September 11th and Canadian Immigration
...pplicants will be obligated to pay more fees as well as show a significant amount of settlement funds in order to qualify (Abrams, 2). It costs approximately $550 each for the applicant, spouse and dependent in immigration fees. The fees may sound fair from the standpoint of a rich person or someone coming from a country with a good economy and currency value, but the total may be a large amount for some people to handle considering that afterwards, they need to show money in available funds as well. A family of three used to need C $12, 939 but under the new regulations, they need to demonstrate that they have at least C $27, 805 in available funds ready. $28, 000 is an outrageous amount of money for a family of three and this is after all the crazy immigration fees have been paid for. Though all the new implementations may have valid arguments, the fact of the matter remains that due to these new changes, immigrants will be evaluated tougher and harsher than before. If the tough criterion was not enough, now racial profiling has also founds its way into Canada’s immigration policies. Even though Canada was marketing itself as getting “tough on criminals,” the hard fact remains up front that by “getting tough,” Canadian Immigration officials have become racist and racial profiling has occurred (Singer, 2). People from the Middle East have been targeted and have been discriminated against. They have either been evaluated harsher than others or have been discriminated during their evaluations. By getting harsh on immigrants, there will be more and more racial profiling and racism against people from specific backgrounds. That might be able to prevent terrorists from entering Canada but will also make life even more miserable for innocent people trying to immigrate to Canada. According to the new regulations, it will now be easier for families to immigrate to Canada however, individuals, especially males, will suffer since they will be evaluated with a tougher system (Singer, 2). The new point system for Independent/Skilled Workers requires a minimum of 75 points to pass out of a possible 100. Half of the points are split into Education and Language which come up as the deciding factors. Once again, some people may be evaluated more strictly than others due to their ethnic backgrounds and this has already started to occur. It is quite evident that this has occurred in the United States and Canada has also been following suit, not only with Immigrants but with Refugees as well. Canada’s refugee policy, which was very open before, has also become tough and is blocking and deterring refugees in need of getting safe-haven in Canada (Stock, 1). In June of 2002, Canada signed the safe third country agreement with the United States. Under the agreement, Canada would designate the United States as a 'safe third country' meaning that any refugee claimant who came to Canada via the United States would be returned to the U.S. An estimated 14,000 refugees used the U.S. to reach Canada in 2001 and they will all be returned to the U.S. where they are either put in detention, or deported back to their country. Once again this is an arguable topic however, refugees who are in dire need of asylum will be eventually sent back home. Through all the regulations and implementations, Canada’s immigration policy has become much more racist than before and has led to the suffering of numerous innocent people. If immigration was not enough, the new laws have also tangled themselves with the post-immigration process and hurt residing immigrants. The implementation of the new Permanent Resident, or Maple Leaf, Card which will be issued to new immigrants arriving to Canada in order to keep track of their whereabouts and indicate their status has caused much controversy (Abrams, 5). The new card acts as a “tracking device” in order to keep track of residents and check how long they have resided in Canada. The card will act as a proof of residence so that the Immigration Department knows where the resident has been and how long they have stayed in Canada. Not only that but grants of citizenship can now be nullified within five years, if officials learn the applicant did not qualify in the first place because of a criminal record or use of false identity, without court intervention (Thompson, 2). Although this is a very smart decision, some i...