Bill C-11 (Historical)

Balanced Refugee Reform Act

An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act and the Federal Courts Act

This enactment amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, primarily in respect of the processing of refugee claims referred to the Immigration and Refugee Board. In particular, the enactment
(a) provides for the referral of a refugee claimant to an interview with an Immigration and Refugee Board official, who is to collect information and schedule a hearing before the Refugee Protection Division;
(b) provides that the members of the Refugee Protection Division are appointed in accordance with the Public Service Employment Act;
(c) provides for the coming into force, no more than two years after the day on which the enactment receives royal assent, of the provisions of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act that permit a claimant to appeal a decision of the Refugee Protection Division to the Refugee Appeal Division;
(d) authorizes the Minister to designate, in accordance with the process and criteria established by the regulations certain countries, parts of countries or classes of nationals;
(e) provides clarification with respect to the type of evidence that may be put before the Refugee Appeal Division and the circumstances in which that Division may hold a hearing;
(f) prohibits a person whose claim for refugee protection has been rejected from applying for a temporary resident permit or applying to the Minister for protection if less than 12 months have passed since their claim was rejected;
(g) authorizes the Minister, in respect of applications for protection, to exempt nationals, or classes of nationals, of a country or part of a country from the 12-month prohibition;
(h) provides clarification with respect to the Minister’s authority to grant permanent resident status or an exemption from any obligations of the Act on humanitarian and compassionate grounds or on public policy grounds;
(i) limits the circumstances in which the Minister may examine requests for permanent resident status or for an exemption from any obligations of the Act on humanitarian and compassionate grounds; and
(j) enacts transitional provisions respecting the processing of pending claims by the Minister or the Immigration and Refugee Board.
The enactment also amends the Federal Courts Act to increase the number of Federal Court judges.

Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Speaker, just over a year ago, the minister of immigration brought in Bill C-11 that, with the support of Liberals and New Democrats, ultimately passed. It was supposed to deal with the backlogs and streamline the system. The member even made reference to that bill.

Did the government mess up that badly that it had to reintroduce more legislation, when it did not implement the previous legislation even though it passed the House of Commons? Did that legislation not address the issues which, at one point in time, the minister of immigration told Canadians the bill would resolve the problems? It is like conceding the fact that the minister messed up the first time around. That is the way I think most people would interpret it.

[Matthew Kellway, NDP, Beaches—East York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, as yet another member of the citizenship and immigration committee, I am pleased to stand and talk to Bill C-31, although I am disappointed to have to do so under time allocation.

Bill C-11 of the previous Parliament, which Bill C-31 seeks to replace, is due to come into effect in June 2012, a mere three months from now. Bill C-11 was a product of a minority Parliament, but according to the minister, it was also the product of good faith, something that should guide the way that all Parliaments, minority and majority alike, function.

The minister told Canadians that he listened to all the speeches on Bill C-11 and that:

During the debates and consultations, the government took constructive criticism into account and recognized the need to work together with the opposition to design a bill that reflected the parliamentary consensus.

What emerged from this approach to developing legislation, according to the minister himself, was “a stronger piece of legislation...a bill that is both faster and fairer than the bill as it was originally tabled”.

That progress, that monumental achievement for all involved, as the minister once described Bill C-11, is now about to revert to the slower, less fair, weaker piece of legislation in the form of Bill C-31 and the collective wisdom that informed Bill C-11 all but erased. What is left is a bill characterized by a terrible irony.

This is a bill that is meant to set out how to treat people who have fled their country of origin on the basis of persecution or fear of persecution on grounds that are protected by human rights laws and convention. Yet this is a bill that is dismissive, if not actually contemptuous of the rights and freedoms that Canadians and citizens of many other countries around the world feel are fundamental.

The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedom, for example, is not reflected in the bill. Bill C-31 carries over from Bill C-4 the power of the minister to create a second, or in the terms of the bill, a “designated” class of refugee that face mandatory detention upon arrival. Such detention in the absence of good reason and sound process clashes with section 7 of our charter, which provides for the right to life, liberty and security of the person.

Further, group detention of refugees implies the detention of individuals without specific assessment and therefore grounds. Such arbitrary detention raises a violation of section 9 of our charter, and that is the right not to be arbitrarily detained or imprisoned.

The fact that there is no review of the detention for at least 12 months raises further issues. Section 10 of the charter requires that everyone arrested or detained has the right to be informed promptly of the reasons therefore, retain and instruct counsel and to be informed of that right, to have the validity of the detention determined within 48 hours and to be released if the detention is not lawful.

These are not the rights and freedoms of Canadians alone. They are what we call “human rights” and we consider them to be inalienable. In the language of our charter, they “belong to everyone”.

Long before our charter, we were signatories to the Charter of the United Nations. As a signatory to the UN charter, we reaffirmed our “faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small...”

What follows is our signature on a number of United Nations declarations and conventions and our participation in that organization all for the purpose of putting these beliefs into practice. Most relevant to today's debate is the International Bill of Human Rights, the Convention and Protocol relating to the Status of Refugees and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Today I would like to focus on the latter and the treatment of children under Bill C-31.

Bill C-31, as we know, reintroduces Bill C-4 to the House with some minor changes. One of those changes is with respect to the treatment of children in that Bill C-31 does not commit children to detention, but nor does it say what becomes of the kids who arrive in a group that the minister declares irregular.

International declarations with respect to the rights of the child go back almost a century. Over this time, what has remained constant in the successive iterations of such rights and the recognition that: children embody human rights; that they are entitled to special safeguards, care and assistance, including appropriate legal protection; that, “for the full and harmonious development of the child”, they should grow up in a family environment.

And finally, and therefore:

...the family, as the fundamental group of society and the natural environment for the growth and well-being of all its members and particularly children, should be afforded the necessary protection and assistance....

Such consideration and commitments to children and their families who form part of an irregular arrival are nowhere to be found in Bill C-31.

