What just happened to your claim
Bill C-12 created new grounds on which a refugee claim can be found ineligible to be referred to the Refugee Protection Division, including the one-year rule (claims made more than one year after entry) and rules for claims made after crossing from the United States. If your letter cites s.101(1)(b.1) or s.101(1)(b.2), or you received a procedural fairness letter marked "redetermination – ineligibility", an officer, not a judge and not the Refugee Board, is deciding your claim will never be heard on its merits. Many people describe this as their asylum claim being cancelled. What it legally means is that instead of a refugee hearing, you may be limited to a Pre-Removal Risk Assessment (PRRA), a much narrower process.
That decision is not necessarily the end. Officers make errors: about the facts, about the timeline, about whether the provision applies to you at all, and about procedural fairness. The Federal Court exists to review exactly these errors. We set out the specific error patterns we see most often in challenging a s.101(1)(b.1)/(b.2) decision.
What judicial review can do
- Set the decision aside. If the Court grants the application, the ineligibility determination is quashed and the matter is redetermined.
- Preserve your position. A pending challenge, and where necessary a stay motion, can be critical to remaining in Canada while the case is decided.
- Protect the whole family. Each family member, including children through a designated representative, may have their own application.
What "leave" means, and what the odds actually are
An application for leave and judicial review has two stages, and almost everything people are told about it collapses the two. Leave is permission to be heard. A judge decides it on the paper record alone. There is no hearing, you do not attend, and if leave is refused no reasons are given. Leave is refused in most immigration applications. If leave is granted, a hearing follows, usually months later.
So the honest position is this: filing is not a remedy, it is a request for permission, and the odds at that first stage are against every applicant regardless of who files it. Anyone who tells you they can predict the outcome of your leave application is guessing. What can be controlled is whether the application is complete, properly evidenced, and filed inside the deadline, and those are the things that sink otherwise arguable cases.
Why this firm
The Law Office of Rohan George has prepared and filed Federal Court applications for leave and judicial review of C-12 ineligibility determinations, including complete filing sets for families with minor children.
We are not going to overstate what that means. These provisions came into force in 2026, so no counsel in the country has years of experience under them, and this is a small practice rather than a large litigation department. What we can tell you is that we have done the filing, we know what the Court requires, and we will give you a straight assessment, including when we think an application is not worth your money, and when a matter should go to counsel with deeper litigation experience than ours.
Common questions
What should I bring to a consultation?
The ineligibility letter itself, any procedural fairness letter you received before it, your identity documents, and the dates you entered Canada and made your claim.
What does it cost?
Fees are discussed openly at the first consultation and depend on whether the matter involves one applicant or a family, and whether a stay motion is needed.
I already responded to a procedural fairness letter. Is it too late?
No. The judicial review challenges the final determination. But the deadline runs from when you were notified of that determination, so contact counsel immediately.