What if she can't find her babies father?

[Boracay]

So I've applied for my common law partner to come to Canada and now we're just playing the waiting game.
She is from The Philippines

She has a daughter almost 2 years old. My partner is planning on coming here alone. Her parents have been raising her daughter while she has been working in a different city to support them.

We've been talking about my partner getting here first and then once she's settled we can apply to bring her daughter here. But the problem is the babies father abandoned her. Even on the babies birth certificate it says "Unknown" as the Father. We're concerned because I believe it's Canada's law that the father must sign for permission for the daughter to come here.

But what if he's nowhere to be found. There must be a way as I'm sure she's not the only woman in that situation.

[AmericaninQuebec]

The name of the father has been omitted from the birth certificate, and so generally he would retain no legal rights as a parent. There is, for all intents and purposes, no father. Therefore, even if she could locate the gentleman she knows to be the father he would have no legal right to sign any forms as the father. Since no one can sign the permission form as the father, so therefore there is no need for such a permission form.

I would recommend though confirming this with both an immigration lawyer in Canada and possibly the Philippines.

[AllisonVSC]

I have no direct experience with this ...I believe I have seen this come up on the forum before, but I can not find the thread now. From what I remember, the advice was to use every means possible to locate the absent father, and to provide proof that attempts were made to locate him. So for example, write certified letters to last known address, post classified ad in local newspaper, attempt to contact friends and relatives, places of work, etc. and document the effort.

[emrn]

So I've applied for my common law partner to come to Canada and now we're just playing the waiting game.
She is from The Philippines

She has a daughter almost 2 years old. My partner is planning on coming here alone. Her parents have been raising her daughter while she has been working in a different city to support them.

We've been talking about my partner getting here first and then once she's settled we can apply to bring her daughter here. But the problem is the babies father abandoned her. Even on the babies birth certificate it says "Unknown" as the Father. We're concerned because I believe it's Canada's law that the father must sign for permission for the daughter to come here.

But what if he's nowhere to be found. There must be a way as I'm sure she's not the only woman in that situation.

You can go to DSWD Department of Social Welfare and Development that the custody of the child is with ur common law wife. And since the father wasn't declared in the birth certificate it means he wasn't acknowledged and he didn't acknowledge the child. Or u can adopt her so u can be the father.

[RobsLuv]

I'm not a lawyer - and I agree with AmericaninQuebec that you should consult with a qualified immigration attorney to confirm this, but I believe that it's legally considered "sole custody" for the mother when there is no father named on the birth certificate.  CIC is not going to require permission to immigrate from a biological father who has no legal right to the child.  I think it would be really, really important to make sure that the birth certificate is absolutely certified as authentic when it's submitted - so there are no questions - but, with an authentic b/c, I doubt you'd have issues with CIC on custody.  

My question to you would be this: why would you/she wait until later to sponsor the child to Canada?  She will have to be included on her mother's application anyway - and will have to undergo medical examination, too - even if she is designated non-accompanying.  Unless there is some specific reason the two of you do not want the child to come to Canada with her mother, my advice would be to go ahead and list her as accompanying and eliminate the need to go through a whole new application process - with additional fees, a new medical exam and another long wait time - to bring her here later.  There are no additional eligibility requirements for you, as a sponsor of your c/l partner, if you want to also sponsor her child.  You do not have to adopt her, meet financial qualification or anything else and, as I already mentioned, the child still has to be included and undergo examination as part of her mother's application anyway - even if she's listed as "non-accompanying".  Just be sure you're informed about this decision and consider carefully before you submit your partner's application - don't just eliminate the child as coming now because you're worried about the custody matter.    

[Boracay]

ok....I had thought it's bad news because it said Unknown for the Father but maybe it can work in our favour.
We made a point to mention in a notarized letter that although the birth certificate says unknown that she does know who the Father is, we stated his name and also stated that she has had no contact with him and has no idea how to find him.

We mentioned that because we didn't want the officer to be confused as to who the child's Father is. It's a complicated matter. She's legally married to another man from Nepal, who is not the babies father. To make a long story short she got pregnant and abandoned and then her Father forced her to marry another man. After just 1 day of her so-called marriage she ran away leaving her baby with her Mother and Father.

Divorce is illegal in The Philippines and her abandoning him is not grounds for an annulment. So we're applying as Common-Law as we've lived together over a year. So in the application we've done our best to ensure she has no ties whatsoever to him. And because of that we ensured that we mentioned the babies real father and the story behind that so the VO is not confused.

About 6 months later she met me briefly, then we reconnected when I cam back to The Philippines a year later. Fell in love, moved in together and over a year later we're in the situation we're in now. I'm back in Canada.

So being that's it's complicated with the 1 day fishy marriage I wanted to 100% be clear that the officer doesn't think that the baby is Nepalese man that she is legally married to as they ever spent even 1 night with him.

ugh!! what a mess ...poor girl hasn't had good luck in the past

.........

RobsLuv

We have already applied as her daughter non-accompanying. We've already got her daughter medical tests done. My partner's parents are still taking care of her daughter, while my partner is working on a different island. We spoke about bringing her daughter here right away but decided not to as we want to get our feet firmly planted in the ground first.
My life kind of fell apart financially waiting out our 1 year term so we could be common law, and now that I'm back I'm slowly working on fixing that. And when my partner comes I really want her to get a feel for the environment here. Know her way around, make friends, get a job and do everything a normal Canadian does.

I think then we can apply for her daughter to come here and by then we'll be able to get a proper sized apartment instead of the bachelor I'm in, and enough money to ensure baby has a good life and an excellent support system.

I guess there's a lot more to it then that, but for some reason we feel it's better to wait and then apply.
I just hope the officer doesn't have any problems with that.