As you may be aware, changes to Canada's citizenship
law will come into effect in April of this year.
Some concerns have been raised about how recent
changes to citizenship legislation may affect adoptees born outside Canada. The
new law was passed by Parliament in spring 2008 and comes into effect on April
17, 2009. It will simplify citizenship rules. It also seeks to protect
the value of Canadian citizenship by making sure it is not passed down
endlessly through generations living outside Canada.
In almost all cases, the ability for people born outside Canada to acquire citizenship by descent will be limited to the first generation. (Note: this limit is not a result of proposed changes to the regulations that were pre-published in the Canada Gazette in December 2008.)
Limiting citizenship by descent means that once the new law comes into effect, children born outside Canada will only acquire Canadian citizenship automatically if one of their parents was born or naturalized in Canada (this includes adopted people who first became permanent residents and then later, citizens).
To ensure fair treatment, the limitation will apply equally to children born outside Canada to a Canadian parent, and to foreign-born children adopted by a Canadian parent and granted citizenship through the adoption law effective December 2007.
One objective of the December 2007 changes was to reduce the distinction in eligibility for citizenship between foreign-born adopted children and children born abroad to Canadian parents. The April 2009 changes will continue to do this.
Once the new law is in force, children born outside Canada to both groups of people will not be eligible to claim Canadian citizenship through that parent (although, if the other parent was born or naturalized in Canada, the child would be able to claim citizenship through that parent).
Foreign-born children adopted by both groups of people will not be eligible for a grant of citizenship under the December 2007 adoption provisions.
Children born or adopted abroad who do not acquire Canadian citizenship because of this new limitation may be eligible to be sponsored as permanent residents and then apply for citizenship as soon as they become permanent residents.
In some rare cases, the new law could create stateless children if they don't obtain citizenship from either of their parents or from their country of birth. In such a case, the parent could sponsor the child for permanent residence and then immediately apply for citizenship for the child.
As an additional safeguard, the new law includes a statelessness provision that offers another option to gain Canadian citizenship. This provision fulfills Canada's obligations under the UN Convention on the Reduction of Statelessness.
For more information, please visit the Citizenship and Immigration Canada website: www.cic.gc.ca