Canadian immigration law does not have one removal order. It has three — departure, exclusion and deportation — and the difference between them is not what happens on the way out of Canada. It is what happens afterwards: whether written permission is needed to come back, and for how long.
Angelina Shuster is a paralegal licensed by the Law Society of Ontario, and representation before Immigration and Refugee Board tribunals falls within a licensed paralegal's scope. What follows is general information about procedure in Canada and is not legal advice; reading it does not create a paralegal-client relationship, and every removal matter turns on its own record.
What is a removal order?
It is a written order requiring a person who is not a Canadian citizen to leave Canada, issued under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. Some orders are made by the Minister's delegate on a report under section 44; others are made by the Immigration Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board at the end of an admissibility hearing.
Section 48 sets out what an order does. A removal order is enforceable if it has come into force and is not stayed, and once it is enforceable the foreign national is required to leave Canada immediately and the order is to be enforced as soon as possible. Both phrases — come into force and not stayed — are dealt with below.
The type of order is not selected by the officer or the tribunal member as a measure of how serious the matter is. It is prescribed by regulation according to the ground of inadmissibility that was found.
The three removal orders at a glance
The table sets out the consequence that separates them, once the order has been enforced.
| Order | Written authorization to return? | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Departure order, complied with in time | No authorization required | IRPR s. 224(1) |
| Departure order not complied with in 30 days | Becomes a deportation order automatically | IRPR s. 224(2) |
| Exclusion order | Required during the one-year period after the order was enforced | IRPR s. 225(1) |
| Exclusion order made under s. 40(2)(a) for misrepresentation | Required during the five-year period after the order was enforced | IRPR s. 225(3) |
| Deportation order | Required at any time afterwards, with no expiry | IRPR s. 226(1) |
The written authorization in each row is the authorization to return to Canada. Section 52(1) of the Act is the provision behind all of it: once a removal order has been enforced, the foreign national is not to return unless authorized by an officer or in other prescribed circumstances. The rows above are those circumstances.
Which order goes with which ground?
Section 229 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations prescribes the applicable order for each ground. Deportation orders attach to the most serious grounds — security under section 34, violating human or international rights under section 35, serious criminality and organized criminality. Exclusion orders attach to health grounds, financial reasons, misrepresentation under section 40(1)(a) or (b), and a failure to appear for examination.
Two subsections then move the line. Under section 229(2), where a refugee claim has been made and referred, a departure order applies in several situations that would otherwise produce an exclusion order. Under section 229(3), the order becomes a deportation order where the person was previously subject to a removal order on the same grounds, failed to comply with a condition imposed under the Act, or was convicted in Canada of an offence punishable by way of indictment. The complete mapping is set out in the earlier article on what an admissibility hearing decides, and an older article covers the types of removal order in outline.
When does a removal order come into force?
Section 49(1) gives three answers. An order comes into force on the day it is made where there is no right to appeal; on the day after the appeal period expires where there is a right to appeal and none is made; and on the day of a final determination confirming the order where an appeal is made.
Section 49(2) treats refugee protection claimants differently. A removal order made against a claimant is conditional, and does not come into force until one of a list of events occurs. The most common are these:
- The claim is determined to be ineligible only under paragraph 101(1)(e) — the order comes into force on the day notice is provided.
- The claim is otherwise determined to be ineligible under subsection 101(1) — seven days after notice.
- The claim is rejected by the Refugee Protection Division and there is no right to appeal — 15 days after notice of the rejection.
- The claim is rejected and no appeal is filed and perfected within the time limits — the later of the day after the limit expires and 15 days after notice.
- The Refugee Appeal Division provides notice that the claim is rejected — 15 days after that day.
- The claim is determined to be withdrawn — on the day notice is provided; or determined to be abandoned — 15 days after notice.
A refused claimant is therefore not removable on the day of the decision. The conditional order sits dormant while the claim runs, and the fifteen-day periods in that list start on the day notice arrives.
When is a removal order "enforced"?
