PR Card & H&C

Your expired PR card can still be renewed should you have sufficient consideration of H&C factors.

Specifically, if it is determined that you have valid H&C considerations relating to your Permanent resident Card renewal, then you will overcome any breach of the residency obligation made before the determination.

Officers can consider whether sufficient H&C factors have been brought to their attention to justify the retention of permanent resident status before making a decision that there has been a failure to comply with the residency obligation. However, the onus is on you to satisfy an officer that there are grounds to justify retention of status. Meaning even though H&C factors can be considered, it is still your obligation to prove you have grounds for H&C.

We are here to help you see your H&C grounds. Having a consultation with us will help determine your H&C grounds. We can advise you if you have strong H&C grounds or not. Should you not have strong H&C grounds at the time, we will prepare a plan for you as to some steps you can take.

Humanitarian and Compassionate Grounds

A positive decision on retaining permanent resident status, based on H&C grounds, is an exceptional response to a particular set of circumstances. An examination of H&C factors includes an evaluation of reasons given and supporting evidence of events and circumstances that have occurred in the five-year period immediately preceding an examination.

While “intent” is no longer the determinative factor, your intent can be taken into consideration as an element of Humanitarian and Compassionate assessment. Again you bear the onus of satisfying the decision-maker that there are compelling H&C factors in your individual circumstance that justify keeping of your permanent resident status.

You also bear the onus of explaining why you were not able to comply with the residency obligation and the extent of any hardship that the loss of permanent resident status may cause to you and your family members, who would be directly affected by the decision. The resulting hardship from loss of status may be unusual and undeserved or disproportionate.

The following definitions are not meant as absolute rules; rather, they are an attempt to provide some guidance in determining whether sufficient H&C considerations exist to justify the retention of permanent resident status.

Unusual and Undeserved Hardship

One way of showing you have H&C grounds is to show the officer the unusual and undeserved hardship you will face should you lose your PR status. The hardship (of losing permanent resident status) that you would face should be, in most cases, unusual. This hardship should be, in most cases, the result of circumstances beyond your control.

Disproportionate Hardship

H&C grounds may exist in cases that would not meet the criteria of unusual and undeserved but would be met where the hardship would have a disproportionate impact on the permanent resident due to personal circumstances.

Factors for Consideration

The range of factors to be considered is up to the discretion of the officer reviewing your case. Officers are obliged to consider all the information presented by a permanent resident.

H&C factors are reviewed on a case-by-case basis. At Akrami & Associates, we make submissions on all aspects of your personal circumstances that we feel would warrant the retention of your permanent resident status.

The following are examples of the kinds of factors which can be considered:

• Extent of Non-Compliance:

• How many days of physical presence in Canada within the five-year period under examination have you spent in Canada?
• Were you outside Canada for more than three years in the last five-year period because of a medical condition or the medical condition of a close family member?
• Could alternative arrangements for the care of the family member have been made, or was it your choice to remain outside Canada?
• Circumstances beyond your control: are the circumstances that led to you remaining outside Canada compelling and beyond your control?
• Were you prevented from returning to Canada, and if so, by whom or by what event?
• Are you now returning to Canada at the earliest possible opportunity?
• Did you leave Canada as a child accompanying a parent?
• Are you dependent on the parent they are accompanying because of a mental or physical disability?

• Establishment in and Outside Canada:

• Are you a citizen or permanent resident of a country other than Canada?
• Have you taken steps to establish any permanence in a country other than Canada or the country you resided in immediately before becoming a permanent resident of Canada (that is, any third-country status)?
• To what degree have you established in Canada?
• What linkages and ties have you maintained in Canada?