Bill C-50 (Historical)

Budget Implementation Act, 2008

An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on February 26, 2008 and to enact provisions to preserve the fiscal plan set out in that budget

Part 1 enacts a number of income tax measures proposed in the February 26, 2008 Budget. In particular, it
(a) introduces the new Tax-Free Savings Account, effective for the 2009 and subsequent taxation years;
(b) extends by 10 years the maximum number of years during which a Registered Education Savings Plan may be open and accept contributions and provides a six-month grace period for making educational assistance payments, generally effective for the 2008 and subsequent taxation years;
(c) increases the amount of the Northern Residents Deduction, effective for the 2008 and subsequent taxation years;
(d) extends the application of the Medical Expense Tax Credit to certain devices and expenses and better targets the requirement that eligible medications must require a prescription by an eligible medical practitioner, generally effective for the 2008 and subsequent taxation years;
(e) amends the provisions relating to Registered Disability Savings Plans so that the rule forcing the mandatory collapse of a plan be invoked only where the beneficiary’s condition has factually improved to the extent that the beneficiary no longer qualifies for the disability tax credit, effective for the 2008 and subsequent taxation years;
(f) extends by one year the Mineral Exploration Tax Credit;
(g) extends the capital gains tax exemption for certain gifts of listed securities to also apply in respect of certain exchangeable shares and partnership interests, effective for gifts made on or after February 26, 2008;
(h) adjusts the rate of the Dividend Tax Credit to reflect corporate income tax rate reductions, beginning in 2010;
(i) increases the benefits available under the Scientific Research and Experimental Development Program, generally effective for taxation years that end on or after February 26, 2008;
(j) amends the penalty for failures to remit source deductions when due in order to better reflect the degree to which the remittances are late, and excuses early remittances from the mandatory financial institution remittance rules, effective for remittances due on or after February 26, 2008;
(k) reduces the paper burden associated with dispositions by non-residents of certain treaty-protected property, effective for dispositions that occur after 2008;
(l) ensures that the enhanced tax incentive for Donations of Medicines is properly targeted, effective for gifts made after June, 2008; and
(m) modifies the provincial component of the SIFT tax to better reflect actual provincial tax rates, effective for the 2009 and subsequent taxation years.
Part 1 also implements income tax measures to preserve the fiscal plan as set out in the February 26, 2008 Budget.
Part 2 amends the Excise Act, the Excise Act, 2001 and the Customs Tariff to implement measures aimed at improving tobacco tax enforcement and compliance, adjusting excise duties on tobacco sticks and on tobacco for duty-free markets and equalizing the excise treatment of imitation spirits and other spirits.
Part 3 implements goods and services tax and harmonized sales tax (GST/HST) measures proposed or referenced in the February 26, 2008 Budget. It amends the Excise Tax Act to expand the list of zero-rated medical and assistive devices and to ensure that all supplies of drugs sold to final consumers under prescription are zero-rated. It also amends that Act to exempt all nursing services rendered within a nurse-patient relationship, prescribed health care services ordered by an authorized registered nurse and, if certain conditions are met, a service of training that is specially designed to assist individuals in coping with the effects of their disorder or disability. It further amends that Act to ensure that a variety of professional health services maintain their GST/HST exempt status if those services are rendered by a health professional through a corporation. Additional amendments to that Act clarify the GST/HST treatment of long-term residential care facilities. Those amendments are intended to ensure that the GST New Residential Rental Property Rebate is available, and the GST/HST exempt treatment for residential leases and sales of used residential rental buildings applies, to long-term residential care facilities on a prospective basis and on past transactions if certain circumstances exist. This Part also makes amendments to relieve the GST/HST on most lease payments for land on which wind or solar power equipment used to generate electricity is situated.
Part 4 dissolves the Canada Millennium Scholarship Foundation, provides for the Foundation to fulfill certain obligations and deposit its remaining assets in the Consolidated Revenue Fund, and repeals Part 1 of the Budget Implementation Act, 1998. It also makes consequential amendments to other Acts.
Part 5 amends the Canada Student Financial Assistance Act and the Canada Student Loans Act to implement measures concerning financial assistance for students, including the following:
(a) authorizing the establishment and operation, by regulation, of electronic systems to allow on-line services to be offered to students;
(b) providing for the establishment and operation, by regulation, of a program to provide for the repayment of student loans for classes of borrowers who are encountering financial difficulties;
(c) allowing part-time students to defer their student loan payments for as long as they continue to be students, and providing, by regulation, for other circumstances in which student loan payments may be deferred; and
(d) allowing the Minister of Human Resources and Skills Development to take remedial action if any error is made in the administration of the two Acts and in certain cases, to waive requirements imposed on students to avoid undue hardship to them.
Part 6 amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act to authorize the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration to give instructions with respect to the processing of certain applications and requests in order to support the attainment of the immigration goals established by the Government of Canada.
Part 7 enacts the Canada Employment Insurance Financing Board Act. The mandate of the Board is to set the Employment Insurance premium rate and to manage a financial reserve. That Part also amends the Employment Insurance Act and makes consequential amendments to other Acts.
Part 8 authorizes payments to be made out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund for the recruitment of front line police officers, capital investment in public transit infrastructure and carbon capture and storage. It also authorizes Canada Social Transfer transition protection payments.
Part 9 authorizes payments to be made out of the Consolidated Revenue Fund to Genome Canada, the Mental Health Commission of Canada, The Gairdner Foundation and the University of Calgary.
Part 10 amends various Acts.

