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Bill C-3, which came into effect Dec. 15, removes the first-generation limit to citizenship

A new piece from CBC on the coming into force of the legislative changes to Canadian citizenship by descent.

A couple of interesting points from further down the article:

Vermette says many Franco-Americans have long felt invisible on both sides of the border.

He believes Bill C-3 presents Quebec with a unique opportunity to repatriate or reclaim those who feel a connection to the province’s culture and language, even amid heightened controversy surrounding immigration and pressures linked to cultural and linguistic preservation.

"The Franco-American population is an untapped natural resource for Quebec," he said. . .

In a statement to CBC, the IRCC said it does not have an exact estimate of how many people might be affected by Bill C-3, but says it expects tens of thousands of requests for Canadian citizenship certificates over time. 

According to the IRCC website, at the beginning of March, almost 48,000 people were waiting for a decision pertaining to their certificate application, with an estimated processing time of 11 months.

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[-] glimse@lemmy.world 0 points 1 hour ago

Any Canadians want a side gig helping me forge some legal documents?

You might do better looking for an actual ancestor born or naturalized in Canada.

You may be surprised.

[-] glimse@lemmy.world 2 points 25 minutes ago

Unfortunately I know my lineage back to Europe so forgery is my only option

[-] Etterra@discuss.online 5 points 15 hours ago

My grandfather was from New Brunswick and I've started gathering up the paperwork.

[-] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 3 points 14 hours ago

Good luck. That should be fairly straightforward as you are only second generation descent.

[-] Mycatiskai@lemmy.ca 2 points 13 hours ago

Not that I don't love Canada, despite our issues but I'm looking into getting my Irish/EU passport so I can live and work in the EU if it is ever necessary.

[-] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 1 points 13 hours ago

Understand. Many of us are considering our dual citizenship options while they are available.

[-] slykethephoxenix@lemmy.ca 3 points 16 hours ago
[-] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 5 points 16 hours ago

There is no generational limit. However, a direct line of descent has to be documented back to an ancestor born or naturalized within the borders of what is now Canada.

Acadians in Louisiana have been successful in making claims back to the Le Grand Derangement / Expulsion by the British. They had meticulous records however.

[-] slykethephoxenix@lemmy.ca 2 points 16 hours ago

What type of evidence? Just like birth certificates and stuff? I immigrated here from Australia, but I have a great grandmother (she was a native and lived over 100. Died in like 1990) who was sold as a slave in the late 1800s. I'm not sure where she was from, it may not have been Canada, but instead the US. My brother looking to come here from Australia and is looking into this.

[-] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 4 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 15 hours ago)

Long form birth certificates that name parents and marriage certificates to show name changes would cover it.

Baptismal certificates can be used when there’s no civil registration of births. Civil registration began very late in several provinces of Canada. There’s more likely to be an Anglican or Roman Catholic baptismal record regardless of being Indigenous.

You may be able to find ship manifests and landing records in Family Search or Ancestry. Those list nationality — you would be looking for her to be a British subject domiciled in Canada at the time she landed in Australia.

Your great grandmother’s death certificate may have information that could be useful, as they usually state the place of birth. Newspaper death notices and obituaries can also be helpful as supporting information.

Lastly Canadian and US census records can be used as supporting information.

[-] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 27 points 1 day ago

Weren't we just being inundated with right wing talking points about how the population of our country had risen too quickly and we had to severely curtail immigration? And now we do this?

So, one is to surmise that the problem was really that the population increase did not have the desirable... hue?

[-] CandleTiger@programming.dev 2 points 9 hours ago* (last edited 9 hours ago)

And now we do this?

I don’t think it was a choice exactly. The news I was reading said the Canadian Supreme Court rejected the first generation limit as unconstitutional.

No source today, sorry. Brain is exhausted from documenting my Canadian ancestry in exhaustive detail all weekend.

[-] sveltecider@lemmy.ca 5 points 16 hours ago

Right wingers genuinely openly say “we don’t mind Ukrainian refugees and European immigrants.”

It’s not an open secret because it really isn’t a secret at all. They didn’t want more brown people in the country.

The C-3 changes were in response to the 2023 Bjorkquist court decision that struck down the first-generation limit on citizenship by descent. The Government had to bring in legislative amendments or the Court would have just struck the limit down as a Charter violation.

It was Conservative Party of Canada Harper Government that enacted the limit in reaction to air lifts of Canadians in Lebanon, calling them ‘Canadians of convenience.’

The CPC tried to amend the Bill C-3 to require a 1095 day presence in a 5 year period in order to past citizenship down to future generations, basically making it like the requirement for naturalization. Instead the law has a lifetime 1095 day presence to pass down citizenship to children born after December 15, 2025.

