Citizenship and Immigration committee  I didn't interview them myself, but in certain communities, quite a substantial number of the people who had terrorist connections came in as refugee claimants.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  The example I used was the 152 people who arrived off the coast of Newfoundland in 1986. I was involved in that, because I had just been the high commissioner in Sri Lanka and had just returned. They had asylum in Germany, but I think it's reasonable to assume that they had heard there were much better benefits in Canada.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  First of all, the term “detention” is sometimes equated to imprisonment, and in some cases, as Mr. Showler pointed out, people are kept in penal places. The recent influx of Roma people from Hungary, in fact, is probably mostly kept in hotels, and the space available for the Canadian-born who may need assistance is limited.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  That's a good question, Monsieur Giguère. The new act does give the minister more authority, but it brings us in line with what most other countries do. One of the objections is having public servants do the initial screening, instead of having an independent body. There will be reviews by an independent body, but you will get much more continuity and consistency in the decisions.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I think they get more sophisticated. The more barriers you set up against them, the more complex they can sometimes be. I think the sheer numbers coming in by boat pose a major problem, but smugglers have been using forged documents and fraudulent documents for years. Mr. Showler mentioned that we agreed originally with the UN convention.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I can’t recall cases of major human smuggling there. In Sri Lanka, the boats hadn't started yet, and it's the irregular arrivals that much of this bill is aimed at. In Canada's case, they first began to increase in number in 1986. In Australia, as Mr. Showler mentioned, one of the main reasons why there was a dip in claims in Australia was that the John Howard government instituted the Pacific solution, where they simply didn't let people land.