Interestingly, and hopefully instructively, others have gone before us to measure the impacts of mandatory detention of child refugees against the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Australia, as the government side will know, has a mandatory immigration detention system. It applies to children who arrive in Australia without a visa, so-called “unauthorized arrivals”. The Australian Human Rights Commission studied the impacts of this system and concluded that this system breached the following convention provisions: article 37(b) and (d), which is to ensure that detention is a measure of last resort for the shortest period of time and subject to effective independent review; article 3.1, which is to ensure that the best interests of the child are of primary consideration in all actions concerning children; article 37(c), which is to ensure that children are treated with humanity and respect for their inherent dignity; and article 22.1, article 6.2 and article 39, which all protect the right of children to receive appropriate assistance, to ensure recovery from torture and trauma, to live in an environment which fosters health, self-respect and dignity, and to enjoy to the maximum extent possible their right to development.

It further found that children in immigration detention for long periods of time were at high risk of serious mental harm and that the failure of its country, Australia, to remove kids from the detention environment with their parents amounted to cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment of those children in detention.

In short, the commission recommended the release of children with their parents and that immigration detention laws be compliant with the convention and based on a presumption against the detention of children for immigration purposes.

I have taken this time to review the findings of the Australian Human Rights Commission because it is a cautionary tale. Australia has gone before us down this path of immigration detention and, if it were not already obvious, there is at least now laid at the feet of the government more than ample evidence to suggest that it proceed with the detention of children and their parents in full understanding that such action is in conflict with the Convention on the Rights of the Child and causes harm to children and their families.

It is, in part, I am sure, because for our historic commitment to human rights, that from time to time people end up on our shores seeking safe haven or asylum from persecution and yet Bill C-31 proposes to deny to others the very rights and freedoms that define this country for ourselves and in the international community and make us so proud to be citizens of it.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the member for Beaches—East York.

I rise today to add my strongest objection to Bill C-31, the Protecting Canada's Immigration System act. I find it ironic that the bill would be given this title. It would do anything but protect our immigration system. In fact, the bill would set out to dismantle our immigration system, damaging it legally, socially, morally and internationally. I find the omnibus nature of the bill very disturbing.

This particular bill groups together two major pieces of legislation, Bill C-4, the Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System act, and C-11, the Balanced Refugee Reform act from the last Parliament. Then it introduces the mandatory collection of biometrics for temporary residents. These are three major issues that deserve adequate attention and debate.

I have already stood in the House and expressed my strong objection to C-4, yet components of the bill reappear here in C-31. The bill would attack refugees rather than human smugglers. By placing an overwhelming amount of power in the hands of the minister, the bill would allow the minister to designate a group of refugees as an irregular arrival. If the minister believed, for example, that examination for establishing identity could not be conducted in a timely manner, or if it were suspected that the people were being smuggled for profit, or a criminal organization or terrorist group was involved in the smuggling, designated claimants would then be subjected to a number of rules. They would be mandatorily detained on arrival, or on designation by the minister, with no review by the Immigration and Refugee Board for their detention for a year. Release would only be possible if they were found to be true refugees. If the Immigration and Refugee Board ordered their release within a year, even then the Immigration and Refugee Board could not release people if the government said their identities had not been established, or if the minister decided that there were exceptional circumstances.

Decisions on claims by designated persons could not be appealed to the Refugee Appeal Division. A designated person could not make humanitarian and compassionate applications. A designated claimant could not apply for permanent residency for five years. If the person failed to comply with the conditions or reporting requirements, that five year suspension could be extended to six years.

This raises a number of concerns. First, this is extremely discriminatory as it would create two classes of refugee claimants: real refugees and designated claimants. This is possibly a violation of the Canadian Charter of Human Rights and Freedoms' equality rights, as well as the refugee convention, which prohibits states from imposing penalties on refugees for illegal entry or presence.

Second, detention without review is a clear violation of the charter rights. The Supreme Court already struck down mandatory detention without review on security certificates. This legislation would imply indefinite detention on the basis of identity with no possibility of release until the minister decided that identity had been established. Arbitrary detention is also a violation of a number of international treaties.

Third, designated persons would have no access to the Refugee Appeal Division. This means that these claimants would not have the right to an appeal, thereby removing any system of checks and balances.

Additionally, the mandatory five year delay in applying for permanent residency would further delay the family reunification process, forcing claimants to wait eight to ten years to be reunited with their spouse or child living overseas. Last, this legislation would create an undue barrier for humanitarian and compassionate claims. I am extremely concerned with the idea that the minister could name someone a designated claimant based on irregular arrival with no explanation of what constitutes an irregular arrival.

If we look at the history of the legislation of this nature, introduced by this government, we can see that it has glaring resemblances to Bill C-49 in the last Parliament.

Bill C-49 was hastily drafted by the government when Canadians witnessed the spectre of boats coming to the shores of British Columbia, carrying some of the most damaged and wounded people on earth. These were people fleeing, as the minister has rightly pointed out, one of the worst civil wars in the world, in Sri Lanka. Never ones to pass off a good photo op, the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism and the Minister of Public Safety were in British Columbia, holding news conferences where they publicly accused the people on these boats of being bogus refugees, harbouring terrorists and trying to jump the immigration queues. They called these people “queue jumpers”.

I find this extremely confusing. The government seems to be speaking out of both sides of its mouth. On one hand, we have the Minister of Foreign Affairs referring to the Sri Lankan civil war as a great atrocity where numerous war crimes and crimes against humanity were committed. On the other hand, we have the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism and the Minister of Public Safety accusing people fleeing this very violence of being bogus. This is completely absurd. Which one is it?

Some of the refugee claimants and the refugees who arrived on the MV Sun Sea now live in my riding of Scarborough—Rouge River. Many of them have told me stories of their trip to Canada and their arrival in British Columbia. Many of them had UNHCR refugee cards. Upon their arrival, the people who greeted them gathered all of their refugee cards. When there was not the same number of cards as people, all the people aboard were told that they had not presented adequate identification and documentation when they came. Regardless of whether they had refugee cards, they were all detained. Thankfully, many of these people have now been released, but some are still in detention. Some of these people who had refugee cards are still being detained.

