The Liberal government has introduced new legislation to remove barriers to citizenship erected by its Conservatives predecessors while retaining and extending officials’ authority to deal with fraud.

The changes, expected to be implemented later this year, will provide greater flexibility for applicants trying to meet the requirements for citizenship and help immigrants become full-fledged Canadian citizens sooner, said Immigration Minister John McCallum.

Critics applauded the changes, hoping they would reverse the worrisome course of “easier to lose, harder to get’ Canadian citizenship under the Tories, which had seen the annual number of new citizens nosedive from a peak of 260,805 in 2006 to 113,150 in 2012.

The government will also fulfil another campaign promise by repealing the controversial provisions introduced by the Tories in May that allowed authorities to remove citizenship from dual citizens for “acts against the national interest,” including terrorism or treason.

“We are honouring all of the commitments on which we were elected,” McCallum told the Star Thursday. “A Canadian is a Canadian is a Canadian. It’s not up to the government to revoke citizenship. We want to facilitate the process of people becoming Canadian citizens while retaining program integrity.”

Despite the proposed changes, immigration officials still have the power to revoke citizenship if it was obtained by false representation or fraud, while the federal court continues to be able to remove the citizenship of those involved in organized crime, war crimes and crimes against humanity.

What matters most to would-be citizens are the proposed changes to citizenship requirements including:

Repealing the intent to reside provision that raised immigrants’ fear that their citizenship could be revoked if they moved outside of Canada.

Reducing the length of time that someone must be physically present in Canada to qualify for citizenship from four out of six years to three out of five.

Allowing time in Canada before permanent residency to count toward physical residency requirements, which would benefit refugees and those previously in Canada on study or work permits.

Amending the age range for language and citizenship knowledge exams, allowing those under 18 or older than 54 to be exempted.

“We are very pleased with the government’s decision to rescind the previous government’s Bill C-24 that made it far more difficult to obtain citizenship and far easier to lose,” said Debbie Douglas of the Ontario Council for Agencies Serving Immigrants.

“We are particularly pleased that we are moving away from two-tier citizenship where dual citizens could have their citizenship revoked. We commend the Liberal government for taking this principled decision.”

The new citizenship bill also makes some new changes by extending immigration authorities’ power to seize documents suspected of fraud and barring those serving conditional sentences from seeking citizenship or counting the time toward the residency eligibility.

Andrew Griffith, a former director-general with the immigration department, said the proposed legislation surprisingly retained many of the provisions passed by the previous government to improve enforcement and integrity of the citizenship system while reducing unreasonable hurdles for would-be citizens.

“They are removing some of the worst abuses the Conservatives did, promoting its diversity and inclusive agenda, without changing the fundamental value of real and meaningful commitment to Canadian citizenship,” Griffith said.

“These proposed changes reflect, apart from revocation, relatively modest changes, in line with the Liberals’ public commitments, and that retain virtually all of the previous government’s integrity measures.”

While he is pleased with the proposed citizenship changes, veteran immigration lawyer Lorne Waldman said those who face citizenship revocation on the grounds of misrepresentation are still not entitled to a hearing – a practice that is under a legal challenge in the federal court.

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“Why are we keeping this Harper legacy?” Waldman asked.

Under the Harper government, the citizenship application backlog had ballooned with processing time significantly lengthened. New resources were brought in last year to reduce the wait time.

McCallum said new citizenship applications are now being processed in 12 months and the backlog is expected to be cleared by the end of this year.

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