Under the IRPA and after Irving: The Right to Standing before the Federal Court for Canadian Children Seeking to Challenge Their Parents’ Deportations

"It is shortly before Christmas and 9-week-old Jonathan is about to lose one of his parents. His Colombian mother is scheduled to be deported from Canada and his Canadian father has applied for sole custody.

Canadian law obliges the immigration authorities in many circumstances to consider the impact of their decisions on children. The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (IRPA) requires the relevant powers to take into account "the best interests of a child directly affected" in deciding a non-status parent's application to stay in Canada on Humanitarian and Compassionate grounds (H&C), for example, and in deciding whether or not to grant a permanent resident parent's appeal of a decision to strip her of her status. The Court has also interpreted the IRPA as requiring the officials responsible for scheduling deportations to consider the children's best interests in a more limited fashion in deciding whether or not to defer a parent's deportation temporarily, such as to allow time for her H&C application to be considered. A parent involved in any of these administrative processes may therefore give evidence to demonstrate how her removal will harm her child."