FEDERAL IMMIGRATION PROGRAMS
Family Class
The Federal Immigration program allows Canadian citizens or permanent residents to sponsor certain members of their immediate families to immigrate to Canada. Spouses can sponsor one another and their dependant children. Spouses may be married, or in common-law or conjugal relationships, and they may be the same sex or opposite sexes, and parents may sponsor their dependant children*. Spouses may be in a marital, common-law or conjugal relationship, and be the same sex or opposite sex.
To qualify, sponsors must not be in breach of an undertaking, must not be bankrupt, and must not have a serious criminal history, particularly in the form of spousal abuse or sexual offences.
Citizens of Canada, who wish to sponsor their spouses and dependant children, do not need to meet the financial criteria set out in the Low Income Cut-Off Table (Guide 5196-Table 3) in order to qualify, as long as they meet the other criteria outlined above. If citizens want to sponsor their parents, grandparents, or great grandparents, they must be able to prove their ability to support those family members when they arrive in Canada as set out in the Low Income Cut-Off (LICO) Table. If permanent residents wish to sponsor any family member they too must prove they have adequate income to support the application as set out in the LICO Table.
Sponsored persons must also not have any criminal or medical issues, in order to qualify. In the case of spouses or dependant children most medical conditions may not be used as a bar to admission.
* Sponsorship applications for parents and grand-parents have been suspended until the middle of 2013 but they may now apply for a Supervisa which is a 10 year multiple entry visitor visa that allows a stay for up to 2 years at a time.