I am going to go back to the idea of an irregular arrival. This concept is not defined in this legislation. Based on the history of this bill, it is easy to jump to the conclusion that irregular arrival means arrival by boat. This bill is essentially saying that people who arrive in an irregular fashion, or by boat, are not refugees but rather are criminals. This bill is saying that people who wish to flee war, conflict or persecution but do not have the means to pay for a plane ticket so instead risk their lives by throwing themselves onto a rickety cargo boat and spending months crossing an ocean are not real refugees. No, the government is saying they are criminals. They are not real asylum seekers. They are not really fleeing a horrible situation, leaving behind their homes, livelihood and families with hopes of creating a better life here in Canada. No, these people are criminals. This is what this bill and the government are telling us.

Furthermore, if they fail to provide adequate identification, they can be detained without review. Most refugees who come to Canada do not have documentation, regardless of which process is used to enter the country. When people flee their home nation, they leave everything behind. How can we expect people who have left a war-torn country to carry valid identification? This concept of queue jumping, as the minister likes to say, is completely bogus. These people still must go through the same immigration process as any other immigrant to Canada. When people are fleeing persecution or war, they cannot be called queue jumpers. For refugees, there is no queue to jump. There is no lineup for people who are in serious danger; people living through a civil war; or people being persecuted because of their gender, religion, sexual orientation, et cetera. When people's lives or the lives of their families are called into question, there is no line. These people must leave their country immediately. Once they are safely here in Canada, they must joint the same queue as everyone else who wants to gain some sort of status in our country.

The second part of this bill comprises of Bill C-11, from the last Parliament, and the calling of safe countries. In the 40th Parliament, after a lot of work and compromises, Bill C-11 passed this House with all-party support. It was scheduled to come into effect this spring. However, before the legislation that was passed by this House could even have a chance to come into effect, the members opposite have including the original legislation, Bill C-11, excluding any part of the amendments that were accepted by all parties, in this current omnibus bill. The government has not even given the original Bill C-11 from the last Parliament a chance to work.

The Conservatives are using fear-mongering and fear tactics to scare the current immigrants in Canada and current Canadians. They are pitting Canadians against immigrants and new immigrants against other newer immigrants. This type of fear tactics is absolutely wrong.

Bill C-31--Time Allocation Motion

[André Bellavance, Bloc, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Mr. Speaker, we now know how this government operates. To this government, winning a majority spelled the end of debates and the beginning of installing its ideology. It figured it had four to four and a half years to pass everything it was unable to pass when it had a minority. We know that.

Now, the public is suffering the consequences. Workers are seeing their rights violated. We see what the government did with Air Canada. It has gotten to the point where special legislation is introduced before there is even a dispute. That is pretty bad; it is unheard of.

I imagine this government will never cease to amaze us, even if, here in Parliament, we are less and less surprised.

My question for the minister is quite simple. He was the one who ensured that the opposition parties and his government could manage to work together to draft a bill on refugees, namely Bill C-11, that was acceptable to everyone. Then he simply decided to scrap the whole thing and come up with Bill C-31.

He accuses the opposition of wanting to stall, but why did the government not reintroduce Bill C-11? Everyone agreed on it and there would have been no systematic obstruction.

[Matthew Kellway, NDP, Beaches—East York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am very disappointed to see the government invoking time allocation for the 18th time in the very short life of this Parliament.

More than that, I am a bit dizzy watching the minister flip-flop back and forth on this issue of the value of debate in this House. There was a time, it seems, when the minister did not use filibuster and debate in this House as synonyms. I go back to the debate around Bill C-11. The minister is on record and I would like to quote his comments about the development of Bill C-11. He said in June 2010:

I am pleased to report that the proposed reforms in the original version of Bill C-11 received widespread support. However, many concerns were raised in good faith by parliamentarians and others concerned about Canada's asylum system. We have, in good faith, agreed to significant amendments that reflect their input, resulting in a stronger piece of legislation that is a monumental achievement for all involved.

I would like to hear from the minister how he reconciles those comments made in June 2010 with his support for time allocation today.

Protecting Canada's Immigration System Act

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Madam Speaker, I want to thank my colleague for her comments and question.

I just want to remind the House that in the former Bill C-11, there was the possibility of having a committee, including human rights experts, meet in order to make this designation.

I think that in a democratic country, it is important to ensure that these powers are not given unilaterally to one person, but that a committee makes this type of decision in a transparent and impartial fashion.

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Madam Speaker, I will be sharing my time with the hon. member for Laurentides—Labelle.

A policy without justice is an inadequate policy. Bill C-31 completely jeopardizes refugee rights. Never in human history have refugee rights been as threatened as they are under the Conservatives and never has our democracy been as discredited as it is under the Conservative government, which is unable to respect the compromises reached in consensus with the other parties.

The government seems to forget that our ratification of international conventions on refugee rights and human rights requires us to bring our laws and policies into line with the provisions of these international conventions.

Canada is a signatory to the 1951 Geneva Convention on Refugees. Bill C-31, intended to protect Canada's immigration system, respects neither the spirit nor the letter of the Geneva convention. Having read the bill, one wonders whether the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, adopted by the House in 1982, is still in effect in Canada.

Let us not forget that Bill C-31 is an omnibus bill, which seeks to amend the Immigration Refugee Protection Act by unfortunately incorporating into Bill C-4 the most unreasonable provisions of the former Bill C-11, which received royal assent in June 2010.

The government had three main goals in mind for this bill: revoking the majority of the compromises included in the former Bill C-11, Balanced Refugee Reform Act, which received support from all the parties; reintroducing Bill C-4, the Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada's Immigration System Act; and finally, introducing the use of biometrics into the temporary resident program.

Bill C-31 raises some serious concerns in addition to the those already raised by Bill C-4, the unconstitutional nature of which we have raised and highlighted in our previous interventions.

In my speech today, I would like to draw the attention of the House to some of the concerns that Bill C-31 raises. In reaction to the introduction of Bill C-31, the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers says that like the sorry Bill C-10, Bill C-31 is extremely complicated.

The most draconian measures in Bill C-4 have been integrated into Bill C-31. Let us look at a few examples. Bill C-4 provided for mandatory detention for one year for people fleeing persecution in their country of origin and entering Canada without identity documents in their possession. Also, Bill C-4 eliminated review of detention for refugees who are smuggled into Canada.

