What Are the Changes in the Parents and Grandparents Sponsorship Program?

2.5 minute read

"The Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) recently announced that they will conduct a lottery for the Parents and Grandparents Sponsorship Program. The lottery will be held during the week of September 2, 2021, where applicants will be nominated for permanent residence. Those selected will receive an Invitation to Apply (ITA), which they must respond to within 60 days."

Written by My Visa Source Team
Published on: Aug 20, 2021

The Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) recently announced that they will conduct a lottery for the Parents and Grandparents Sponsorship Program. The lottery will be held during the week of September 2, 2021, where applicants will be nominated for permanent residence. Those selected will receive an Invitation to Apply (ITA), which they must respond to within 60 days.

What Other Changes Have Been Made to the Parents and Grandparents Sponsorship?

Canada’s Immigration Minister, Marco Mendicino announced that the IRCC will invite 30,000 additional applicants who submitted their applications between October and November 2020, during last year’s application window. During this period, Canadian citizens and permanent residents who were interested in sponsoring their parents and grandparents for permanent residence in Canada submitted their applications.

In January 2021, the IRCC invited 10,000 applicants from this pool while also stating that it plans to invite an additional 30,000 later in the year from the same pool of applicants. Therefore, if you applied for the program in 2020, you still have hope of getting invited to apply for permanent residence.

What Is the Parents and Grandparents Sponsorship Program?

The Parents and Grandparents Sponsorship Program allows Canadian citizens and permanent residents to sponsor their parents or grandparents for permanent residence in Canada. The sponsor will be required to meet Minimum Necessary Income (MNI) requirements to successfully sponsor their parents or grandparents.

What Are the Eligibility Requirements for the Parents and Grandparents Sponsorship Program?

Sponsors must meet the following requirements to be eligible for this program:

Be a Canadian citizen, permanent resident or have First nations status

Be at least 18 years or older

Have sufficient income to support your family members

Meeting the MNI requirements is a key factor to successfully applying for this program. The IRCC evaluates the income of every sponsor for the last 3 tax years. If the MNI requirements are not satisfied, your application will be refused.

How Will the Minimum Necessary Income (MNI) Requirement Be Different for Parents and Grandparents Sponsorship?

Given the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, the IRCC has stated that it will only evaluate the income of the applicants for the year 2020. The usual MNI plus additional 30% criteria will also not be applied to this year’s lottery. Applicants will also have the liberty to include their Employment Insurance (EI) benefits and the Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB) to their minimum income.

Applicants residing outside the province of Quebec must provide a Notice of Assessment from the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) for each of their tax year’s incomes. However, for applicants residing in Quebec, demonstrating sufficient income in the last 12 months that is available to support yourself and your family is enough to meet the MNI requirements.

Applicants for Quebec Immigration must get their income assessed by Quebec’s Immigration Ministry, based on the provincial income requirements.

In both cases, applicants will be required to sign an undertaking to state that they will be financially responsible for the family member that they are sponsoring for permanent residence in Canada. The length of this undertaking is 20 years for all residents of Canada except Quebec. For Quebec applicants, it is 10 years.