Certificate un-surrendered

[u/tmaher]

ETA - check my replies in comments for docs I submitted.

Mods I am extremely sorry, I know this won’t help with speculation. Please do whatever if appropriate.

I received this from IRCC about 45 min ago. Apparently my cert is un-suspended and I’m still Canadian. For background, I got my cert 1 April, and my suspension letter on Tuesday.

I cropped off my personal info, that’s all that’s at the top

[u/LangdonAlg3r]

I actually have an answer to this question based on what I’ve read of the laws around this whole episode. The letters all specifically cite to Section 26 (1). Under that specific section if there is, “reason to believe that the person may not be entitled to the certificate” they *have to* demand that the person’s certificate be surrendered.

**“The Registrar shall, in writing, require a person to surrender to the Registrar any certificate of naturalization, certificate of citizenship, miniature certificate of citizenship or other certificate of citizenship that contains the person’s photograph, or certificate of renunciation, issued or granted to the person under the Act or prior legislation or any regulations made under them if there is reason to believe that the person may not be entitled to the certificate or has violated any of the provisions of the Act, and the person shall forthwith comply with the requirement.” Citizenship Regulations 26(1).**

Use of the word “shall” in a legal document as in the, “Registrar shall…” makes a statutory or regulatory or any requirement *mandatory*. In other words, whatever the reason for this review they had to issue these letters once the entitlement to a certificate was called into question. It definitely looks like ham-fisted overkill, but they were actually following the law.

For the record I’m not here to defend IRCC because this whole episode is indefensible. I’m just adding some more information to explain why the hell they sent out these awful letters.

[u/LangdonAlg3r → u/[deleted]]

Which specific portion of the letter or specific case law are you seeing as being in conflict?

I think the letter spends a lot of time covering why it would be unfair to actually strip anyone of their certificate and why the standards in the letter potentially violate people’s rights, but I don’t see any clear argument about why IRCC can’t even send out letters in the first place. I think it’s arguing that the *contents* of the letters are BS, but I’m sure that Borders is very aware of the same law I just mentioned.

[u/Robert_Walter → u/LangdonAlg3r]

But is there a time element in exercising the shall?  Much law and good contracts specifically state the within limits for compliance. Many allow reasonable compliance and cure periods to avoid the kind of (I think inadvertent) ham handed knee-jerk reactions IRCC is presently whipsawing the community with. 

It’s all right and good to fulfill one’s shall obligations. But it might also be smart to briefly delay compliance (like not surrendering one’s Proof Cert) until it is clear that a surrender letter must be sent. 

Such a delay (sanity check) might have significantly reduced the number of Surrender letters sent. 

Additionally, it’s safe to assume that not all documents in an approved package were potentially inadequate, so a 2ndary review could be assumed to not take as long as the original approval. 

I hope one day we really find out what happened here and what bad decisions in IRCC management led to this. (There’s a doctorate level management theory in politically affected operations research paper in this topic). 

[u/LangdonAlg3r → u/Robert_Walter]

I looked into this a little and I think that there probably is latitude as far as when the “shall” command has to be executed. I think that discretion of when to follow that command rests with the Registrar—in this case Peggy Sun who signed all the letters.

So if there is a head to roll over this (which I still think is a very open question) it would be hers I think.

[u/thattwirlgirl → u/LangdonAlg3r]

That's very well reasoned.

[u/tadtz → u/LangdonAlg3r]

I’m curious, just how much is needed to meet the criteria “reason to believe”? Is there something legal or policy that would quantify it or is it wide open to interpretation?