50-year immigration wait stuns lawyers and families, but IRCC says it’s no mistake

2025/10/21 Leave a comment

Highlights immigration policy and program management failures and the impact of people’s lives on government trying to correct for these failures:

Processing times for Canadian immigration applications have reached unprecedented lengths — up to 50 years under some permanent residency programs — stunning applicants and lawyers who say the system has become unviable.

“We were shocked,” said Olha Kushko, whose family fled Kyiv and settled in Ottawa in 2023 under the Canada-Ukraine Authorization for Emergency Travel (CUAET), a special measure introduced after Russia’s full-scale invasion.

“It doesn’t have any sense. I don’t know how it’s possible, so I can’t believe it,” Kushko said.

Families who recently applied for permanent residence (PR) under Canada’s humanitarian and compassionate stream face waits of 12 to 600 months, according to the new immigration minister’s May 2025 “transition binder”.

Other economic immigration programs list similar waits: 

Up to 108 months (nine years) for the caregivers pathway.

Up to 228 months (19 years) for the agri-food stream.

Up to 420 months (35 years) for entrepreneurs under the startup visa stream. 

Lawyers say these skyrocketing processing times published by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) are unheard of, and some fear mass cancellation of applications if the Liberal government passes its strong borders bills, which would grant the minister sweeping new powers.

Source: 50-year immigration wait stuns lawyers and families, but IRCC says it’s no mistake

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Immigration program for parents ‘discriminatory,’ Federal Court of Appeal rules

2015/02/07 Leave a comment

42 days vs 37 months:

In 2010, Attaran complained to the Canadian Human Rights Commission, claiming that the program discriminated against parents and grandparents by delaying the processing of their applications.

At the time of his complaint, it took immigration 42 days to screen the sponsors of spouses and children but the same screening took 37 months for those who wanted to bring their parents and grandparents to Canada.

The commission, however, dismissed his complaint, a decision later upheld by a federal judge.

In a ruling released Wednesday, the Federal Court of Appeal said the decision by the human rights commission to dismiss the complaint was unreasonable.

It overturned the lower court decision that there was a “bona fide” justification for the differential treatment. The court referred Attaran’s case back to human rights commission for reconsideration.

“The explanations provided by CIC (Citizenship and Immigration Canada) confirm that it was differentiating adversely based on family status by treating sponsorship applications for parents more slowly than sponsorship applications for spouses and children,” wrote Justice Wyman W. Webb on behalf of the three-member panel. “As a result, CIC was carrying on a discriminatory practice.”

In dismissing Attaran’s complaint, the human rights watchdog had said it did not appear immigration officials treated the complainant in an “adverse differential manner based on age.” It also concluded that the delays do not deprive parents and grandparents the access to permanent residency.

“There is no reference to undue hardship . . . in the decision of the (human rights commission). There is a reference, though, to the justification being ministerial discretion and a general reference to challenges being imposed on ‘the resource allocation for’ CIC,” said the appeal court decision.

Immigration program for parents ‘discriminatory,’ Federal Court of Appeal rules | Toronto Star.

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