Work and examine permits will not be obtainable for flagpolers at ports of entry in Canada.
Flagpolers are overseas nationals holding momentary resident standing in Canada who depart the nation and re-enter to entry immigration providers, reminiscent of work or examine permits, at a port of entry reasonably than submitting a renewal software by Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada.
The Canada Border Companies Company (CBSA) reviews that greater than 69,300 flagpolers had been processed between April 1, 2023 and March 31, 2024 primarily within the Pacific, southern Ontario and Quebec areas.
“This modification will allow us to additional streamline actions at our ports of entry and permit Canadian and American border officers to concentrate on what they’ve been expertly educated to do — border enforcement,” Public Security Minister David McGuinty stated in a press release on Monday.
This announcement comes as a part of a broader transfer to strengthen Canada’s border safety forward of the inauguration of the U.S. president-elect on Jan. 20.
Canada has been centered on strengthening its border safety in an effort to dissuade Trump from imposing a hefty 25 per cent tariff on all Canadian items. He says his tariff risk is in response to considerations about border safety, migrants and unlawful medicine, particularly fentanyl.
The Liberal authorities’s fall financial replace earmarked $1.3 billion for a border safety package deal over six years. That features shopping for helicopters and drones to strengthen monitoring of the shared border and spending extra on the CBSA, the RCMP, Public Security Canada and the Communications Safety Institution Canada. However the assertion was gentle on particulars about how that cash will likely be spent.
It was, partially, this dedication to frame safety and Canada’s impending tariff struggle that led former deputy prime minister and finance minister Chrystia Freeland to resign from cupboard.
In her resignation letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Freeland stated the 2 have been at odds over one of the best path by Trump’s tariff risk.
“We have to take that risk extraordinarily critically,” she wrote in her letter. “Meaning conserving our fiscal powder dry as we speak, so we have now the reserves we may have for a coming tariff struggle.”
The CBSA says the modifications to flagpoling had been made to permit each Canada and america to “successfully handle border operations and keep the integrity of our shared border.”
“A robust Canada-U.S. relationship retains individuals and items transferring safely whereas defending each side of the border. Flagpoling is pointless and diverts sources from crucial enforcement actions,” Immigration Minister Marc Miller stated in a press release.
The CBSA says that in some “restricted circumstances,” work and examine permits could also be administered to people who would in any other case meet the standards of a flagpoler, together with: residents and everlasting residents of the U.S.; truck drivers who want to depart Canada for work; professionals and technicians beneath free-trade agreements with the U.S./Mexico, Chile, Panama, Peru, Colombia and South Korea; and spouses or common-law companions of execs and technicians beneath free-trade agreements with Panama, Colombia and South Korea.
People who don’t meet the restricted circumstances and try and flagpole will likely be redirected to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada to submit their software.