The provisions pertaining to detention found in Bill C-4, which are being reintroduced in Bill C-31, are a direct violation of our Constitution. Furthermore, the jurisprudence constante of the Supreme Court is categorical in this regard.

Why are the Conservatives attempting to put themselves above the rule of law, which is a key principle of our democracy, even though they are familiar with the precedents of our high court? Why are they attempting to mislead the House by proposing that it pass laws that they know violate not only our Constitution, but also the Canadian charter and human rights conventions that our country has signed? Pacta sunt servanda is a principle of international law. Signed conventions have to be respected.

Furthermore, lawyers specializing in refugee rights have said that they are deeply troubled by the short time frames that Bill C-31 gives refugee claimants to seek Canada's protection. They find that Bill C-31 drastically changes Canada's refugee protection system and makes it unfair. Bill C-31 imposes unrealistic time frames and unattainable deadlines on refugee claimants and uses the claimants' inability to meet those deadlines to exclude them from protection.

In fact, under the terms of Bill C-31, refugee claimants have only 15 days to overcome the trauma of persecution, find a lawyer to help them, gather the documentary evidence to support their allegations, obtain proof of identity from their country, scrape together the money for legal fees, present an articulate and coherent account of their life, and so forth.

Is there a woman who has been raped and traumatized who would be willing to tell her story to a stranger? I am a psychologist and I know that is impossible in the time provided.

Unsuccessful refugee claimants will have 15 days within which to file an appeal under Bill C-31. As everyone can see, the time frames imposed on refugee claimants are not long enough to allow them to make full answer and defence.

Under our justice system, the greater the risk to life, the longer the time frames given to the person being tried to prepare his defence. Bill C-31 does not respect this principle of fundamental justice.

I am also deeply concerned not only about the new term—designated country of origin—that Bill C-31 introduces into our legislation but also about the undemocratic nature of the process for designating the countries in question. Under Bill C-31, the minister alone has the power to designate safe countries of origin, without first defining the designation criteria for these countries.

According to the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, the designated safe country list and the unilateral power granted to the minister dangerously politicize Canada's refugee system.

Refugee claimants who are on a designated safe country list have even less time to submit their written arguments and will not be allowed an appeal.

Bill C-31 also relieves the minister of the obligation of justifying why a country is safe and considering the differential risks that certain minorities face in a country that is safe for others.

If Bill C-31 is passed, refugees will become more vulnerable because their fate will depend on the political whims of the minister and the government. Failed claimants from designated countries of origin can be deported from Canada almost immediately, even if they have requested a judicial review of the decision. In other words, a person can be deported before his case is heard.

This shows us that the government has no understanding at all of the Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, which was adopted on July 28, 1951. The convention insists that the individual concerns of victims of persecution be taken into account. The Geneva convention does not state anywhere that international protection is granted to the victim of persecution based on the country in which the persecution was experienced.

Persecution of religious minorities does not occur solely in non-democratic countries, nor does discrimination based on sexual orientation occur solely in non-democratic countries. Race-based persecution can happen anywhere in the world. All signatories to the European Convention on Human Rights are democratic countries, but the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights is teeming with rulings that condemn democratic states for abuses of individual rights.

If that is the case, by what objective criteria can the minister deny a person international protection based on the fact that he or she is from a particular country and claims to have been persecuted because of his or her sexual orientation or religion?

The process of designating countries of origin is not carried out by an independent, democratic entity. The government is judge and jury. It has the power to designate countries of origin considered safe, and it has the power to refuse protection provided for in the Geneva convention on refugee status without examining the merits of a given case.

I would also point out that under subclause 19(1) of Bill C-31, the government can, if it chooses, withdraw the international protection due to victims of persecution on the grounds that circumstances have changed in the refugee's country of origin. Under this provision, the government could now decide to send people to whom it granted international protection during the first and second world wars, for example, back to their countries of origin.

Subclause 19(1) also adds new terms to the section concerning loss of permanent resident status. It states that the existing criteria for withdrawing protection from asylum seekers can be grounds for loss of permanent resident status.

I will conclude with one final concern about changes that Bill C-31 makes to claims made on humanitarian grounds. Such claims enable a person to stay in Canada even if he or she is not eligible on other grounds. Unfortunately, under Bill C-31, applicants awaiting a refugee appeal division decision cannot simultaneously apply on humanitarian grounds.

This bill is unjust and cruel. It is antithetical to Canadian values of compassion for victims of persecution, and it must be defeated.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Madam Speaker, when Bill C-11 was passed and we anticipated an implementation date of June 29 of this year, there was an expectation that we would have rooted out the issues of false claimants, that we would have put a process in place that would have exemplified to individuals thinking about claiming refugee status in Canada that if they did not have a true refugee claim, they would not be welcome in Canada, or it would not be approved and would be done so in a very expeditious manner.

What we learned, whether it was through crooked consultants or advice from individuals who understand how to manipulate and work around our process, is that they were not being scared off or they did not see the fear in applying in Canada. They simply found additional loopholes. Bill C-31 would eliminate, once and for all, the loopholes that allow bogus refugee claimants to come to Canada to seek refugee status. In fact, we will be assisting those who truly need help.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Madam Speaker, it continues to boggle my mind that the opposition keeps suggesting that there are two levels of refugees in the world. That is wrong. There is only one. There are those who seek asylum and deserve it, and there are those who seek asylum and do not deserve it.

I appreciate the fact that the member works extremely hard on the immigration committee, and I respect her being here this afternoon, but she was not here in the previous Parliament when we passed Bill C-11 and moved toward a more balanced approach. Bill C-31 would make the process of safe country more transparent and more accountable. How that process would work is spelled out in the legislation and regulation, as is how and when the minister would be able to undertake the issue of safe country.

I come back to the original point of what the refugee system in this country is supposed to be about. It is supposed to be about assisting those who genuinely need the help of this country to seek a new life, to seek a new country and to seek new opportunity but it is for those who deserve it, not for those who attempt to get it under bogus means.