Budget Implementation Act, 2008

[Bob Rae, Liberal, Toronto Centre, ON]

I have livened them up. They are awake. They are alive, even at ten to six in the afternoon.

In a very direct way for members opposite, they will never get anywhere by running down the neighbourhood. They will never get anywhere by running down the place where they live. They will never get anywhere by running down the people who work hard.

I am proud to say that all of Canada is a good place to invest. I am proud to say that every province is a good place to invest. I will always say that whether I am in opposition or whether I am in government. Canada is the best place to live. Canada is the best place to invest. Canada is the best place to bring up children. Canada is the best place to be. Every province can claim the same thing.

We will never succeed as Canadians if we have the attitude that somehow when we get into office it simply becomes a chance for us to make partisan hay each and every day. That is what we see in the House of Commons every day. It is a sad thing.

I read the farewell speeches of the former member of Ottawa Centre, Ed Broadbent, and my predecessor, Bill Graham, who was the member for Toronto Centre. Both of them commented at the end of their time that they could not believe the lack of civility in the House of Commons and the way, from their experience, it had gone down.

I do not want to wait until I leave to make those remarks. If somebody asked me what the big difference between what life was like in the old days when I was first here and today, I would say it is the absolutely barbaric way in which debate takes place in the House of Commons. It is not a reasonable exchange. Every time someone asks a question, all the Conservatives say is the equivalent of “Your granny wears army boots”. That is the thoughtful response we get from the government each and every day, each and every step of the way.

We on this side have a principled difference with the government. We do not agree with its vision. We do not agree with its direction. We do not agree with its policies. We have a principled division, but that does not require us each and every day to simply refuse to answer questions or refuse to deal with the nature of the House.

I was on television today with a member of the Conservative Party who said the reason the Prime Minister would not appear before a committee was because he knew it would be a circus. What is he saying about Parliament? Parliament is a place where we are supposed to do the public business. Our committees are supposed to be the place where we do the public business. It is a sad commentary that this is what has happened to the institution which we are supposed to revere.

I disagree strongly with the comments that were made by the Minister of Finance because they are harmful to my province and to my country. I believe he should stand up and correct the record. I believe he should say that he may have differences from time to time with other governments, but he should never say that this is a bad place to invest or a bad place to do business.

