I'm in BC, Canada again after 2 years working in the US. I'm English on a temporary work visa.

So I went to get a new driving licence from ICBC and got that no problems, but for my wife they said she would need a visitor visa from CIC?

I think last time she held one she just showed her passport with a Visitor stamp valid for a year.

They said it may take 2 months to get a visitor visa for her. Does that sound right? Is this another 9-11 thing?

ICBC has some strange rules and you can't win any fight over it with them. They don't want to issue DL's to people with plain visitor visa - but they will issue DL to person with valid for at least 12 months work/study permit or with Visitor Record. VR is what they asked your wife to show, not visitor visa (TRV). Your wife should have asked for VR at the port of entry when coming to Canada.

Why didn't she apply for open work permit at the border? As long as your work permit's job is in skilled occupation she is eligible for open work permit and with any WP ICBC will not make problems anymore.

Hi Andrew

My wife didn't apply for a work visa as she has no intention of working and we're applying for PR fairly soon anyway.

I didn't think there would be any point in getting one, but it seems like there was ;-)