[Sadia Groguhé, NDP, Saint-Lambert, QC]

Madam Speaker, this bill gives the minister alone all the power to determine which countries are safe, while in the former Bill C-11, that task belonged to a panel of experts that included human rights specialists. Bill C-11 was sponsored by the Minister of Immigration at the time.

Why is the government creating two classes of refugees and how can it guarantee that any single country in the world is completely safe from persecution?

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Madam Speaker, it is with great pleasure that I rise to speak to Bill C-31.

First, there are a couple of aspects that were brought up by the critics from the Liberal Party and the NDP with regard to Bill C-11, the balanced refugee reform legislation which was passed in the last Parliament. They claimed that bill is on hold, that it has not been implemented and that no acts within that bill have actually been processed. I want to clarify that they are factually incorrect. It needs to be identified in the House and on the record that there are two very important components of that bill that have continued.

The first is that prior to passing Bill C-11, there was a backlog in this country of over 60,000 refugee claimants. The process set in place by Bill C-11 would see that reduced significantly. In fact, that has happened. The backlog has been reduced to below 45,000 refugee applicants, which is a very critical component to the direction Bill C-11 was moving toward, which is to ensure that we do not have a tremendous backlog that would put us in an extremely difficult position in terms of processing applications.

The second is a point which the minister brought up during his speech. With the implementation of Bill C-11, we would see an additional 2,500 refugees, which is 20% on top of the current average. An additional 2,500 refugees would be able to settle in our country. We would accept those additional 2,500. Five hundred would be government-sponsored refugees and 2,000 would be privately sponsored.

I know what the Liberal Party and NDP critics' jobs are, but to hear them say that Bill C-11 has not moved forward and has not helped refugees or those in need is completely false. I suggest that when they get the opportunity, they should acknowledge that they supported two parts of that bill without reserve, and those parts continue to move forward today.

Turning now to Bill C-31, Canada welcomes more refugees per capita than any other G20 country in the world. I mentioned the additional 2,500 refugees that will settle in this country. They will, through the United Nations and private sponsorship, begin to come to this country.

The facts speak for themselves. In 2011, Canada received a total of 5,800 refugee claims from people in democratic, rights-respecting member countries of the European Union. That is an increase of 14% from 2010. It means that 23% of the total refugee claims come from the EU. That is more than Africa and Asia. In fact, Hungary is the top source country for people attempting to claim refugee status in Canada. Hungary is an EU member state. That means 4,400 or 18% of all refugee claims in 2011 came from Hungary. That is up 50% from 2010.

What is even more telling is that in 2010, of the 2,400 claims made by Hungarian nationals, only 100 of them were made in countries outside Canada. That means Canada received 2,300 of those claims, 23 times more than any other country in the world. That is not by accident. Those claims are being made for a reason. What is most important is that virtually all of these claims are abandoned, withdrawn or rejected. Refugee claimants themselves are choosing not to see their claims to completion, meaning they are actually not in genuine need of Canada's protection. In other words, these claims are bogus. They are false. They are untrue. These bogus claims from the EU cost Canadian taxpayers over $170 million a year.

At the federal level, we throw figures around in millions of dollars on a regular basis. However, if the average cost of a refugee claim is $55,000 and upwards of only 38% of those claims are actually approved, we can see what we now accept and have to deal with. It costs $170 million to deal with bogus claims and claims that are withdrawn or abandoned. That money should not go to defend and try to articulate and determine whether these are actual refugees. It should go to refugees who are in fact approved and need the assistance, whether it be for settlement services, education or whatever it may be to help them acclimatize and learn about our Canadian system.

Bill C-31, the protecting Canada's immigration system act, is part of our plan to restore integrity to our asylum system. It would make Canada's refugee determination process faster, fairer, stronger and more appealing. It would ensure that we would go through this process in a faster way so that legitimate refugees would be able to settle into the country and be approved. As well, we would remove bogus claimants in a much quicker, more expedient way so that we could actually deliver services to those who deserve them.

The monetary aspect is not why we are moving forward with the legislation. However, with the implementation of Bill C-31, over the next five years, we will see a savings to taxpayers across the country of close to $1.65 billion.

Bill C-31 would also help speed up refugee claims in a number of ways. One major component is the improvements to the designated countries of origin provisions. It would enable the ministry to respond more quickly to increases in refugee claims from countries that generally did not produce refugees.

The minister and I spoke earlier of what we saw in the European Union. That is specifically why we will be able to ensure with a safe country that we can process and work through the response in a period of up to, and no more than, 45 days. That is compared to a process which now takes upward, and in many cases exceeds, 1,000 days. It goes on and on.

Much of the determination of which countries would be designated would be determined on criteria clearly outlined in both the legislation and within the ministerial order. For example, for a country to be considered relatively safe, more than 60% of its asylum claims are withdrawn or have been abandoned by the claimants themselves, or more than 75% of asylum claims are rejected by the independent Immigration and Refugee Board. If that is not an objective, neutral test, I am not sure how the opposition could actually come up with one.

Because there will be countries that do not have a threshold in terms of the numbers who come to our country and claim refugee status, where there are not enough of those claims to make an objective quantitative assessment, clear qualitative criteria will be applied to determine the likelihood that a country would produce genuine refugees. This criteria will include, for example, an independent judicial system that recognizes and respects democratic rights and freedoms and whether civil society organizations exist and operate in that country.

In fact, unlike the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, which had both quantitative and qualitative criteria specified only in regulation, Bill C-31 would have its qualitative factors enshrined in legislation, while the quantitative factors would be set out in a ministerial order. In this way, the criteria used to trigger a country for review for designation would be more transparent and more accountable than under the Balanced Refugee Reform Act. It is an important criteria and important aspect to keep in mind as we debate the bill.

The designated country of origin provisions included in Bill C-31 would bring Canada in line with peer countries, like the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Switzerland, recognizing that some countries were safer than others.

The opposition likes to use the United Nations as an example, or at least as the leadership that we should follow in terms of how we recognize refugees and how we are supposed to stay in line with what should happen in dealing with refugees in our system, in our program in our country.