We need to have that capacity as a public place in Parliament where we recognize that each and every one of us has limits to what we can and should say about other places and other members.

When I see the government in action, I see a government that is consumed by a partisan interest. It is a government that, in a sense, is still an opposition party that has suddenly found itself in government.

The Conservatives do not think like a government. They do not act like a government. They act like a group of people who have temporarily taken over the government and who cannot resist taking partisan, nasty, brutal shots at everything that gets in their way, whether it is a provincial premier or a mayor they do not like, or a member of the opposition they do not like. Whatever it is, they throw the ball and their heads to see how they respond.

Some of us who have been around can handle it and we will deal with it. However, we will continue to deal with it in a way that speaks profoundly to the need for us to share the great values we have as Canadians, the great values we see going forward and the great need for us to have a federal government that has the capacity to serve the interests of the entire country.

[Chuck Strahl, Conservative, Minister of Indian Affairs and Northern Development and Federal Interlocutor for Métis and Non-Status Indians]

Mr. Speaker, I listened with interest to what the hon. foreign affairs critic had to say.

He talked about the nobility of this place and the need to restore the demeanour of which all Canadians can be proud. I know he is like that, personally, because today during question period, for example, when pressed a little, he said that the members opposite spent their spare time pulling wings off butterflies. He is a noble man. He would not stoop to gutter politics. He would not say something out of line. He keeps the debate very highbrow so the people in Rosedale will understand it, even today, during question period.

Let me interpret for people watching. When he says he wants a government with enough capacity to give direction, what he means is he wants a big, big government. We know what that means. Look out for the taxes, because the taxes will go up. He says he wants to make a difference with the federal government. The interpretation is he wants to intrude in provincial jurisdiction. We should keep our eyes open.

There is a reason that support for separation in Quebec is at the lowest in our lifetime. Why? Because the government on this side of the House believes in respecting provincial jurisdiction. On that side of the House, they do not.

To get back to James, whom he quoted. There is a quotation from another book of James that he will remember. It starts with “Consider it all joy...when you encounter various trials”. If the Liberals were ever in power, we would have a pervasive carbon tax that would hit low income people the worst. We are talking about a leader who says that if we have a problem in Afghanistan, the way to solve it is to invade Pakistan. That will get things smoking for us.

If we want to encounter various trials, if we want to look for trouble, look to the—

[Bob Rae, Liberal, Toronto Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will try to focus on one aspect of the comments of the member opposite, because it is a real difference of opinion.

I spent 15 years in the provincial jurisdiction. I know pretty well what a provincial jurisdiction is all about. The key challenges we face in our country are areas where both the federal government and the province have to learn how to cooperate and work together.

Is the question of urban transportation a municipal issue, a provincial issue or a federal issue? It is all three. It requires the cooperation of all three levels of government. There are no watertight compartments. There are no firewalls between municipalities, provinces and the federal government.

The key challenge of governance today in Canada, and this is a real difference that we have with the Conservative Party because it has this very narrow, locked-in view of what the responsibility of one level of government is and of another and never the twain shall meet, and that is a ludicrous—

[Chuck Strahl, Conservative, Chilliwack—Fraser Canyon, BC]

It's called the constitution.

[Bob Rae, Liberal, Toronto Centre, ON]

It is not called the constitution. It is a ludicrous proposition. If we had that idea, we never would have had unemployment insurance and then employment insurance. We never would have had health insurance and health care and a national health care program. We would have had none of these programs. We never would have had Central Mortgage and House. We never would have had any of the institutions that have made a real difference in the lives of families.

Yes, I believe there is a role for the federal government in terms of providing leadership. I believe there is a role for provinces and for municipalities. The key challenge in the future of our country is how to make sure these governments can work effectively together. If they are captured and ensnared by the philosophy or the ideology of the Conservative Party of Canada, the condition of all the people in the country will deteriorate for sure. That is why I am so strongly opposed to it.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member used the term “principled position”. How is it that there is any principle involved when in Bill C-50 there is the theft of $54 billion of workers' money that they will need if they become unemployed? We know that Ontario is in trouble. We talked about that earlier. A lot of the unemployed manufacturing workers and their families will need this fund, yet this bill only puts aside $2 billion to set up a crown corporation.

