Canadian Club and Immigrant Women

immigrant women: About every six days, a woman in Canada citizen, non-citizen, aboriginal, non-aboriginal is killed by her intimate partner. A government that cares about women would want to protect them from domestic violence, right? Yet, consider this recent example:, according to The Star. If a Canadian woman is abused by her partner, the system is supposed to protect her, but when an immigrant woman is abused by her Canadian sponsor, she is treated as the wrongdoer. How did this happen? A couple of years ago, then-minister Jason Kenney decided that marriage fraud was a problem of mass proportions crying out for a policy response and Immigration Minister Chris Alexander will be speaking to the Canadian Club on the eve of International Womens Day about what his government does to support immigrant women. His speech should be short. A young woman is in a relationship with a Canadian citizen. They marry, and shortly thereafter she has a child. Her husband sponsors her application to remain in Canada. The sponsorship is approved but just before she is issued her permanent resident visa she flees the matrimonial home, a victim of domestic abuse. Shortly thereafter, she is called into an immigration office and she advises them of her circumstances. How do immigration officials respond? They arrest the woman, and tell he that she will be deported because the husband has cancelled the sponsorship. Fortunately, just before officials carried out the deportation order, a judge stopped it out of concern for her child. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.