[-] theacharnian@lemmy.ca 13 points 1 day ago

Oh I'm not at all against this. I am absolutely for it. What I'm against is the trumpist-smelling anti-immigration rhetoric of the right and the centre.

[-] ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 3 points 22 hours ago

But that has nothing to do with this as it was a court decision.

It’s a concern the way the CPC MPs confabulated citizenship by descent with immigration during the committee hearings on the Bill.

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[-] YiddishMcSquidish@lemmy.today 1 points 13 hours ago

I'll fight with/for you fuckers. Just get me some tropical environment.

[-] HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 1 points 15 hours ago

don't we also have to live in canada for 3 years?

[-] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 2 points 14 hours ago

No.

The 1095 day presence is a requirement should you wish to pass Canadian citizenship to a child born or adopted after December 15, 2025z

[-] HeyThisIsntTheYMCA@lemmy.world 2 points 14 hours ago

thank you. the articles i find are intentionally obtuse and confuse the different admission programs with each other. it's almost like they don't actually want us using these programs

[-] Zephorah@discuss.online 9 points 1 day ago

Is grandma’s birth certificate good enough?

[-] MnemonicBump@lemmy.dbzer0.com 11 points 1 day ago

My best friend and his brother are currently in the process of getting their Canadian citizenship using exactly their grandmother's birth certificate. I'd recommend getting a lawyer to handle the paperwork, but other than that it's been a pretty straightforward process. They started the process back in November and should be Canadian citizens before summer. My friend's first ever passport will be a Canadian one.

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[-] Triton420@mander.xyz 6 points 1 day ago

You’ll also need your parents info. It’s all on the Canadian immigration website and pretty easy to do, you just have to file the steps carefully. I got mine last summer through my parent’s in Canada, we just sent in my wife’s based on her grandparent’s

[-] CandleTiger@programming.dev 2 points 9 hours ago

Do you have a link to:

It’s all on the Canadian immigration website and pretty easy to do

? The current info I have says to apply using the old forms requiring first-generation Canadian parent, wait for your rejection, and hope for an invitation at the discretion of IRCC to request discretionary grant of citizenship based on descent.

No forms for this new process appear to exist and I’m not bloody likely to achieve a certified long form birth certificate for my great grandmother born in the 1800s so it leaves me feeling pretty uncertain about what documentation exactly is or isn’t good enough.

[-] Lumelore@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 1 day ago

There is no generation limit so you could go back to your great great greats or later if you wanted. I have quite a few great great grandparents who were born in Quebec and I'm gonna go for it.

For people born after Dec 15, 2025 there is a requirement for a parent to have been in Canada for a while, but I don't know how many babies are using Lemmy and reading this.

canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/services/canadian-citizenship/act-changes/rules-2025.html

Having your grandmother’s birth is a great start.

You need to prove a direct line of descent by birth* back to your grandmother — assuming she’s the last generation born or naturalized in Canada.

So, her birth certificate would establish that she was Canadian if it’s from a Canadian province or territory. However, you will also need to demonstrate :

  • that one of your parents was her child with their long form birth certificate with her name listed as their mother — if your grandmother’s family name changed in marriage, you’ll need a marriage certificate or other proof to show she was the same person;

  • likewise, you’ll need to demonstrate that parent your parent’s child through your long form birth record and possibly your parents’ marriage certificate if claiming through your mother.

*Adoption unfotunately continues to not have quite the same process:

If you were adopted, and you are claiming citizenship through your adoptive grandmother, this is possible but it’s a two step process where your adoptive parent would need a Confirmation of citizenship first and then you could apply for a grant of citizenship.

If the parent you are claiming citizenship through was adopted by your grandmother, as the Act is now, they would not be able to pass down citizenship to you. They could get a grant of citizenship for themselves but it would only come into effect the day the grant is made and couldn’t only pass it down to their children born after the date of granting.

[-] CandleTiger@programming.dev 1 points 9 hours ago

Where are you going this stuff from about extra steps for adoptive parents? I was just reading the CIC summary of new guidelines and it said adoptive parents count the same as birth parents. You just need to get a certificate of adoption or other proof that the adoption happened and proof that the adoptive parents were Canadian citizens at the time

[-] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 2 points 3 hours ago

Concerns about equity for adopted persons were raised by senators when the bill was being studied in committee. They let C-3 go through due to the need to address Bjorkquist but asked the Minister to come back with further amendments in future.

There is a different form and process for adopted persons adopted outside of Canada. Current processing time is about two years.

