The potential elimination of birthright citizenship in Canada is a story we’ve been following closely on our blog in the last few days.
Recently, an article out of Hong Kong said that immigration consultants were encouraging Chinese women to hide their pregnancies and come to Canada to give birth so that their babies will automatically become Canadian Citizens – through birthright citizenship, where anyone born on Canadian soil is automatically granted Canadian Citizenship. The United States has a similar policy, but other developed nations have been doing away with the process.
In the aftermath of the article coming to light, the Canadian Government announced it was considering some kind of legislative change to remove birthright citizenship and stop this apparent problem – for which there are no official statistics or any evidence.
Find out why our own immigration lawyer Michael Niren says this is a knee-jerk reaction to a problem that may even not exist, and these changes threaten a long-standing tradition in Canada.
The CTV News video clip is available here.
President & CEO
Michael Niren
Mr. Niren is CEO of VisaPlace LLC and the President and Managing Partner of VisaPlace Legal Canada, an immigration law firm based in Toronto, and VisaPlace Legal US a law firm registered in The District of Columbia, USA. Mr. Niren is a graduate of Osgoode Hall Law School in Toronto, a member of the Law Society of Upper Canada, the Canadian Bar Association’s Citizenship and Immigration Section, American Lawyers Association, and an Associate Member of the American Bar Association.