How could there be a principled position when 92% of Liberal members refuse to vote on this issue? Tell me.

[Bob Rae, Liberal, Toronto Centre, ON]

Mr. Speaker, if we were to treat employment insurance as real insurance, what would that mean? It would mean that the workers who have the highest rate of unemployment would have to pay the highest premiums and that the industries that have the highest rate of unemployment would have to pay the highest premiums. It would be a complete disaster for working families across the country.

I do not know why the New Democratic Party and indeed many of my friends in the labour movement continue to persist in this notion that somehow the answer for everything is to get back to the idea of employment insurance being real insurance. They are not serving the interests of working families when they do that, because they do not understand that the experience ratings that would apply would absolutely clobber working families.

Ironically, it is the New Democratic Party that has contributed to one of the most inane aspects of Bill C-50, which is the creation of this crown corporation. The NDP members got their wish and they will come to regret it.

[Louise Thibault, Independent, Rimouski-Neigette—Témiscouata—Les Basques, QC]

Mr. Speaker, on Monday, thanks to the opposition, the House had the opportunity to debate two specific aspects of Bill C-50, namely immigration and the creation of an employment insurance financing board, or parts 6 and 7 of the bill. I had the opportunity to speak about these subjects in the House on Monday. Today I will be challenging the bill in its entirety. I will bring up various points.

Bill C-50 deals with the implementation of the intentions the government laid out in its 2008 budget speech, a speech that I criticized then, on April 9, for reasons that I would like to restate today.

Although the budget speech included some timid measures, it had nothing to offer in terms of redistribution of wealth and government management of the common good.

The bill's preamble concerns me a great deal because it talks only about global economic uncertainty when there is real uncertainty in all regions—mine in particular—about economic development; we know that. And the government should be concerned.

What has the government done in this time? I am sure everyone will recall that it created this trust fund, which, at the time, was linked to the budget. We managed to stop it, after some citizens demonstrated their dissatisfaction.

Although the trust fund, totalling a billion dollars over two years, was removed from the budget, the government did not really address the crises currently facing our communities. The agricultural and forestry sectors are in crisis. Of course, there is also a crisis facing non-profit organizations, which saw their funding suddenly slashed by the Minister of Labour and Minister of the Economic Development Agency of Canada for the Regions of Quebec.

Although he says he will space it out over two years, we all know what this means in Rimouski, for example, and in eastern Quebec for all non-profit organizations in the marine sector. We have a research centre. We are the hub of marine technology, and this will have a major impact. In that sense, the government has set us back. I will never accept this kind of thing.

The government created a savings account, known as a TFSA, and would have us believe that they have reinvented the wheel. In reality, it will not help modest to middle income earners. It will only help those who are already well off.

Speaking of the less fortunate and of the poor—and I will probably wrap it up here—I want to say once more that the government had an opportunity with this budget to help our seniors and to bolster the guaranteed income supplement. Instead, it put $10 billion towards the debt and decided that only the first $3,500 earned by seniors who choose to work would not affect their benefits.

The government should have accepted motion M-383, which I moved and which was adopted by a majority in this House. It would have allowed seniors to not be penalized had they wanted to work up to 15 hours per week at the average wage in their province of residence. This would have been a significant gesture that would have helped seniors currently living below the poverty line and who, obviously, want to work. I am not suggesting that all seniors should go back to work. Far be it for me to suggest that.

However, there were some relatively easy and practical ways to help our seniors and other disadvantaged groups, as well as to fight poverty. Instead, the government cut corporate taxes for companies that are already making obscene profits, such as banks and oil companies.

