The Hongcouver | Citizenship revamp: New Canadians no longer have to intend to live in Canada

Trudeau government’s ‘total reversal’ of Tory policy also slashes residency requirements and gives credit for time spent as visitors or students

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Dragon dancers perform during a Chinese New Year Parade through Vancouver’s Chinatown on February 16. Photo: Xinhua

Published: 5:30am, 2 Mar 2016Updated: 3:24pm, 2 Mar 2016

When Canada’s new Liberal government last week unveiled its sweeping rollback of the ousted Conservatives’ citizenship crackdown, much of the focus was on the decision to remove terrorism as grounds for revoking dual citizenship.

But the amendments also carry huge implications for anyone who simply heads back to their country of origin after obtaining a Canadian passport. This modern phenomenon of reverse migration is one that has been thoroughly embraced by tens of thousands Hong Kong and mainland Chinese immigrants alike, to varying degrees of legality.

The changes, for the most part, put things back the way they were in 2014.

Canada's Immigration Minister John McCallum says dual citizens should be treated no differently than native-born sole-citizenship Canadians. Photo: Reuters

The proposed amendments to the Citizenship Act, unveiled last Thursday, remove the requirement that new citizens must intend to live in Canada after obtaining citizenship. According to the government, the intent-to-reside provision “created concern among some new Canadians, who feared their citizenship could be revoked in the future if they moved outside of Canada”.

[Previously,] citizenship was harder to obtain and easier to lose; now it’s easier to obtain and much harder to lose

Immigration lawyer Richard Kurland

The proposals also shorten the period of physical presence required of new citizens to three years (1,095 days) out of the previous five, compared to four years out of six under the Tories; allow periods of non-permanent presence in Canada – for instance, time spent as a student, temporary worker or even a visitor – to be credited among those three years (albeit up to a maximum of one years’ credit, with each full day of non-permanent residency counting as half a day); and shrink the age band for applicants who must pass language tests, from 18-54, compared to 14-64 previously.

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