However, if I could just quote from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, who has himself acknowledged, “there are indeed Safe Countries of Origin and there are indeed countries in which there is a presumption that refugee claims will probably be not as strong as in other countries”. He also has agreed that as long all refugee claimants have access to some process, it is completely legitimate to accelerate claims from safe countries.

Under Bill C-31, every refugee claimant would continue to receive a hearing before the independent and quasi-judicial Immigration and Refugee Board regardless of where he or she may have come from. Furthermore, every refugee claimant in Canada would have access to at least one level of appeal. This is contrary to the opposition statements. These procedures exceed the requirements of both our domestic law and our international obligations.

Unfortunately, what is lost in a lot of the debate on the bill is the other equally important positive aspect that it will have. Not only will it result in fewer bogus claims abusing our generous immigration system, it will also allow for legitimate refugees who are in need of Canada's protection to receive that protection much sooner than they do now.

I want to stop at this point for a moment. Under Canada's current refugee determination system, it takes an average of two years before refugee claimants receive a decision on their case. Our system has become so backward that legitimate refugees are not in a position to move forward in a much quicker way. Our system has been overwhelmed by a backlog of cases. We have started to work toward a reduction of those cases, but we have not done enough and we need to do more, which is why we are debating Bill C-31.

It is important to remind the House and all Canadians that bogus refugee claims clog up our system. They result in legitimate refugees who are in genuine need of Canada's protection waiting far too long to receive that needed protection.

Bill C-31 would further deter abuse of Canada's immigration system by providing the government the authority to collect biometric data from certain foreign nationals who wanted to enter into Canada. The minister brought forward countless examples of serious criminals, human smugglers, war criminals and suspected terrorists, among others, who had come into this country in the past, sometimes repeatedly, up to eight times, even after having been deported. As fraudsters become more sophisticated, so too must the countries that are to protect their citizens. Therefore, biometrics will improve our ability to keep violent criminals and those who pose a threat to our country out.

Foreign criminals will now be barred entry into Canada thanks to biometrics. It is an important new tool that will help protect the safety and security of Canadians by reducing identity fraud and identity theft. Biometrics, in short, will strengthen the integrity of our system and help protect the safety and security of Canadians while helping facilitate legitimate travel.

Using biometrics will also bring Canada in line with other countries that are already ahead of us in that regard, the United Kingdom, Australia, European Union, New Zealand, United States and Japan, among others.

I would like to point out that while other countries around the world are using biometrics, opposition members voted against the use of biometrics and the funding to implement it, to assist with the safety of both Canadians and those entering our country. They determined they were not going to support what Canadians, if we were to ask them, probably believed should already have been implemented.

It is not likely surprising to anyone that I certainly do support the bill and that all of the government's efforts to improve our immigration system move us in the right direction.

However, what is telling about the bill is that a large number of experts and immigration stakeholders also support the bill. I heard from both critics, from the NDP and Liberals, that all lawyers across the country did not support the bill.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Madam Speaker, I will inform the member that it was actually a Liberal government that brought it in, but if the member for St. Catharines wants to try to take the credit for that, I will give him some credit.

What the government can take credit for is the huge backlog of refugees that has been generated. Remember that it was the Conservatives who did not fill the necessary positions at the refugee board to hear the numbers, and that is what started the backlog in the refugee system. Yes, improvement has been needed but members will find that through the years there has been movement, with a good mixture of immigrants and a progressive immigration policy that includes refugees.

We in the Liberal Party value the contributions that refugees make to our country. We have had refugees who have made it to Governor General of Canada, and to every economic, business, societal, non-profit and for-profit organization. Ninety-five percent plus of refugees who settle here in Canada go on to contribute immensely to our country and nation. We recognize that and are not scared to talk about it. The government and this minister in particular, on the other hand, have a totally different objective, an objective that demonizes the refugees in our great country.

The Liberal Party does not support Bill C-31, and for a good reason. Bill C-31 is in essence Bill C-4 and Bill C-11, with one major compromise in Bill C-11. The compromise took out the idea of an advisory group that would determine and advise the minister on which countries would be on the safe list. That was good enough when the Tories had a minority government but now that they have a majority government, they are going back to the Reform ways in how they are trying to deal with refugees in our country.

The minister wants to say what is a safe country. Think of the consequences of that. The minister wakes up one day and says that country X is no longer a safe country. As result, someone who comes from that country and claims to be a refugee will in all likelihood be gone before any sort of an appeal can be heard. That person will not even be in Canada but will have had to leave the country in order to make any sort of appeal.

The minister also wants to say who is an irregular arrival. That goes back to Bill C-4. There have been arguments about that. I know the minister will often write off the Liberal Party or the New Democrats as just being the opposition speaking. I would like to provide a specific quote about the government's behaviour on that particular line, and this comes from lawyers across our country.

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, it is true that the Bloc did play an instrumental role in building Bill C-11 in the previous Parliament. It is only fair to point that out.

It does seem like the government is trying to target refugees. One of the problems with Bill C-4 is that although it is directed punitively at human smugglers, it actually penalizes the refugees. That is what everyone is pointing out.

What happens if a refugee comes here? We will lock them up. We will prevent them from sponsoring their family for five years. We will prevent them from making an appeal application for five years. That is not targeting the smugglers but the refugees.

That is the problem with this bill. This bill also prevents someone from making a humanitarian and compassionate claim for up to one year, and it forces someone who arrives on our shores to make an election within 15 days between whether they make a refugee claim or a humanitarian and compassionate claim. These are people who often cannot speak English and have no access to legal advice. This is another serious structural flaw in the bill.

[André Bellavance, Bloc, Richmond—Arthabaska, QC]

Madam Speaker, an exceptional thing happened, and I am sure the member who just spoke took part in it. It was in 2010, when we passed an amended version of Bill C-11. All the parties examined the issue and improved the government's bill. Even the minister was pleased, because he said that once the bill was amended, it was an essential tool for safeguarding the integrity of Canada's immigration and refugee systems. The bill, as amended by the Bloc Québécois and the other parties, had a provision to accelerate the application process. It also provided the right to appeal for all refugees, without exception. With Bill C-31, the government is removing all that.

