This episode is about the concept of a universal basic income and how it would work in Canada. We are joined by Sheila Regehr and Sameer Nurmohamed of Basic Income Canada Network.

We discuss which type of immigrants (permanent residents, workers, students, asylum claimants, people without status) etc. would be eligible, whether a basic income would impact other public funding for services like legal aid, whether it would cause inflation, and more.

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5:30 What are different models of universal basic income?

9:00 How is the amount of basic income calculated?

10:45 What was the Ontario pilot project?

12:45 In practice is there a difference between an income guarantee model and a flat-payment model?

14:30 Do wealthy people get the same payment and benefit under a universal basic income?

15:30 How would a universal basic income be funded?

23:45 Would a universal basic income replace other services like legal aid?

28:25 A review of Motion 46 – GUARANTEED LIVABLE BASIC INCOME

30:35 Would international students, foreign workers, permanent residents, asylum claimants, people without status, etc. be eligible to receive a universal basic income?

42:00 What would the labour market interaction be with a universal basic income in terms of its impact on wages?

45:00 Would immigrants abuse a universal basic income system?

47:30 How have the impacts of the CERB impacted peoples’ perspectives on how a universal basic income would work?

56:00 Would a guaranteed basic income cause inflation or people gauging marginalized individuals?

1:03 Where can people learn more?

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Dennis McCrea was the founder of McCrea Immigration Law. He started practicing immigration law in 1974, and was one of the original members of Vancouver’s immigration bar. In this episode we discuss how to build an immigration practice, how the practice of immigration law has evolved, avoiding burnout and more.

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3:00 – How lawyers use to interact with visa officers. 

6:00 – The formation of the immigration bar. 

11:30 –  Thoughts on whether it is possible to have both a corporate immigration practice and a refugee or enforcement practice. 

15:30– Did the practice of immigration law become more or less fun over time? 

18:00 – What kept Dennis motivated when it came to practicing immigration law? 

22:30 – What type of cases did Dennis enjoy the most?

 26:00 – What are some tools that lawyers can use to prevent burnout? 

41:00 – Did the practice of immigration law vary depending on which political party were in power? 

42:00 – How to retire. 

45:00 – How can junior lawyers who are trying to build a practice have time for hobbies? 

48:00 – How Steven and Deanna got into immigration. 

58:00 – Growing a firm. 

1:03:00 – Should you article at an immigration law firm. 

1:06:00 – Being too specialized. 

1:13:00 – What percent of Dennis’s practice was immigration processing, firm management and enforcement? 

1:16:30 – Thoughts on consultants. 

1:19:00 – Are decisions getting better or worse? Are boilerplate refusals becoming more or less common?

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Chieu v. Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration), 2002 SCC 3 was a landmark Supreme Court of Canada which affirmed the use of the Ribic factors in the H&C assessment. We discuss these factors and how they are used in immigration appeals.

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1:00 – How the assessment of Humanitarian & Compassionate considerations has become somewhat nebulus. 

4:00 – A case study of Chieu v. Canada 

10:00 – What is an example of a negative country condition in someone’s country of citizenship? 

13:00 – The decision and principles in Chieu. 

15:00 – The Federal Court of Canada in Zhang v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2020 FC 927, which seems to limit Chieu. 

16:00 – The Ribic factors and the types of immigration appeals. 20:00 How much weight each factor should get. 

25:00 – Stories about our appeals. 

32:00 – The remorse factor and flexibility. 

45:00 – The counter arguments to considering country of citizenship conditions. 

50:00 – Consents on appeal.

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A discussion about responding to procedural fairness letters with digressions on possible bias against people from Punjab, unreasonable documentation requests, tunnel vision amongst visa officers, how if an officer goes out looking for misrepresentation in an application they will probably find it, aggressively banning people from Canada as a deterrance policy, IRCC misleading Parliament about whether it bounces applications for incompleteness and more. Raj Sharma is a Partner at Stewart Sharma Harsanyi in Calgary. He can be found on Twitter @immlawyercanada. 

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2:30 When does IRCC have to send a procedural fairness letter vs. being able to refuse an application without one?

15:00 Specific issues with the Canadian visa offices in New Delhi and Chandigarh.

21:00 Racialized assessments of visa applications.

23:00 Why hunting for misrep can lead to misrep findings.

25:00 Misrepresentation as a deterrence policy.

35:00 Is there a specific focus on Punjabs?

44:00 Can you tell if someone is lying as soon as you meet them at the start of an interview?

46:00 Preet Bharara on investigations

50:00 When IRCC believes that a job is fake because no employer would wait as long as IRCC’s processing times to fill a position.

1:00 Procedural fairness letters in the citizenship revocation process.

1:06 Litigation as a way to achieve policy reform.

1:15 Procedural fairness and the bouncing of applications.

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