August 28, 2004
Another letter arrives
Another letter with the “Crimestoppers” logo on arrived this morning…
This time it’s a letter saying that my request has been authorised and passed to the NIS for action. I should get a letter stating my prosecution and conviction history within 40 days. Yay!
Things are moving along, we seem to have finally settled that this is a reasonably good thing for us to be doing. I think we’re both pretty sad about leaving the UK though, there are lots of great aspects of the UK; the problem is that it seems to being sucked into a moral vacuum pretty quickly now.
I’ve been reading a forum lately for ex-pats who’ve lived abroad and returned to the UK. Very interesting reading but the most common reason for returning appears to be “you never know what you’ve got till it’s gone”. I find that interesting as I’ve been mulling over what I’d miss but I haven’t itemised it yet.
Anyway, I just realised that even after all this talk of my prosecution and conviction letter I never mentioned that I downloaded the forms I used to apply for it. A lot of people probably don’t know that you can download the form so there’s a link below. I used the PNC request one…
Note the text that says you must live in London otherwise they won’t be able to supply information… Interesting that one, as the only place that the CIC say that you have to get info from is the Metropolitan Police — at no point do they mention getting the info from your local police force. Hopefully there won’t be an issue anyway, as this is meant to be a NATIONAL database? Hmmm…
August 27, 2004
Proof it CAN be done!
Well done to Kate who has proven without doubt that, if you prepare properly there are lots of opportunities in Canada by being offered a great job.
Certainly gives me some hope that there are jobs over there! It’s a struggle over here to find any kind of decent job, in the North West anyway. I have no interest in moving darn sarf given how expensive everything is down there.
We’re still looking at BC but who knows, we could end up ANYWHERE. Toronto doesn’t really appeal given its population (4.6 million people in the GTA in 2001) but we could end up there if thats where the jobs are!
I still hold on to my dream of living in a smaller centre though, it’s the lifestyle thats driving the decision rather than any other concerns. Even if we’re looking at Canada through rose-tinted specs Kate has proved that you can move there and get a good job. That has to make us hopeful!
I still want my own little business though! ;)
August 23, 2004
Poms Want Aussies To Talk Proper (and Canajuns Too)
Thanks to G for pointing this out to me, from an Aussie news site. But the thing is…would Brits pass their own language test?! I did discover that the UK does show some leniency toward the language requirement; if you are from an English-speaking country and can show any sort of proof of English profiency (for example, high school or post-secondary diploma showing that you’ve taken some English courses) then they’ll waive the requirement. I guess at least Britain doesn’t have the same Citizenship requirement as Canada, where you have to attend classes on being “Canadian”, but I hear rumours that a similar requirement will eventually be put in place over here.
Poms want Aussies to talk proper
August 20, 2004STONE the bloody crows! Wotcha mean, we can’t speak English?
Australians wanting to become British citizens must prove they can speak English under new rules introduced by the British Government.
The rules will also apply to other nationalities that claim English as their first language, including Canadians, Americans, New Zealanders and South Africans.
According to one report two Australians, including a knight who has lived in Britain for 44 years and a writer with a degree in English, have been rejected under the new rules.
Australians have needed five years’ residence in Britain to go through the naturalisation process, one that has a seven-month waiting list. But the language test is a new hurdle.
August 22, 2004
Canadian Census Data On Immigration
(After my previous post about immigration data, this article appeared in the Globe and Mail. While I can see the reasons for wanting to settle in larger cities, I think the perception that it’s easier to find work there might be a bit over-rated because you’re a small fish in a VERY big pond. I don’t think this data will change anytime soon; the “big three” cities will perhaps always attract the largest number of immigrants; I do feel, however, that there are benefits to striking out on your own and moving to a smaller centre)
Most immigrants settled in cities in 1990s: study
By ALLISON DUNFIELD
Globe and Mail
Nearly all the immigrants who came to Canada in the 1990s settled in the country’s largest cities, a report says — a large jump over the number who settled in urban centres in the previous decade. About 1.8 million people settled in Canada’s 27 metropolitan areas in the 1990s, Statistics Canada said Wednesday. Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal got the bulk of the immigrants — about 73 per cent of whom made their homes in those three cities. Comparatively, in 1981, only 58 per cent of immigrants settled in those cities.
