Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth’ rules

[sazamizi]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

Well said.

Thanks,
S.

You know what, every developing country has an air quality issue. I think Hanoi, Manila, Jakarta, New Delhi, Kuala Lumpur, etc are just as pollute as any city in China or even worse. Canada has a good quality of air because the population is much less, and there is almost no factory here. In US, with much more population but still less factories than China, pollution is worse than Canada. In China, some cities alone has about 150 million of population (the whole Canada = 30 million) and being the factory of the world, there is no way air quality can be better than US, let alone Canada or Swiss.
And fyi, Singapore has more mainland Chinese than Canada, it's just very difficult to immigrate to Singapore, so most of their status are not PR or citizen. But they park their money there much more than they do in Canada. Here they just park it mostly as property assets. In Singapore, they park it there as properties and investment fund. That's why the government of Singapore imposed a stamp fee of 18% for foreigners buying property and make it very difficult to get mortgage, to stop mainland Chinese from buying the whole country.

 

[keesio]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

it's just very difficult to immigrate to Singapore, so most of their status are not PR or citizen.

exactly.

 

[Charlamag]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

I don't see this as a negative thing nor do I see it as anti-immigrant.

 

[paw339]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

Only children born in Canada to people who have the right to live in Canada permanently should get Canadian citizenship. Everyone else just gets the parents Citizenship. Sensible change IMO and long overdue.

New Zealand brought this change several years ago and it didn't cause any problems but did stop a growing problem with "birth tourism"

 

[Rayan14]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

Only children born in Canada to people who have the right to live in Canada permanently should get Canadian citizenship. Everyone else just gets the parents Citizenship. Sensible change IMO and long overdue.

New Zealand brought this change several years ago and it didn't cause any problems but did stop a growing problem with "birth tourism"

Britain is now doing the same. No more automatic citizenship to non-citizen parents/individuals.

 

[Msafiri]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

Britain is now doing the same. No more automatic citizenship to non-citizen parents/individuals.

1. Birth in the UK effective January 1, 1983 as per the British Nationality Act (BNA) 1981 no longer confers UK citizenship unless one of the parents has settled status = Permanent residence or British Citizenship. There was a legitimacy issue pre 2006 iirc where if the parent was the father then he had to be married to the mother. It was quashed for being discriminatory.

2. Canada and the US have a different situation. In the US the constitution protects soil birth right and was put in place to protect the right of slaves to live in the US post emancipation. Amending the constitution isn't easy.

3. Canada has a demographic issue and requires immigration to sustain let alone increase population growth - you and I need more bodies paying into the CRA pot so when we are septuagenarians have a steady (albeit minimal) pension coming in eh! The UK is an island half the size of AB with double the population of Canada most of them in England. Add in EU migration (which the British Government can't really control) under EU treaty rights and its a whole different ball game.

4. Add to this that in Canada and the US the 'anchor' baby isn't able to help you until they are the age of majority, have a minimal income and are on the hook for all/most of the welfare you will claim. At some point in time the parent sponsorship will inevitably be removed - its hard to explain why your parents have to live with you really when you are an adult eh?

5. For the said demographic reason the soil birth right in Canada is at this time rhetoric. It could and should have been included in Bill C-24. Once you cover/include a clause to deal with 'statelessness' then what is the argument? Registering of births shouldn't have major changes. The issue is amending any systems that require PR/Citizenship status for eligibility such as the issuance of passports..in this case where birth is after date y (birth on soil no longer confers citizenship) then additional documents from the parents is required. This is what happens in other countries including the UK.

 

[sazamizi]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

Fair enough !

1. Birth in the UK effective January 1, 1983 as per the British Nationality Act (BNA) 1981 no longer confers UK citizenship unless one of the parents has settled status = Permanent residence or British Citizenship. There was a legitimacy issue pre 2006 iirc where if the parent was the father then he had to be married to the mother. It was quashed for being discriminatory.

2. Canada and the US have a different situation. In the US the constitution protects soil birth right and was put in place to protect the right of slaves to live in the US post emancipation. Amending the constitution isn't easy.

3. Canada has a demographic issue and requires immigration to sustain let alone increase population growth - you and I need more bodies paying into the CRA pot so when we are septuagenarians have a steady (albeit minimal) pension coming in eh! The UK is an island half the size of AB with double the population of Canada most of them in England. Add in EU migration (which the British Government can't really control) under EU treaty rights and its a whole different ball game.

4. Add to this that in Canada and the US the 'anchor' baby isn't able to help you until they are the age of majority, have a minimal income and are on the hook for all/most of the welfare you will claim. At some point in time the parent sponsorship will inevitably be removed - its hard to explain why your parents have to live with you really when you are an adult eh?

5. For the said demographic reason the soil birth right in Canada is at this time rhetoric. It could and should have been included in Bill C-24. Once you cover/include a clause to deal with 'statelessness' then what is the argument? Registering of births shouldn't have major changes. The issue is amending any systems that require PR/Citizenship status for eligibility such as the issuance of passports..in this case where birth is after date y (birth on soil no longer confers citizenship) then additional documents from the parents is required. This is what happens in other countries including the UK.

 

[on-hold]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

I agree more with eileenf -- I'm not sure how much this is a problem, I don't trust the implementation to solve the problem, and Canada needs people. I just want to point out one error,though -- the US and Canada are not the last two countries in the world with this policy, they are the last two developed countries (the traditional grouping of US, Canada, Japan, AU/NZ with western Europe). It's pretty standard throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.

If they did cut it out, though, there is one big group of people that would slowly become smaller -- the invisible Canadian-Americans (or American-Canadians) who exist because both countries have birth citizenship, are almost identical, and are relatively easy for citizens to move between for work.

 

[Leon]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

If they did cut it out, though, there is one big group of people that would slowly become smaller -- the invisible Canadian-Americans (or American-Canadians) who exist because both countries have birth citizenship, are almost identical, and are relatively easy for citizens to move between for work.

However, if the parents have dual citizenship and are moving back and forth for work, the children would also end up being dual. In order to pass on US citizenship if the baby is born outside the US, the parent need to have lived in the US for a few years after becoming an adult. In order to pass Canadian citizenship if the baby is born outside Canada, they need to be Canadian born or naturalized themselves, however, even if they aren't and can't pass citizenship to their US born children, if they move to Canada again, they will sponsor the children for PR and they will be naturalized Canadians and can later pass Canadian citizenship to their children if born outside Canada.

 

[screech339]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

To provide a little more details to Leon's post, a single American parent can pass on their US citizenship to Canadian born child if the American parent has lived in US for 5 years (3 of them between birth and 14 years old) prior to the birth.

http://www.uscis.gov/us-citizenship/citizenship-through-parents

A Child Born Outside the U.S. is a Citizen at Birth if One parent is a U.S. citizen at the time of birth and the birthdate is on or after November 14, 1986 and the parents are married at the time of birth and the U.S. citizen parent had been physically present in the U.S. or its territories for a period of at least five years at some time in his or her life prior to the birth, of which at least two years were after his or her 14th birthday.

Children born in US to Canadians unable to pass citizenship by descent, can apply for Canadian citizenship after they entered Canada as PR. They are not naturalized Canadian when they land as PR in Canada. They however are exempt from the 3 year residency requirement to apply for Canadian citizenship. As Leon has mentioned, once they become naturalized Canadians, then they can pass on citizenship to their children born outside Canada.

Screech339

 

[screech339]

Re: Harper government considers tightening ‘citizenship by birth' rules

http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/maternity-tourism-report-recommends-limiting-citizenship-by-birth-1.1974665

Here is another link on "birth tourism"

Screech339