Section 240(1) of the Regulations answers this precisely, and the answer is not "when the person leaves". A removal order, whether it is enforced by voluntary compliance or by the Minister, is enforced when the foreign national does four things: appears before an officer at a port of entry to verify their departure from Canada, obtains a certificate of departure from the Canada Border Services Agency, departs from Canada, and is authorized to enter their country of destination other than for the purposes of transit.
The certificate of departure proves the second step, and its absence is the common reason a departure order stops being one. Subsections 240(2) and 240(3) provide two ways an order can still be recorded as enforced afterwards: by an officer outside Canada, where a person who left applies for a visa, an electronic travel authorization or an authorization to return and establishes that they are the person described in the order, and by an officer in Canada who confirms the departure.
How a departure order becomes a deportation order
By the passage of time, and by nothing else. Section 224(2) of the Regulations requires a foreign national issued a departure order to meet the requirements in paragraphs 240(1)(a) to (c) — verify departure, obtain the certificate, and leave — within 30 days after the order becomes enforceable, failing which the departure order becomes a deportation order.
There is no fresh hearing, no new decision and no notice from a tribunal. The conversion happens by operation of the Regulations, and the consequence is the one in the table above.
Section 224(3) supplies the exception: if the foreign national is detained within the 30-day period, or the removal order is stayed, the period is suspended until release or until the order becomes enforceable again. Detention and a stay pause the clock; they do not restart it.
What returning to Canada requires after each order
A departure order that was complied with leaves no return bar. Section 224(1) makes an enforced departure order a circumstance in which the foreign national is exempt from the requirement to obtain an authorization to return.
An exclusion order requires written authorization during the one-year period after the order was enforced, under section 225(1). Where the exclusion order was issued as a result of the application of paragraph 40(2)(a) of the Act — the misrepresentation bar — section 225(3) extends that to five years. Section 225(2) then confirms the other side of it: the expiry of the one-year period, or the five-year period where subsection (3) applies, is itself a circumstance in which no authorization is required.
A deportation order requires written authorization at any time after it was enforced, under section 226(1); section 226(3) applies the same rule to a removal order arising from a certificate under section 80. One narrow exemption covers both orders: where the order was made on the basis of inadmissibility under paragraph 42(1)(b) — an accompanying inadmissible family member — sections 225(4) and 226(2) remove the requirement.
Section 52(2) covers the case where the order should not have been made. Where a removal order for which there is no right of appeal has been enforced and is later set aside on judicial review, the foreign national is entitled to return to Canada at the expense of the Minister.
What stays a removal order?
Section 50 of the Act lists five situations in which a removal order is stayed: where a decision made in a judicial proceeding would be directly contravened by enforcement, with the Minister given an opportunity to make submissions; for a foreign national sentenced to imprisonment in Canada, until the sentence is completed; for the duration of a stay imposed by the Immigration Appeal Division or another court of competent jurisdiction; for a stay under paragraph 114(1)(b); and for a stay imposed by the Minister.
The Regulations add one that operates automatically. Under section 232, a removal order is stayed when a person is notified that they may apply for a pre-removal risk assessment, and the stay runs until the earliest of several events: written confirmation that no application will be made, the expiry of the period for making one, rejection of the application, or, where it is allowed, the decision on the resulting application for permanent residence.
Enforcement and the orders that pause it are covered in a separate article on stays of removal orders. A person held in immigration detention also has a fixed schedule of detention reviews, which run regardless of the removal order.
Where is a removal order challenged?
Section 63(3) gives a permanent resident, a protected person and a foreign national holding a permanent resident visa the right to appeal a removal order made at an admissibility hearing to the Immigration Appeal Division. Section 64 removes that right where the finding was security, violating human or international rights, sanctions, serious criminality or organized criminality, and, in defined circumstances, misrepresentation.
Where no appeal exists, the remaining route is an application for leave and judicial review in the Federal Court, filed within 15 days for a matter arising in Canada. Leave is decided first, on the written record; judicial review asks whether the decision was reasonable rather than re-hearing the evidence.
Karb Law appears on removal order matters and on appeals to the Immigration Appeal Division. Anyone holding a written order or a decision with a deadline running can contact the office to discuss representation.