“The changing characteristics of immigrants have been central to this trend,” Statistics Canada said. “Immigrants from East and South Asia have historically settled in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver and immigrants from these regions have accounted for an increasing share of all new arrivals in Canada.”
It also notes that children of those who immigrated to Canada and settled in Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver also settled in those cities.
“The report showed that most immigrants settle in their intended destination in Canada and do not move from one metropolitan area to another during the resettlement process… This is the case even for those in their 30s and 40s,” the agency said. Immigrants move to major cities because they believe it will make it easier to find work, says Gerd Damitz, president of the Association of Immigration Counsel of Canada, a non-profit organization that represents Canadian immigration practitioners.
“It’s a big step for somebody … to immigrate to a new country, it’s like starting a new life,” said Mr. Damitz, who immigrated to Canada from Germany in 1990.”So they want to be as secure as possible, and the most important fact is where to find a job.” But employers want Canadian work experience, which makes the job hunt frustrating for many immigrants, he added.
The report also notes that some smaller cities have also noticed an increase in the number of immigrants who settle there. “For example, only about 1.3 per cent of all recent immigrants settled in Windsor, Ont., but they represented 8 per cent of its total population,” the report says.
The report also found that although most immigrants to Canada had “higher levels of educational attainment than those born in Canada,” many more immigrants were working in jobs beneath their level of education than Canadian-born employees.They were also earning less than their Canadian-born counterparts and had higher unemployment rates. In Edmonton, for example, recent immigrants had an employment rate of 76.1 per cent, compared with 84 per cent for Canadian-born workers. “Other urban centres showed similar patterns, and differentials were typically higher for women than men,” the agency said.
The study also found that recent immigrants were not typically working on a full-time, year round basis. For example, in Ottawa-Hull, 61 per cent of immigrant men in the ages 25 to 54 worked full-time, year-round, compared with 77 per cent of Canadian-born men in the same age category.
Statistics Canada says while there is an earnings gap, past studies have shown that the gap decreased until immigrants were earning almost the same as their Canadian counterparts. The agency says, however, that it is unclear whether the most recent immigrants to Canada will fare as well. “It remains to be seen if earnings for these workers will ever catch up to their Canadian-born counterparts. These details are essentially the same for all urban areas.”
The Statistics Canada report is the third in a series intended to highlight the most important issues faced by Canadian cities, and to assist in policy and planning.
Most data came from the 2001 census.
August 17, 2004
A letter arrives...
Well OK, it actually arrived yesterday but seeing as Royal Mail have seen fit to downgrade our local postal delivery service from arriving before we go to work to arriving sometime before midday neither of us were in to take delivery of a letter which needed a signature…
So, this morning I went to the local collection depot (opening hours: 7am — midday) before I set off for work. I saw the “Crimestoppers” logo on the letter and knew it was from the Metropolitan Police. Opened it once I was back in the car thinking that they would just be returning my driving licence and saying it would be a few weeks before I can expect to get a letter from the NID saying I had no convictions…
Nope, it wasn’t that!
Instead it was a letter saying that they couldn’t process the request with a bunch of tickboxes underneath. Two of which were ticked…
- You haven’t provided proof of identity with your current address on.
- You didn’t sign the cheque.
I admit the second one unreservedly. I didn’t sign the cheque, the proof is right there in the envelope! There will probably be an inquisition, perhaps even a Spanish one. I won’t be expecting it though! No-one does… ;)
The first one though — excuse me? I most certainly DID include proof of identity with my current address in the form of my driving licence which they returned in the envelope along with the cheque and the application!