I wonder if the government is trying to send a message to refugees the world over, telling them not to come to Canada, that they are not welcome. That is the feeling we get from Bill C-31. What does my colleague think?

[Don Davies, NDP, Vancouver Kingsway, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to stand and debate this bill and present the position of the official opposition, the New Democratic Party of Canada, on Bill C-31, improperly and inaccurately named “protecting Canada's immigration system act”, because this bill would do damage to Canada's immigration system legally, socially, morally and internationally.

I want to talk about the omnibus nature of this bill which, just from a structural point of view, is something that is a disturbing feature of the Conservative government. Canadians saw already in this Parliament, the government take nine separate pieces of serious and complex crime legislation and put them into one omnibus bill and then put that before parliamentarians to discuss and debate. Now we see the minister take two separate major pieces of legislation, as well as another serious issue, which is that of biometrics, and combine those into one bill.

For Canadians who may be watching this, I want to explain a bit about what those bills are. By introducing this bill, the minister has taken Bill C-11, which was introduced in the last Parliament, debated, went through committee, was amended and passed in this very House, went through all three readings at the Senate committee and passed there, received royal assent and was waiting to be implemented this June, and the minister has stopped that bill from being implemented this June. I will tell members a bit more about what the minister had to say about that bill in a few moments. That bill was geared toward reforming Canada's refugee system.

About that bill, in June 2010 the minister said:

We have, in good faith, agreed to significant amendments that reflect their input, resulting in a stronger piece of legislation that is a monumental achievement for all involved.

These amendments, I am happy to say, create a reform package that is both faster and fairer than the bill as it was originally tabled.

Those were the comments by the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism on Tuesday, June 15, 2010. The minister has now taken the original bill that he had tabled in the previous Parliament, before those amendments that made it fairer and faster, and has thrown the amendments in the garbage and reintroduced the original bill, the very bill that he said was inferior to the amendments that were made by all parties of this House. The minister has, not unsurprisingly, neglected to explain that.

In addition, one of the first bills the Conservatives introduced in this Parliament was Bill C-4, again inaccurately and unconscionably titled a bill concerning human smuggling. It has been going through debate in this place but the minister has taken that bill and put it into this current Bill C-31. There is no explanation as to why he would take a bill, which has already been introduced and is moving through the system, slow it down and put it back into this legislative process, basically putting us behind where we would have been. I have a theory as to why that may be the case. Bill C-4 has been roundly condemned by virtually every group and stakeholder involved in the immigration system in this country, from lawyers, refugee groups, churches and immigrant settlement services across the board. I cannot name any group that has sent any message that it supports Bill C-4.

As well, the government has taken another issue, biometrics, and put that into the bill. What is puzzling about that is that approximately 30 days ago we commenced a study in the Standing Committee on Immigration and Citizenship on biometrics. We have had a handful of meetings and are in the middle of our study of biometrics and the government introduces legislative steps on the very thing we are supposed to be studying. I wonder what that says about the government's view of the work of standing committees and the experts and witnesses who appear before our committee when it actually comes to a conclusion before we have heard all the evidence.

I want to talk about the substance of Bill C-4. Bill C-4 was hastily drafted by the government when Canadians witnessed the spectre of two boats coming to the shores of British Columbia carrying some of the most damaged and wounded people on earth, people fleeing, as the minister has rightly pointed out, one of the worst civil wars in the world in Sri Lanka.

Some 550 people were on those boats. And, never ones to pass up a good photo op, the Minister of Immigration and the Minister of Public Safety were there doing news conferences outside accusing the people on those boats of being bogus and of harbouring terrorists. They said that publicly. They also accused them of queue jumping.

What anyone going through the immigration system knows up to now is that there is no queue jumping. It is a normal part of our refugee system for people to make their way to a country by regular means and make a refugee claim, and the Minister of Immigration knows that. No queue is being jumped. The Minister of Immigration actually went into immigrant communities where they were suffering long delays in their applications for permanent residency to sponsor their parents and preyed on their frustrations at his government's inability to deal with that backlog and wait time and tried to foster resentment from those immigrants toward these refugees.

We always want to be careful with our analogies but we need to consider the Jews when they were fleeing Nazi Germany during World War II. When they made their way into a neighbouring country through the dark of night, they did not arrive with a visa. They did not come through any UNHCR process because there was none at the time. They just made their way to safety. Those people were not bogus. They were not jumping any queue. They were escaping for their lives. That is what people do and that is what those people were doing on those boats.

To make the claim that those people were terrorists before there was an adjudication is as incendiary and as inflammatory as it is wrong. To this day, of 540 people, none have been deemed to be terrorists. Also, if anyone has any kind of question about their origin, there are less than a handful.

What would Bill C-4 do? It would allow the minister to concentrate his power. The Minister of Immigration wants the power to designate people as irregular arrivals. Under the bill, it just says a group. It does not define how many. We presume it is two or more. What happens to those people? Those people could be detained for up to a year without review.

I will talk about the legality of that. The identical provision has gone to the Supreme Court of Canada in the security certificate cases and it has been deemed unconstitutional, yet the government puts it right back into this bill. Moreover, the minister says that they can come out if they are deemed to be refugees. That is true but that assumes that we have a refugee determination system that would make that determination in under a year. If it does not, people could be stuck in detention for up to a year. Even if those people are deemed to be bona fide refugees, this part of the bill would still prevent those people from being able to make a permanent residency application for five years or sponsor their family for five years. I will say right now that that is a violation of the UN convention on refugees and a violation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

I will explain for the minister why that is the case. I put the question to him and he avoided answering the question. It is because the UN convention on refugees says that signatories, which Canada is, are not to put penalties on people who arrive at our shores by irregular means. If people who are deemed to be refugees are then prevented from sponsoring their families for five years or prohibited from making a permanent residency application for five years, they are absolutely being penalized because of their irregular entry.

The minister said that if they make a successful refugee claim they would be let out within the year. That is true but what about the five year bans? The minister refuses to answer that. That is the differential treatment of someone who comes through in the other process and it is a violation of the UN convention on refugees.