It involves two steps:

  1. Confirmation of parent’s Canadian citizenship, which when completed provides a digital identifier to be used in step two
  2. Applicant provides the documentation of the adoption and original birth certificate.

The text on the linked IRCC page reads:

If you choose to apply for citizenship, there are 2 parts to the process:

Part 1: We check if the parent can pass on Canadian citizenship to their adopted child.

Part 2: We check if the adopted child can become a Canadian citizen. See:

https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/services/canadians/adopt-child-abroad/processes/choose-process/citizenship.html

[-] CandleTiger@programming.dev 2 points 1 hour ago
[-] mp3@lemmy.ca 2 points 1 day ago

Should be, as long as your able to prove lineage, and it wasn't uncommon at the time for the wife to drop her maiden name for the spouse's, so you may have to also dig out a certificate for the name change if that is the case.

[-] BinzyBoi@piefed.ca 0 points 14 hours ago

Completely against this.

Every single election cycle we hear the same thing from either side of the aisle of American politics where if the person they're against wins, suddenly they want to move to Canada.

We already have a big enough problem with having our own national identity. You can argue we have xyz that'll keep us afloat, but the reality is, we lack a lot culturally compared to other countries in our position. We constantly lose cultural talents here to the U.S. because it's more profitable to do what they do down south than it is here. Like, how many Canadian actors can you name that haven't moved to the American film industry? How many of them even live here?

The same goes for a lot of major musical talents. Like wow, congrats, fucking Drake lives in Toronto, what an accomplishment that we have one major musical talent from this era who stuck around, and it's one of the worst people you can name.

When Americans come in here through these ancestry claims, we are importing more American culture while completely failing to adequately protect our own. We are also giving credence to Americans seeing us simply as a safe-haven extension of the U.S., and allowing people to abandon the responsibility to their country if the Trump administration is the root cause of them coming here.

Want to protect those such as immigrants and trans people in the U.S.? Get rid of the Safe Third Country agreement. We should only be taking in those whose lives are directly in danger despite their actions rather than those who have the ability to do something about their situation, yet take the coward's way out by leaving after they refused to take proper action.

You already see this crap online of people simply saying "sorry" and doing fuck all otherwise about shit like the annexation talk. Why reward inaction?

[-] Blisterexe@lemmy.zip 2 points 4 hours ago

Disagree, this isn't about giving citizenship to Americans, they just happen to be the primary beneficiaries. This is an attempt to right the wrong that was the mass deportation of french canadians by the british after they took new france.

[-] KingGimpicus@sh.itjust.works 3 points 13 hours ago

When your national identity is colonizing, raping, and killing children, maybe it shouldn't be preserved.

Please note that I am an Ojibwe man with a French last name before you tell me it was a long time ago and the history should stay in the past.

[-] BinzyBoi@piefed.ca 1 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago)

We can denounce the horrible shit that people have done in the past and correct the wrongs that continue to happen while also making indigenous people front and centre of how we approach our national identity, especially when it comes to the connection we have to the land that we live on seeing how indigenous people's cultures are by and far the most attached cultures to the land which we live on.

I respect treaty rights and the right for First Nations have regarding self-determination, and there should be more efforts out there to help give proper reconciliation to the people we've historically harmed who have more right to this land than anybody else.

In Edmonton for example, while there is absolutely more that needs to be done, especially when it comes to helping indigenous people directly through social services and the likes, I do appreciate that the efforts for reconciliation have been made such as the renaming of city wards to Cree names, renaming Dan Knott Junior High to Kisêwâtisiwin due to Knott's very likely connections to the KKK, and renaming the Oliver community to Wîhkwêntôwin because of Frank Oliver's racist efforts and attitudes towards indigenous people like the Papaschase as well as Black immigrants.

We are leaving the very people who hold the richest culture relating to our land behind, and it is absolutely inexcusable that we continue that pattern, to which we should hold the government to account.

Edit: Looking at the modlog for you and the absolutely vile things you've said about people, I'm just not going to engage any further.

[-] StillPaisleyCat@startrek.website 1 points 14 hours ago

I can appreciate your concern.

[-] fubarx@lemmy.world 2 points 1 day ago

Do photos of ancestors qualify?

Hard to provide residence address. They tended to move around a lot.

[-] Eldritch@piefed.world 4 points 22 hours ago

Heh, what about ancestors predating photography generally. I'm officially on tribal rolls for a segment of a tribe death marched across continent. That the capital of Canada literally shares a name with and still has a presence in Canada. One of these days I should stop wondering about it and start finding out. It's a long shot but still.

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this post was submitted on 08 Mar 2026
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