Background
Ivan Andrienko, an Israeli national, was nominated for permanent residence by Ontario under the Employer Job Offer stream of the Ontario Immigration Nominee Program. He applied for permanent residence in August 2020, later obtained a work permit, and began working in Canada for Northern Force Security.
Ontario asked IRCC to place the application on hold in February 2021 without Andrienko being notified, despite his repeated status inquiries. Ontario lifted the hold in February 2024, after which Andrienko promptly completed a medical examination and submitted updated, police, and military documents. No further update followed. By the hearing, the application had been pending for more than 70 months; eligibility and medical assessments had been passed, security screening remained pending, and criminality screening had not begun.
The Court’s Holding
The Federal Court granted mandamus, finding that the delay met all three conditions for unreasonableness: it exceeded what the process required, Andrienko had not caused it, and IRCC had offered no satisfactory justification. Although Ontario was responsible for part of the overall delay, its hold had been lifted nearly two and a half years earlier, making the subsequent delay attributable to IRCC.
The Court held that neither a generic reference to pending security screening nor the designation of the application as “non-routine” explained the delay. Published service standards were not binding, but remained relevant benchmarks. The Court ordered a decision as soon as possible and no later than 90 days from the order, without prejudice to the Minister’s right to seek an extension. It awarded no costs and certified no question.
Key Takeaways
- A generic statement that security screening remains pending cannot, without further explanation, justify an inordinate immigration-processing delay.
- IRCC’s published processing standards are not guarantees, but courts may use them as relevant measures of whether delay has become unreasonable.
- Where an applicant did not cause the delay and no adequate alternative remedy exists, the Federal Court may compel IRCC to decide an application by a fixed deadline.
Why It Matters
The decision reinforces that describing an immigration file as “non-routine” or pointing generally to security screening does not relieve IRCC of the need to explain prolonged inactivity. It also confirms that delays attributable to another government may carry limited weight once that government’s hold has ended and IRCC has had ample time to proceed.
For mandamus applicants, the judgment illustrates the importance of documenting compliance, repeated status requests, and periods of unexplained agency inactivity. For IRCC, it underscores the need for case-specific evidence when defending processing delays substantially beyond published benchmarks.