I’m just going to resubmit the application with the cheque signed (cough cough) and my driving licence again.
At least it isn’t critical yet, there’s a little bit of time as we want to give ourselves as much of 2005 as possible to wander round the UK and Europe as much as we possibly can before we go for good.
The decision to go is definitely tinged with sadness but we’re pretty sure its the right decision for us.
So, still slogging along with silly little mistakes not delaying things but proving slightly irritating! :)
August 13, 2004
Interesting Bit of Research
Below is a really interesting article, especially since Canada prides itself on being one of the best countries in which to live. But an interesting follow-up to this research is whether or not people who live in small town Canada are happier than people who live in the cities, and whether or not the quality of life is better in a larger centre. Most immigrants to Canada tend to settle in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver but are immigrants who dare to forge their own paths in a smaller area (away from the ex-pat enclaves) better off? This would be an interesting research topic for a cultural geography PhD!
Canada rules best-cities list
By OLIVER MOORE
Globe and Mail
Tuesday, Aug 10, 2004Canadian cities have taken the top four spots in a ranking of the best places in the world for expatriates to live.
The list – which was created by combining rankings of cities’ quality of life and cost of living – was released Tuesday. It placed Canadian cities in five of the top six spots, the Australian city of Perth breaking the Canuck streak with a fifth-place showing. The list comes from Research Worldwide, which calls itself “The Worldwide Commercial Real Estate Information Portal.”
The methodology behind the list led to high rankings by cities that represent a compromise between quality of life and cost. Those that scored well had to show a sufficiently good quality of life, but could not be too expensive to live in.
Ottawa and Wellingtn, New Zealand’s capital, were the only national capitals in the 20 spots on the list, which was generally made up of solidly second-tier cities.
“We computed a schedule of the 20 best cities, that is, ranking the difference where the quality of living is highest and the cost of living is lowest,” the company said. “Corporate real estate players may find this worldwide comparison of interest.”
Canada’s capital ranked first on the list, followed by Vancouver, Calgary and then Montreal. Toronto came sixth, barely half a point behind Perth on a 100-point scale.
None of the cities generally acknowledged to be the world’s most interesting and exciting made the list. New York, London, Paris and Tokyo were nowhere to be found, a reflection of the much higher cost of living there compared with smaller cities.
The United States made the list only once, scoring 16th place with the tropical paradise of Honolulu. The majority of the other 19 cities were in Canada, Australia and New Zealand. There was also a smattering of European entries, the bulk of them in Germany.
Research Worldwide’s list was compiled by combining two studies completed earlier by Mercer Human Resource Consulting. Mercer’s quality-of-life survey evaluated 39 criteria in more than 200 cities, including political, social, economic and environmental factors, personal safety and health, education, transport and other public services. Their cost-of-living survey was based on the consumer behaviour of expatriates living in a foreign city. Each survey used New York as a baseline, giving that city 100 points and extrapolating all the other cities off it.
To create their own list, Research Worldwide subtracted each city’s cost-of-living result from its quality-of-living score. Doing so gave Ottawa a table-leading score of 40.4 points,f our points ahead of runnerup Vancouver.
August 07, 2004
A Mass Exodus?
I don’t know why, but there seems to be a small but steady stream of news stories and statistics in the news about Brits emigrating to another country (or is it just that I pay attention to these sorts of stories because I’m an immigrant and we’re planning on moving back?). Of course I don’t have a pen and paper handy to write down the facts as they appear on the telly and of course these news stories often don’t get put on the websites so verifying them is rather difficult. But just this morning there was a story on Sky News about the numbers of Brits emigrating to Spain; these people want more of a relaxed lifestyle and of course the climate is a big factor as well. The statistic that blew my mind was that there are 175,000 Brits who are living in Spain, either on a part time basis or permanently! And that’s just in one country! Recently, we attended an Emigration Fair in York; there is a larger one down south, in Surrey. But even the “small” one was well-attended by people thinking about relocating.
