Coderre to probe decision on wives
 
By Campbell Clark
The Globe and Mail
 
VANCOUVER -- Ottawa granted permission for three wives of a polygamist to stay in Canada permanently and an immigration official has warned that several more applications from polygamists' wives are likely on the way, according to internal government documents obtained by The Globe and Mail.

Polygamy is illegal in Canada and polygamous marriages are not recognized as legitimate in the official rule book for immigration to Canada.

However, the documents reveal that Citizenship and Immigration Canada granted permanent residence in 1994 to three wives of Winston Blackmore, who was leader of a polygamist community in southeast British Columbia from the mid-1980s until earlier this year.

Government officials knew the women were part of a polygamous relationship, and staff at the local office in British Columbia initially turned down Mr. Blackmore's application for immigration of his three wives.

However, the local decision was later overturned by federal officials in national headquarters in Ottawa.

The women had asked to be accepted on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

"They were approved with instructions and concurrence from NHQ (National Headquarters)," states an internal government report on the polygamist colony prepared two years ago.

The report says the women filled in "housewife" as their occupation on their applications for immigration. They stated they would receive financial assistance from Mr. Blackmore.

Under marriage information, they wrote "not available."

The internal government documents show Ottawa instructed the local office to move ahead with the applications for permanent residency, a designation that allows them to stay in Canada and apply for citizenship.

Although foreigners are normally required to apply from outside the country, officials at the department's national headquarters decided to allow the women to apply from inside Canada on humanitarian and compassionate grounds: that they had children in B.C. with Mr. Blackmore and were stepmothers to other children.

The women's applications were subsequently processed as "independents."

The documents state Ottawa told local officials to allow the application to "proceed to landing."

The women were not identified in the documents. They are believed to have arrived in 1991, across the B.C.-Idaho border and to have come into the country as visitors, who are permitted to stay for six months until they are required to renew their permits.

The documents were written when Mr. Blackmore's community, Bountiful, was reported to be part of a probe by U.S. authorities into arranged marriages involving teenaged girls.

The special prosecutor appointed by the Utah state attorney continues to investigate.

Bountiful is a secluded rural B.C. community of about 1,000 members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, outside Creston. Polygamy is central to the group's religious beliefs.

Ottawa released the documents in response to an access-to-information request submitted by researcher Ken Rubin.

The documents also show that controversial changes to rules for the family-reunification program that came into effect June 28 were expected to make it easier for the wives of Bountiful to obtain immigration papers.

Among the changes were provisions that, for the first time, allowed for a common-law partner to be sponsored, and allowed a Canadian citizen to sponsor a foreign common-law partner, 16 years or older, who was already in Canada.

Carol Anderson, an official in a B.C. office of Citizenship and Immigration Canada, advised the department's communications branch this spring that the wives of Bountiful would qualify under new provisions.

"I fully expect there will be somewhere in the neighbourhood of 30 family- class sponsorship applications submitted from this community immediately after June 28. I have no doubt that these will be second, or third or fourth or fifth etc. wives. All of them will be able to comply with the regulations as currently stated."

In a second e-mail, Ms. Anderson told an official in the department's communication branch this spring that she anticipated lots of publicity about the changes in sponsorship rules.

Mr. Blackmore did not respond to requests for an interview. Ms. Anderson said she was "not at liberty to speak" about her e-mails.

Canadian Alliance immigration critic Diane Ablonczy said the new regulations for common-law partners are too broad.

"Those arrangements definitely contravene Canadian values and cultural norms," she said in an interview.

Angela Battiston, an Immigration Department spokeswoman, said Ms. Anderson was "confused" about the new immigration regulations. Immigration rules do not allow for polygamous relationships, she said.

Ms. Battiston also said that Mr. Blackmore's three wives did not obtain immigration approval because they were his wives.

"We did not grant permanent residency by virtue of their conjugal relationship, but as independent applicants under the humanitarian and compassionate program," she said.

The Immigration Department has accepted many different kinds of cases on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, she added. No statistics were available on the number of cases in this category from Bountiful.
 
TheGlobeandMail.com
Originally published October 7, 2002
 
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