I see no sign, in the government's vocabulary or ideology, of the will to concern itself with the common good and the redistribution of wealth. They are focused solely on looking after companies that are already doing very well. Their tax cuts will not help those who have little or no income—

[The Deputy Speaker, Bill Blaikie]

Order, please. It being 6:05 p.m. the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper.

The member will have five minutes to finish her speech.

The House resumed from June 4 consideration of the motion that Bill C-50, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on February 26, 2008 and to enact provisions to preserve the fiscal plan set out in that budget, be read the third time and passed, and of the motion that this question be now put.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, we know the immigration system is broken and that it needs to be fixed. We also know we have a serious problem when 925,000 applicants are in the backlog. Unfortunately, the direction in which the government is heading is the wrong direction.

I first want to tell the House why there is a problem. During the immigration committee hearings, the Canadian Federation of Independent Business came before us and said that there was a complete mismatch of the people coming into the country and the kind of skills that we need. It said that at least 42% of our immigrants needed to be skilled in the technical category. However, when we look at the number of immigrants coming to Canada with skills in that category we see that only 19% of them were in that category.

If we look at professional and managerial occupations, it accounts for only 8% of the labour shortage and yet 74% of the immigrants coming into this country have that skill set. We are bringing in a lot of people whose skills are mismatched with what we need.

Instead of doing what the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration is doing, we need to set up a system where we bring in the skills that Canada needs, rather than what is happening now.

Recently, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration said:

We said publicly it isn't our intention for the bill to negatively impact on family reunification but I can't categorically say it won't. What I can say is that I won't.

The minister is saying that if she remains the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration she will not do anything to harm family reunification. However, the bill in front of us would allow any minister to change the category so much that a lot of families will not be united in Canada.

We understand that we need to find people who come to Canada with the skills we need. We can look at the kind of system Australia has and the number of immigrants entering that country. Its work rate is 81%, which means that unemployment for immigrants has dropped. For the families entering the country, 69% of them have decent jobs.

In Canada, however, only 60% of our immigrants have the kind of jobs for which they have the skills and only 60% of them are employed. For families, it is only 39%, which means that we have a lot of unemployed immigrants in this country because they do not have the kind of skills this country needs.

How did Australia manage to increase the employability of its immigrants? It transferred the onshore processing of most of the applications and it changed its point system. It frequently updates tracking for occupations in demand and it gives points for immigrants who have families in Australia, which is divided into four main categories: skilled labour, family, business and humanitarian.

As a general rule, it only takes 6 to 18 months maximum for immigrants and their families to get into Australia. It has a processing centre called Adelaide Skilled Processing Centre that looks at the skills Australia needs and then it gives points accordingly.

In Canada, we have a human capital model that was brought in by the previous government in 2002. It points to immigrants according to the kind of education level they have, not necessarily the kind of skills that we need in Canada.

Australia has a very centralized processing system that looks at best practices around the world. It also has electronic filing. Last night I went on its website and looked at its immigration section. Its e-filing is incredible. If people want a visa, whether they are a visitor or skilled labour, they can file online. They can also check online what is happening with their applications, how long they must wait and what kind of documents they need.

We have no e-filing in Canada. Half the time, a lot of people who have been waiting to come into this country go to the office of a member of Parliament, so we all become immigration officers. We send faxes and e-mails to visa offices asking for status updates. It is like a make work situation, whereas Australia has an e-file system where people can go online and find out what is happening with their applications.

One can just imagine the resources, the efficiency and how effective it would be to have that kind of system. The former Liberal government, five or six years ago, agreed that we needed to move immigration filing online and wanted to contract a company to do so. However, that did not work.

The Conservative government, instead of investing in technology, best practices and in a skills centre to update skills, it has put it all in the hands of one person, the minister. The minister will make decisions, based on what criteria we do not know. How will it speed up the situation if the department does not have the infrastructure?

