Between October 13th and November 3rd, Canadian citizens and permanent residents can submit interest to sponsor forms on Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada’s (IRCC) website. After November 3rd, IRCC will conduct a lottery and invite candidates to submit sponsorship applications to bring their parents and grandparents to Canada. IRCC will accept up to 10,000 applications for the 2020 PGP window.
The PGP’s benefits are clear for Canadian citizens and permanent residents who bring their parents and grandparents to Canada. They get to reunite with their loved ones. Their parents and grandparents enjoy the complete benefits of being permanent residents like the power to work in Canada, access health care, and eventually earn the proper to become Canadian citizens.
Benefits of this programs for families are that in addition to supplementing the household income, parents and grandparents enable their children and grandchildren to figure more hours. The reason for this is often that parents and grandparents can provide child care, giving the remainder of the family more flexibility to pursue economic opportunity.
In the past, Canadian government surveys have found that the PGP is among the smallest amount popular immigration streams among Canadians. This is understandable given the perception that parents and grandparents contribute little to the Canadian economy, and are likely to be a big expense on social services like health care, but it’s important to recollect that Canada mitigates these concerns in several major ways. First, parents and grandparents account for just 6 per cent of the entire number of immigrants Canada welcomes during a typical year.
In order to immigrate to Canada, parents and grandparents, a bit like all immigrants, got to pass a medical screening authorized by the Canadian government to make sure they do not create excessive demand on Canada’s health care system.
Canada imposes a 20-year undertaking period on those that sponsor their parents and grandparents. This means that sponsors sign a contract with the Canadian government that they’re going to be financially liable for their parents and grandparents for 20 years from the date their family member obtains permanent residence. During this complete period, the sponsor is legally obligated to repay any supplementary benefit that’s collected by their parents or grandparents. This leads to very low supplementary benefit utilization by parents and grandparents.
Canada seeks to pursue economic, social, and humanitarian goals through its immigration system. It wants immigrants to profit the economy, and thus it selects nearly 60 per cent of its immigrants under the economic class. It also seeks to reunite families which is why it operates the parents and Grandparents Program. While it shouldn’t be viewed through an economic lens, a case can certainly be made that the parents and Grandparents Program does help the Canadian economy.