Canadian citizenship holds significant global esteem, offering fundamental rights such as voting, political candidacy, and passport privileges. For immigrants, citizenship serves as a cornerstone of integration, fostering a sense of belonging in Canada's diverse, democratic, and multicultural society.
In 2009, amendments to the Citizenship Act introduced a first-generation limit on citizenship by descent, restricting the ability of Canadian citizens born abroad to transmit citizenship to their own foreign-born children or to seek citizenship for foreign-born adopted children.
Today, Minister of Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship, Marc Miller, has proposed legislation to broaden citizenship by descent, ensuring inclusivity while preserving the value of Canadian citizenship.
This legislation aims to automatically grant Canadian citizenship to individuals born abroad to Canadian parents who themselves were born abroad prior to the enactment of this law. Furthermore, it seeks to extend citizenship eligibility to foreign-born children adopted by Canadian parents beyond the first generation. Under the proposed legislation, parents born abroad must have accrued at least 1,095 cumulative days of physical presence in Canada before the birth or adoption of their child to transmit citizenship.
Bill C-71, titled An Act to amend the Citizenship Act (2024), not only addresses the plight of "Lost Canadians" who were denied citizenship due to outdated laws but also extends citizenship rights to their descendants and subsequent generations born abroad to Canadian parents.
Individuals potentially affected by the changes proposed in Bill C-71 will undoubtedly seek clarification on its implications for themselves and their families. Should the bill pass through Parliament and receive royal assent, efforts will be made to promptly enact these reforms.