In terms of the rights of the child, the Ocean Lady and the Sun Sea, the two boats came to Canada's shores, included children who were travelling unaccompanied. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child obligates signatories, of which Canada is one, to put the best interests of the child first and foremost in our determination, and that includes in the immigration system. If we have a 14-year-old or a 12-year-old child who comes to our country and is deemed by the minister to be an irregular arrival, he or she would be prohibited from sponsoring his or her parents for five years. That is not in the best interests of that child. I say that there is a violation there.

Lawyers across the country from the Canadian Bar Association to the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers have all said that the detention without review process will be attacked as a violation of the charter in three different ways. The act will go to the Supreme Court of Canada, mark my words.

Let us talk about the Bill C-11 component. All parties in the House in the last Parliament worked in good faith to reform Canada's refugee system. I will grant the minister that there was need for reform. The minister is correct when he says that the old system is not working. People make a refugee claim, they are denied, they appeal. Then they make a H and C application and they are denied the appeal. Then they make a pre-removal assessment application and they are denied the appeal. It can take too long to remove people who do not have valid claims.

That is why the parties rolled up our sleeves last Parliament and worked on a streamlined quick process to make those determinations. The New Democrats proposed, as we have for a long time, through our hard work, that the government actually put in place a Refugee Appeal Division, which I will give the minister credit for doing. The Liberals never did do it and the current minister did. However, it was pushed by the New Democrats all the way.

The problem with the bill is that the minister then wanted to deny access to the appeal division of people that he determined to come from so-called safe countries. The minister wanted the sole power to determine what was a safe country. Again, that is too much power concentrated in the hands of one person. The opposition asked why he did not have an independent panel of experts to guide him with firm criteria and the minister accepted that change. In fact, he praised it. He said that it made the process of designation more transparent. Those are not my words, they are the minister's words in the last Parliament. Now today, the minister has thrown that panel out and he wants to go back to the original proposals so that he alone determines what is a safe country.

As well, the minister wanted to deny access to the appeal division to people who came from what he deemed to be safe countries. In the last Parliament, we persuaded the minister and we said that everyone had a right to appeal. We cannot have a justice system where some people have a right to appeal and some do not. Imagine how Canadians would feel if we said that if they went to court, their neighbour could appeal the decision, but they could not, depending on where they came from. We were successful in saying that everyone had a right to appeal no matter where they came from.

While I am on this subject, a fundamental difference between the Conservatives and the New Democrats is that New Democrats believe that every country in this world is capable of producing a refugee. There are cases where some countries or more or less likely, but every country is capable of that. In particular, on the LGBT community, 100 countries have some form of legal discrimination against the LGBT community. Governments change.

The minister said that there were EU countries that had refugees and they had to be safe. Right now the far-right government of Hungary is currently passing laws before its parliament to have the power to pass laws in 24 hours, with 6 minutes of debate accorded to the opposition parties. It is amending the constitution. There is the situation of the Roma in Europe. Everyone knows in World War II that Jews were rounded up because of their faith and ethnicity. Roma were rounded up because of their ethnicity as were disabled and communists. These were historically discriminated against, including Roma. There is a long history of established discrimination against Roma, and those people come from Hungary. They come from the Czech Republic, from Romania, from countries that are members of the EU in some cases and those people have a right to make their claim.

The minister has thrown out the panel of experts to advise him. I ask why? If the minister is so confident that he can choose which countries are safe countries, why would he not want the benefit of advice from experts in human rights, the very idea he praised and thought was a good idea 18 months ago?

The Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism may have great faith in his own judgment, but to have one person make such important determinations as to what country is safe or not, which country is or is not capable of producing refugees and who is an irregular arrival who will be subject to detention for up to a year without review and penalties that might keep their families apart for a decade. That is too much power for one person. We should build in checks and balances and that would be the case no matter who would be the minister of immigration, including a New Democrat. I do not know who would make the argument that the system is not better served by having that kind of check and balance.

In terms of the biometrics, biometrics is a system whereby this legislation would have people who apply for a visa to come to this country provide their fingerprints and pictures. That is a model we should be looking at, but there are significant privacy considerations and the Standing Committee on Immigration is looking at those very considerations right now.

The privacy commissioner has already testified and she says that providing a fingerprint for the purposes of identification to ensure that people presenting at our borders are who they say they are is fine. However, taking that fingerprint and comparing it to a wide database for other purposes or sharing that information with other countries or other bodies raises serious privacy concerns. We are in the middle of looking at those and those are issues that the government would be well advised to pay attention to before we proceed down that path.

I want to talk about a few other things that the bill would do.

The bill would prevent someone who has been convicted of a jail sentence of more than 10 years from making a refugee claim. I have raised this issue as well. Nelson Mandela was convicted of a crime for which he received a sentence of more than 10 years. Under the legislation, were that to happen today, Nelson Mandela could not make a refugee claim in Canada. He might be able to make a humanitarian and compassionate claim but no refugee claim. I have not heard the government explain that.

The bill would also, for the first time, give the minister the power to refer to the IRB the case of a refugee who had now become a permanent resident. The minister would have the power to strip that refugee of his or her permanent resident status if it were determined that circumstances had changed in the country from which the refugee escaped. That is unacceptable. People come to this country seeking safety and yet they find themselves, under this legislation, perhaps looking at being stripped of that status.

I would like to move the following amendment. I move:

That the motion be amended by deleting all of the words after the word “That” and substituting the following:

this House declines to give second reading to Bill C-31, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the Balanced Refugee Reform Act, the Marine Transportation Security Act and the Department of Citizenship and Immigration Act, because it:

(a) places an unacceptable level of arbitrary power in the hands of the minister;

(b) allows for the indiscriminate designation and subsequent imprisonment of bona fide refugees for up to one year without review;

(c) places the status of thousands of refugees and permanent residents in jeopardy;

(d) punishes bona fide refugees, including children, by imposing penalties based on mode of entry to Canada;

(e) creates a two-tiered refugee system that denies many applicants access to an appeals mechanism; and

(f) violates the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and two international conventions to which Canada is signatory.