Born in Toronto to undocumented parents, Anthony Harford was deported with them to Grenada in 1995 at age 5.

When he finished high school, he did some heavy jobs including loading cement trucks to save up enough money to return to his birth place, with one goal: help bring his parents back to Canada for a better future.

Then only 16, on his own, Harford found a job at a factory in Scarborough making window shades and eventually earned enough money to meet the income threshold set out by the federal government to sponsor one of his parents — his father — to Canada in 2009.

“It was hard to start a new life from scratch. I stayed with an uncle for three months before I went on my own. I was trying hard to survive. My life would have turned out different if I had grown up here,” said Harford, now 26.

“I was born here. I am a Canadian but I’m still an outsider.”

A bureaucratic immigration backlog delayed the processing of his sponsorship application, which was not opened until 2013. After a long wait, it was rejected because of his father’s checkered immigration history and the decision-maker’s ruling that the family was separated “by choice.” The family’s subsequent appeal was recently denied.

“A decision was made for the appellant to come to Canada when he was 16 years old, which has resulted in an ongoing separation from his father since 2006,” wrote Teresa Cheung, an adjudicator with the immigration appeal tribunal, in rejecting Harford’s appeal.

“The overall circumstances . . . do not call for special relief on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, after taking into consideration the severity of the applicant’s immigration breaches and the public interest that non-citizens are required to adhere to immigration laws.”

Harford said his father, Joseph Harford came to Canada twice and stayed illegally to support his family back home because of the high unemployment and dire economic prospects in Grenada. His parents are subsistence farmers on family land in Grenada.

“My father only returned and broke the law again so he could support me and my mother. We were struggling. He came up to work and send us money every month and provided for us,” said Harford, who graduated from an apprenticeship program in 2015 and works as a welder.

“I was deprived of the opportunity available to others in Canada. I have worked hard to establish myself and be independent. All I’m asking for is to have my family join me with a better life here.”

According to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, Joseph Harford, 51, first came to Canada in 1988 on a visitor’s visa but overstayed his time in the country and was deported in 1995 on the taxpayer’s tab, along with his son. He returned in 1998 and was detained at Pearson airport before he was released.

However, he did not show up for his removal and faced an arrest warrant. He claimed he left Canada in 2002 but did not inform immigration authorities. It wasn’t until his sponsorship application was received that officials realized he had left the country.

The older Harford was advised to apply for authorization to return to Canada and the family scraped together the money to pay back the airfare from his 1995 deportation. The application was rejected and he was deemed ineligible to be sponsored by his son.

“While we understand that negative decisions on a particular case can be disappointing, ensuring that all applicants meet the requirements, as set out in Canada’s immigration laws, is a responsibility that (the Immigration Department) takes seriously to maintain the integrity of Canada’s immigration system,” said department spokesperson Lindsay Wemp.

In rejecting the family’s appeal, the immigration appeal tribunal said the father and son had been separated “by choice” in the past, and the humanitarian plea was not justified.

“The objective of family reunification was already compromised in 1998 when the applicant chose to separate from his son, when he left Grenada for Canada,” wrote adjudicator Cheung.

Cheung also wrote that Anthony Harford’s life in Canada “is not one of adversity” and that he has a good relationship with his uncle here.

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Anthony Harford said he has decided not to appeal the tribunal decision to the Federal Court because his family can’t afford to spend more money on lawyers.

“They are saying that we are separated by choice, so am I supposed to move to Grenada to live with my parents?” asked Anthony Harford, who financially supports his parents.

“I am an only child and I only requested one parent to live with me in Canada because I’ve been living alone since I was 17. It is brutal that they don’t understand or even care.”