Canadians vent frustration on social media after online applications to bring family to Canada fill up in mere minutes

By Phil Heidenreich

Online journalist         Global News

Just 11 minutes after the federal government opened Monday’s online application process for Canadians to bring parents and grandparents to the country, the maximum number of application forms had been received, prompting Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) to shut down the process, and generating frustrated comments from Twitter users.

“Terrible! I had 4 different computers available for this,” tweeted someone with the Twitter handle @Patricia_J. “By the time I submitted the application, it said that the form it was closed!! Wow as a public figure in this country I am going to ask for answers for all the thousands of people that they never got a chance to even apply!”

IRCC said it was making application forms available for those wanting to express interest in the 2019 Parent and Grandparent Program at 10 a.m. ET. At 10:11 a.m. ET, the government department tweeted it had closed the process for applying.

“The people invited would then have 60 days from the date of their invitation to submit a complete application,” IRCC tweeted.

Other Twitter users took to social media to say they experienced a variety of technical problems with the application process.

Ahmed Hussen, the minister responsible for IRCC, took to Twitter to respond to the outrage. In a lengthy thread, Hussen said the Liberal government is “committed to family reunification” and increased the number of PGP applications allowed from 5,000 under the previous government to 20,000.

Thread
Our government is committed to family reunification, which is why we increased the intake of parent and grandparent applications from 5,000 under the Conservatives to 20,000 this year.

Source: https://globalnews.ca/news/4900186/canadians-sponsorship-process-grandparents-parents-ircc-online-2019/?utm_source=GlobalNews&utm_medium=Facebook