What about the landing fee?

At the moment when the general election entered the final decisive battle, the Federal Liberal Party and the Conservative Party announced that they would cancel the levy of 975 yuan on new immigrants in stages. Yesterday, the Conservative Party even proposed to set up a national evaluation and confirmation center to confirm the educational background and technical background of new immigrants before their arrival. The local immigrant community welcomes this and hopes that all parties can fulfill their promises after the election. The immigration professional consultant pointed out that reducing the backlog of cases rather than canceling the landing fee is the most needed commitment for immigrants today. Wu Binjiang, the current chairman of the Canadian Mandarin Chinese Association, which is mainly composed of new immigrants from the mainland, welcomed the above policies of the two parties. He said that although naturalized immigrants paid a landing fee of 975 yuan, this policy has no immediate interests for them. However, most of the local Chinese immigrants have parents, relatives and friends, classmates and other future immigrants to Canada. For them, this measure can lighten the burden. Therefore, whether they pay the landing fee or not, this policy will be welcomed by all immigrants in the future. Comparatively speaking, the recognition of overseas technical qualifications is a more critical and important policy for new immigrants. He said that according to the information of Puhua Press, about 55% of the new immigrants have no chance to engage in jobs related to their academic qualifications and technical background, and they can only support their families by simple manual labor. For new immigrants, learning experience is not recognized, which means that life and career belong to zero starting point. Fortunately, due to the limitation of time, energy and conditions, many people can't engage in professional work all their lives, which not only violates their original intention of immigrating to Canada, but also wastes their lives. Wu Binjiang, who is engaged in TCM education, said that it is not only China people who suffer. In the College of Traditional Chinese Medicine where he is in charge, many new immigrants from the Middle East and Eastern Europe used to be doctors, but they were forced to study Chinese medicine because their professional qualifications were not recognized locally.

Immigration consultant Lu bluntly said that the cancellation of the landing fee of 975 yuan has no substantial impact on new immigrants. With his years of experience, he has never met anyone who was blocked from Canada because he couldn't pay the landing fee. For immigrants, the problem is that the current application time is too long. What the government really wants to solve is to increase the resources and manpower of the Immigration Department for overseas operations and reduce the backlog of cases.

Wu Bing, an immigration consultant, also believes that this pre-election commitment to political parties "need not be too serious". She said that the government has already levied a landing fee when issuing immigration documents to overseas applicants. If the policy is implemented immediately, can people who have obtained immigration documents and paid the landing fee apply to the government for a refund if the landing fee has been cancelled when they actually arrive in the future? The government does not follow these practical problems, which shows its sincerity in implementation. In addition, at present, there are a large backlog of overseas cases, and the original intention of the landing fee is to compensate the cost of case approval. Once cancelled, does it mean that the overseas immigration operation center will invest less resources and wait longer? If so, immigrant applicants and their families are still the ultimate victims.

Olivia Chow accused the Liberal Party of its immigration policy.

Olivia Chow, candidate of the New Democracy Party in Trinity Spadana constituency, responded yesterday to the immigration policy platform recently put forward by the two parties. She said that the Liberal Party broke its word many times in 12. This time Martin just announced the cancellation of the landing fee for new immigrants. When interviewed by the media on another occasion, he immediately contradicted himself.

Olivia Chow quoted the Vancouver Sun 65438+1October 4th as saying that Martin had just announced that the landing fee for new immigrants would be phased out in two budgets in three years. In an interview with the newspaper later, he said, "I haven't decided how soon to cancel the landing fee. We will act as soon as possible. I haven't explained how to eliminate it quickly. We will take action as soon as possible. ) "Olivia Chow said that such capricious remarks broke the record of the Liberal Party's quick renege.

She said that since the government imposed landing fees on new immigrants in 1995, the New Democracy Party regarded it as a new "poll tax" and resolutely opposed it. From the day it came to power, the Liberal Party declared that it would strive to achieve an annual population of 1%, that is, 365,438+8,000 people per year. But this goal has never been achieved since 12. The fundamental reason is that the government cuts the resources and manpower for overseas immigrant visas. In 1980s, it took only one year for immigrants to reunite with their parents, but now it takes more than 10 years, which artificially prevents parents from reuniting with their children in China. The pain and harm caused to Chinese families can be compared with the poll tax and the Chinese Exclusion Act, which discriminated against Chinese in history.

The Prime Minister promised to cancel immigration? expense

Canadian news agency city of victoria Power Company, British Columbia

Prime Minister Martin vowed to cancel the criticism and asked the new immigrants to pay 975 yuan. Charging measures, hoping to stabilize the tradition of the Federal Liberal Party, have always been supported by new immigrants. Martin said that when the government begins its next term, it will cancel the measures of collecting new immigrants' arrival fees, claiming that the Liberal Party has always promised to support the families of its citizens; One of the challenges faced by Canadian families with immediate family members abroad is to pay a permanent resident fee of 975 yuan for their relatives. In related news, Prime Minister Martin made the above promise when A5 arrived in city of victoria, the capital of British Columbia, to attend the election campaign yesterday. There are a considerable number of Asian Canadian voters in British Columbia, which has a certain influence on the results of the federal election on June 23, 65438.

This charging measure introduced by the federal liberal government in 1995 is applicable to adult immigrants; Minor children who are allowed to emigrate to Canada or young relatives whose parents have died can be exempted from this fee; Since 2000, people who have been granted refugee status have not to pay this fee.

When Woking introduced this fee measure, it was mainly used to pay for the process of approving immigration applications, but the opposition party accused the government of robbing new immigrants of money.

The Federal New Democracy Party, the Canadian Refugee Council, the Canadian Labor Association and other groups have been asking the federal government to cancel this charging measure.

Sheila kops, one of the candidates at that time, also strongly demanded the cancellation of this fee when the Federal Liberal Party held a leadership competition conference in 2004.

Phase out in the next three years.

This fee will be phased out in the next three years. 600 yuan immediately, 12 months later, then 300 yuan. In the next two budgets, this fee will eventually be cancelled.

Martin said that Canada is a country made up of immigrants. Canada's immigration history is rich and varied. Nearly 654.38+05 million immigrants from all over the world have formed the values and ideals of Canadian citizens. Today, the vitality brought by immigrants has played a role in building and maintaining a strong Canada, and Canada welcomes them.

The annual income is 2 1 10,000 yuan less.

Martin's promise will reduce the federal government's income by 225 million yuan in the next two years, and the final annual income is expected to be 265.438+0 billion yuan.

In recent months, the Liberal Party led by Martin has proposed a number of immigration measures to win the support of voters.

Last autumn, the federal government said that the number of immigrants will increase to 1% of the national population in the next five years, with about 328,000 immigrants every year.

Hu Ping Zao, Minister of Immigration, said at that time that in order to develop Canada's economy, it is necessary to absorb more immigrants, and of course, it is necessary to carefully screen and absorb immigrants who meet Canada's needs.

According to the data, most new immigrants choose to live in big cities in Canada, especially Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver.

Last year, the federal government introduced a bill to admit that a poll tax was levied on immigrants from China, and at the same time, the funds were used for education and memorial projects, but it would not apologize for the poll tax or directly compensate the people concerned. However, this bill was stillborn because of the announcement of the general election.

During the period from 1885 to 1923, the Canadian government imposed poll tax on 8 1000 immigrants from China, ranging from 50 yuan to 500 yuan, with an estimated income of 23 million. From 1923, they refused to allow Canadian immigrants to China, forcing some families to separate for a whole generation until the Chinese exclusion law was revoked from 1947.