Humanitarian and Compassionate Applications 2025

[canuck78]

Hello Experts
I have a question about my mother-in-law. She is 72 years old. My father-in-law recently passed away & she is currently back in her home country. She is planning to travel to Canada in the next 2 or 3 weeks on her valid visitor visa, which is valid until 2029. After her husband’s death she is living alone has health issues and although she has brothers but none of them are willing to take responsibility for her care. There is no one in her home country who can properly look after her....Could you please advise what her chances are in this situation and which immigration pathway would be most suitable for her to eventually obtain permanent residence in Canada? Specifically what are the chances of approval under Humanitarian and Compassionate (H&C) grounds in a case like this? If the H&C application is refused, what other options would she have?
Also, could you please guide what essential documents would be required to prepare a strong application?
Your guidance would be very important in this difficult situation and could genuinely help improve someone’s quality of life.

This is a very common scenario and why families need to prepare for longterm care in their home countries. To visit on a supervisa she will need to be able to obtain supervisa insurance annually and it won’t cover most preexisting conditions so that would make you responsible for a very large bill if there was ever an emergency related to any preexisting health condition. If people do not have the up to hundreds of thousands of dollars a long visit may not be possible. A supervisa was never meant to allow a parent to move to Canada longterm. The Parent sponsorship program is extremely small compared to the amount of immigrants so the majority will not be able to have their parents join them in Canada longterm. That is just the reality. I wish the government would clarify that this is the case so people can make longterm plans in their home countries.

 

[moonarch]

This is a very common scenario and why families need to prepare for longterm care in their home countries. To visit on a supervisa she will need to be able to obtain supervisa insurance annually and it won’t cover most preexisting conditions so that would make you responsible for a very large bill if there was ever an emergency related to any preexisting health condition. If people do not have the up to hundreds of thousands of dollars a long visit may not be possible. A supervisa was never meant to allow a parent to move to Canada longterm. The Parent sponsorship program is extremely small compared to the amount of immigrants so the majority will not be able to have their parents join them in Canada longterm. That is just the reality. I wish the government would clarify that this is the case so people can make longterm plans in their home countries.

Thank you very much for your response..I genuinely appreciate you taking the time to explain this. I completely agree that planning is important but at the same time not everything can be fully planned by governments or individuals...and this is one of the reasons why people leave their home countries and try to settle elsewhere often due to security concerns, uncertainty, or circumstances beyond their control. The existence of humanitarian pathways itself reflects that there are many real life situations where people require support on compassionate grounds...not everyone anticipates or prepares for unexpected hardshipsjust as many people never plan for global conflicts wars or crises yet are forced to relocate because of them. This is also why some countries position themselves as welfare states, offering protection and support in exceptional situations. Perhaps my original question wasn’t fully clear... but I truly appreciate your perspective and the time you took to respond.