My name is Erika and I am new to this site. Myself and my partner are looking into relocating to Canada. My partner Brendan works for the police in the UK and is looking to work for the police in Canada. Currently both Calgary and Edmonton and recruiting officers from the UK. We looked into emigrating 3yrs ago but it would have taken us along time. Reading the Police website we could emigrate in 12mths with the Provincial Nominee Program.

Could you give us an estimated cost of emigration, from start to settling into your new home in Canada?
If you had a choice would you live in Edmonton or Calgary? Are there difference's between the cities? Weather? People? Job prospects? ( I work in childcare). We are both keen skiers/snowboarder, how far away are the slopes? How cold does it get? Is it true that you get lots of sunshine? What are the summers like, does it get warm enough for sunbathing?

I'm sorry about all the questions but once you start asking it's had to stop!! I'm so excited about the possibility of relocating to CANADA, I just hope we can afford it!!!

Well, there is a baby boom underway in AB, and I understand that child care centres are very short of staff so there should be a number of positions. However I am not sure of the necessary qualifications and how transferrable yours would be - maybe a good place to start checking would be the provincial dept of children services (www.gov.ab.ca)

I have never been to Calgary so can't speak for it. It is, however, much closer to the Rockies than Edmonton, about 1 hour to Banff, I believe. Edmonton is about a 3.5 hour drive to Jasper.

I like Edmonton's climate (so far - haven't lived through winter yet!) The summer temperatures tend to stay around the mid-20's, sometimes getting up to 30. Edmonton is known for having very cold winters, but I am told that in reality there are only a couple of weeks each year when it goes down to minus 40. Still, it will be significantly colder than the UK the rest of the time, and there will also be a lot more snow. Edmonton has a large number of sunny days, even in the winter, so even if it is cold at least it isn't always dark and miserable. The Environment Canada website would have stats on average temperatures and number of sunny days at www.ec.gc.ca .

Sorry I can't help on emigration costs - we moved here from Toronto, not the UK.