from filming themselves torturing women and children, which they should have considered a risk. After all, plangent appeals for the world to condemn Israel’s alleged genocide in Gaza, based on the war deaths of their own women and children, are a staple of the pro-Palestinian party line. The sight of the bloodied and raped female victims on October 7 could have been — should have been — a deal-breaker for feminists everywhere.

But it seems Hamas knew their female audience, too. One of the striking features about Hamas’s useful-idiot entourage is the robust support it enjoys from progressive women, in glaring contrast to the robust revulsion that should have prevailed among feminists.

Some women have publicly denied the vicious sexual torture inflicted on Israeli women, or shrugged it off as a sidebar to the sacred mission of “resistance.” This, they parrot, may entail “any means necessary,” including the degradation of women for no purpose other than malicious male pleasure. Evidence of western women’s indifference to Israeli women’s victimhood can be found in the fact that UN Women waited for months after the pogrom before condemning the rapes or Hamas.

A subset of anti-Zionist women appear to have taken their support to the next level. On some campuses, protesters are taking part in Islamic prayers. At UCLA, and elsewhere, to the consternation of some Muslim women living under Islamic regimes where the hijab is a symbol of oppression, some white female students bowing down in submission to Allah have taken to wearing hijabs in solidarity with their Palestinian comrades. Some young people have even reportedly converted to Islam as a result of the Israel-Hamas war, and others may soon follow suit….

Source: Barbara Kay: Radical Islam’s western fangirls

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Fears of new Windrush as thousands of UK immigrants face ‘cliff edge’ visa change

2024/05/22 Leave a comment

Of note, more an implementation issue than policy (where governments often fall short):

Lawyers and migrant rights campaigners have warned that the government is heading for a repeat of the Windrush scandal after imposing a “cliff edge” deadline for immigrants to switch to new digital visas.

By the end of this year an estimated 500,000 or more non-EU immigrants with leave to remain in the UK will need to replace their physical biometric residence permits (BRPs) – which demonstrate proof of their right to reside, rent, work and claim benefits – with digital e-visas.

In order to access their e-visa, people will need to open a UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) digital account. The Home Office has recently emailed invitations for a trial group of BRP holders to open digital accounts, but as many migrants used their solicitors’ email address as their Home Office contact, many have gone to lawyers rather than the immigrants themselves.

In addition, because personal details were excluded from the invitations for data security reasons, the lawyers would have no idea which of their potentially thousands of clients the emails were meant for, meaning they could not forward them on.

“After 31 December, a person without access to their e-visa will be un­able to prove their status in the UK,” said Zoe Bantleman, legal director at the Immigration Law Practitioners’ Association. “The Home Office has placed them in a similar situation to members of the Windrush generation. They have status, but they cannot prove it.

“Given the poor reach of Home Office communications on the issue, it is fair to assume that there will be thousands of people who do not apply for an e-visa before the end of 2024.”

From this summer any BRP holder can open a UKVI digital account without an invitation. But immigration lawyers fear the government’s planned publicity drive will miss many older or poorer people who may not speak English as their first language or do not have ready access to the internet.

Zoe Dexter, housing and welfare manager at human rights charity the Helen Bamber Foundation, described the government’s plans as chaotic. She said: “The Home Office’s move to digitise proof of identity is bound to take a huge financial toll on hundreds of thousands of people, including refugees and survivors of trafficking and torture, whose proof of ID is linked to the benefits they receive.”

Critics warn the Home Office does not have measures in place to deal with possible technical failures, and that it has created a cliff edge with its deadline. People can still apply for a UKVI digital account after 31 December, but if they are not aware of the new rules they may only discover this when they are unable to prove their right to return from holiday or claim benefits, leading to disruption.

“This is a recipe for disaster,” said Bethan Lant of migrant rights charity Praxis. “People will be un­able to evidence their status through no fault of their own, because the Home Office has not communicated well and has given them a cliff edge after which they are going to struggle to access even the basics. We’re not saying don’t go digital, we’re not saying ‘don’t do this’. We’re saying engage better, do it carefully, do it softly, do it over a period of time.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “E-visas provide secure confirmation of someone’s UK immigration status, enhance security and bring cost savings for the UK public. They also offer greater convenience for customers and status checkers, using tried and tested technology. Our April phased launch marked an important step towards replacing physical documents with e-visas by 2025, a key part of the transformation and digitisation of the UK’s border and immigration system.

Source: Fears of new Windrush as thousands of UK immigrants face ‘cliff edge’ visa change

Filed under Immigration Tagged with , , ,

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