Refugee Sponsorship and Active Citizenship

Kelly Gallagher-Mackay: The made-in-Canada option of private refugee sponsorship is lauded internationally as an exciting innovation, according to Toronto Star. Within Canada, sponsors enact values of active citizenship, humanitarianism and solidarity – while providing financial and individualized social support to refugees. By Kelly Gallagher-Mackay Tues., May 3, 2016 My school community, my neighbours and I are among those newly involved in refugee sponsorship. But the sponsorship system is in a rocky place. Further, there is a profound gap between resources available to privately sponsored refugees and government-assisted refugees, the ones adrift in hotels and unable to start their new Canadian lives. Now that the 25,000-refugee target has been met, sponsors and refugees are being told to accept a reversion to insufferably slow processing – with arrival times in 2017 or later. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.