Canadian program to encourage immigrant investment flops over from rot

[Twoller]

http://news.nationalpost.com/2011/12...ndal-lawsuits/

Immigrant-investor program in Maritimes collapses in scandal, lawsuits

Tamsin McMahon Dec 17, 2011 – 2:00 AM ET | Last Updated: Dec 17, 2011 12:24 AM ET

[image]P.E.I. Premier Robert Ghiz speaks to Chinese immigrants who staged a protest in 2009 to demand the return of their $20,000 deposits in the immigrant nominee program. Auditors-general in P.E.I., Nova Scotia and New Brunswick found governments had few controls over how the program ran.

Every year, roughly 60 numbered companies are registered on Prince Edward Island. In 2008 that number suddenly quadrupled, to more than 240, as the provincial government rushed to approve a flood of applications for an immigration program that partnered local businesspeople with foreign investors in exchange for visas, and which was about to be shut down by the federal government.

By the time the island immigrant investor program had ended, more than $500-million had flowed into local businesses, immigration consultants, lawyers and government coffers, the province’s auditor-general later found, a huge sum in a province whose annual operating budget is $1.5-billion.

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