But what strikes me is that so many Brits are leaving and no one in Government is bothering to ask why. Just the fact that emigration fairs exist, and there are at least three separate (and popular!) TV series which deal with Brits relocating abroad should be testament to the fact that something must be wrong. Like we said, what would happen if there was an emigration fair in Canada or Australia for example, for people wanting to relocate abroad? Would that get nearly the number of attendees? Hmmmmm….
A recent article in Britain’s Daily Mail newspaper (unfortunately it wasn’t archived on the website) that covered the big emigration fair in Surrey had an interesting perspective. The paper spoke to many fair-goers who all seemed to echo the same thing;
“the sooner they could leave this over-crowded, over-priced, Brussels-dominated, crime-plagued, traffic-clogged island with its chaotic health service, failing education system and shambolic asylum-seeker policy the better”.
Ouch.
The paper stated that the government tracks the number of people entering the UK to live but there are no official statistics of the number leaving. However, the article mentions that despite the exodus, there are still more people immigrating to the UK than emigrating.
But here’s the interesting point, which should set some alarm bells ringing in government circles. One official representative from New Zealand who was quoted in the article said rather gloatingly,
“we are taking all your top-quality people. In New Zealand, our government policy is designed to take only the best individuals”.
An oversimplification perhaps, but when you think of the points system that Australia and Canada both use to attract skilled workers and those who can invest capital, contrasted with the image splashed on British news of asylum-seekers entering the UK by hiding in lorries and freight trains, and who the British government has openly said the country needs to fill low-paying jobs such as cleaning, farm work and catering because Brits just don’t want to do them while the country cries out for nurses and teachers…well, it seems to create a bit of an unbalanced situation. How will this make the country look in about five to ten years time, I wonder?
The paper noted that there will be a core group of people that will always want to move abroad and Britain being part of the European Union will presumably make it easier for people wanting to do that, but the sharp rise in people wanting to move long-distance to places such as Canada and Australia cannot be ignored. The paper noted that no one from the UK Government was on hand to visit the fair to check out what was going on. When the paper asked fair-goers what would make them change their mind about staying in Britain, lowering taxes, cutting the crime rate and improving hospitals and schools figured most prominently.
However, there are some statistics for Canada’s immmigration, as noted in an article in Canada News which is a UK-based newspaper for people wanting to locate to Canada. These statistics are really interesting, coming from a country that was created on immigration and still welcomes immigrants. It will be interesting, after we’re long gone from the UK, to contrast the situation of the UK in terms of immigration with that of Canada.
Recently released immigration figures for the whole of 2003 have shown that nearly 500 more Brits made a new life for themselves in Canada compared to the previous year.The figures, which were released in mid July, show that 5,198 Brits entered Canada as permanent residents in 2003 – an increase of 479 on the number that arrived in 2002. This is the second-highest number of Brits to move to Canada in the last eight years, and it is expected that even more will arrive this year after the Skilled Worker pass mark was slashed by eight points last September, making it far easier for potential migrants to reach the required threshold.
Canada welcomed just 221,340 new migrants in 2003, a figure only slightly above the lower end of the 220,000 to 245,000 target range established in the immigration plan for 2003.
The main reason for this decrease in numbers was due to an extremely slow first half of the year in terms of migration. After the first six months of 2003, 29,797 less migrants had entered the country compared to at the same point the previous year.
And while the number of new permanent residents arriving in the final two quarters of 2003 increased by 22,079 against the same period in 2002, the figures were still not as high as Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) will have hoped for.
August 04, 2004
Prosecution and Conviction letter, take 2
I’ve just put a cheque for a tenner into an envelope, along with my drivers licence as ID and a form applying for a Prosecution and Conviction letter. Apparently it can’t be over 6 months old when you finally send in your application for emigration. As mine is dated 19 March I think its better to be safe than sorry…
That should give you a pretty big clue as to whether we’ve made our minds up to go or not.
I feel sure C will be along at some point to give you the real skinny…