To make this worse, the immigration section of the Department of Citizenship and Immigration has had a reduction of 32% in its budget between 2008 and the coming year. How will everything be fast-tracked if we do not have the electronic capacity, a decent website and a skills centre to test what kind of skills we need in this country? We do not even have cost effective quality control in terms of caseloads.

On top of that, if a visitor's visa is being denied, there is no appeal process. People would need to go to their member of Parliament who would then need to go to the minister and ask the minister to please allow the person into the country to attend, let us say, a funeral. In Australia, within 28 days people can have an appeal tribunal so that all the decisions are based on law and fact rather than sometimes inconsistent applications of the law.

We have so much that is wrong in our immigration system. We can do a lot in terms of changing our point system, having the electronic capacity to streamline, work with the visa offices, train the staff better, give the right resources and give the right targets.

However, what the government is doing is it is centralizing the sweeping powers in one person's hands, making the minister above the law. Parliament would not have any say over how to reform our immigration department. That is really a shame because we can study the situation and improve on it. Instead, we are going in the wrong direction.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Trinity—Spadina for speaking for all of us in this room about the difficulties we have in trying to service the thousands of immigration cases that come to our office out of sheer desperation. People do not know where else to go. They are desperate by the time they come to an MP's office because they have tried and failed to get basic information from a system that is so clogged up, so bottlenecked and so dysfunctional that they feel they have no avenue of recourse.

People watching at home might be wondering why, in the context of a budget implement bill, we are talking about the Canadian immigration system and its foibles. They should be made aware that this budget implementation bill has a key element to it to reform, in a radical way, not improve, but change the immigration system.

The basic unfairness, as my colleague points out, is that we, as representatives of Canadians, will not get an adequate chance to debate properly the immigration changes while we are debating the budget implementation bill because it does not properly belong here at this time.

However, if the bill passes, and I have a hunch it will pass, immigration law and practice will change for the worse, we argue, in a very dramatic and significant way.

My colleague pointed out that the changes contemplated to the immigration act in Bill C-50 would actually enhance the discretionary powers of the minister. Did I understand her correctly? Will the minister be, more than ever, able to make arbitrary rulings on things that should properly go to a tribunal, a panel or some due process? Is this one of the hazards that she is alerting us to today, the enhancing of the discretionary power of the minister at the expense of due process, as most Canadians would understand it?

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, an objective system would have points and people who want to immigrate to Canada would be able to go online to look at the criteria and see if they have enough points to qualify. After doing the calculation to determine that they do have enough points to qualify, they could apply and, of course, be approved, which is the objective of the system.

Under the proposed change in Bill C-50, even if applicants have all the points, completely qualify, have submitted an application and have waited for several months or a year, their application can be returned. It would not even be processed or considered. The applicant would just be told to come back another time.

Applicants would have no right to appeal and no rights under any law to argue that they had qualified so why was their application not processed or even considered. That is what is alarming the Canadian Bar Association and various immigrant communities all across Canada, because it is arbitrary. It does not tell people whether they fit the criteria or not. I understand that we need skilled labour but this is not the right way to proceed.

Instead, we in the immigration committee should study the point system again and say that in 2002, Canada made a mistake. We changed the existing point system to a human capital situation and it is not working. We are not giving immigrants a head start in Canada. Many of them come into this country and become unemployed. We need a better system, with better tracking and a better match. The way to do it is to fine-tune the point system and actually look at the skills.

In Australia, for example, people are given extra points if they have relatives in the country. It does not necessarily have to be immediate family members. We should probably do the same. The system used to be like that. Under assisted relative class, people were able to get extra points if someone was willing to sponsor them.

[Raymonde Folco, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to speak today about Bill C-50, which, in part 6, seeks to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

The first point I would like to make is this is a bill that actually is hidden in another bill, which is strictly against the kind of Parliament that we have had in the past. The budget implementation bill is a budget bill. Although an immigration bill also has budget implications, the kind of immigration bill that has been presented by the Conservative minister here is of such importance to Canada and Canadians that it should be a stand-alone bill.

The Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration should have full powers and as much time as it requires to study the bill and its implications and add whatever amendments it decides are necessary. With the way the Conservative government has presented this legislation, that is not possible.

We are stuck with a bill for which the government has told us that it will not accept any amendments. The immigration legislation has been hidden inside a budget bill, thereby forcing our hand. This is very much against the kind of parliamentary tradition that we have always lived under since Parliament was founded.

The bill also would give the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration unilateral power to decide on preferences in the treatment of applications for immigration and refugee status.

Under the system we have at present, all applications for immigration are examined. Once they have been examined, claimants receive a positive or negative response. However, all applications are examined, which allows a claimant whose application has been denied to appeal, because that person's application is on file.

Under the new system, however, the immigration minister can tell his officials that he is going to change the order of priority of immigration categories. The minister can decide at any time that, for this year, the largest number of immigrants to be accepted will be in the independent category, for example. That would not only lower the priority of the other categories, but also reduce the number of immigrants in those categories who would be accepted, because in a given year Canada accepts a fixed number of immigrants that is approved by the Parliament of Canada.

This decision by the minister will therefore have a significant impact on family reunification, something that concerns me a great deal, and also on not only the number of refugees we accept in Canada, but the number of refugees we seek out in refugee camps around the world.

Perhaps even more important is the fact that the minister can make this decision without consulting with NGOs that work with immigrants, with the business community or with this Parliament. In other words, the minister can make a completely unilateral decision without having to answer to the Parliament of Canada. This is extremely serious. Since 1867, and even earlier, with the Parliaments of Upper and Lower Canada, Parliament has always been accountable. “Accountable” means that cabinet ministers are accountable to Parliament and consequently to the Canadian people.

Now, with this immigration bill, the minister will no longer have to answer to Parliament because he will no longer have to consult Parliament. He will not be accountable to Canadians. Something very serious is happening here. It is more of what the Conservative government has given us for two years now: a government that acts in secret, does not answer questions in the House, refuses to talk to the media and, now, refuses even to be accountable to Parliament and Canadians.

What is going on right now is a serious matter. I hope Canadians are watching this very closely because having such a secretive government that keeps information to itself is unprecedented in Canada.

The Prime Minister promised Canadians an accountable, honest and scrupulous government. The more time goes on, the more we get to know this government. We are seeing the Conservative government for what it is: a government that does not want to be accountable to anyone, not to Parliament and not to the Canadian public.

This also means that the immigration minister and officials responsible for applying the legislation would have carte blanche with respect to processing applications. Their first decision would be on which applications to examine. A large number of those applications will likely be rejected. Some will be returned to the claimants without even being looked at. That means that the large number of claimants whose immigration applications are returned to them will have absolutely no recourse. They will not be able to come back to see an immigration officer. They will not be able to ask why or how. They will not be entitled to an appeal since, for all intents and purposes, their application no longer exists, as it was not accepted and examined.

Again, this is an attempt to limit judicial review of the decisions made by immigration services. Under the bill, immigration and refugee status officials will have to follow instructions from the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration before examining claims and, when they do examine them, they will have to prioritize them by category of immigration.

This bill eliminates the right to equal opportunity in the processing of claims. Equal opportunity is a fundamental principle of our Canadian society: equal opportunity in employment, housing and in the possibility of immigrating to Canada. A number of us sitting here in Parliament have benefited from this equal opportunity.

I find it especially hard to accept that some members opposite, on the government side of the House, who came to Canada as immigrants through this equal opportunity, are now closing the door behind them in a way by voting with the Conservative Party. They came to Canada and now they are saying too bad for those who want to come behind them. They are closing the door.

This bill could reduce the number of new immigration applications accepted by the federal government and, as I said earlier, notably those applications for family reunification and permanent residency on humanitarian grounds. Giving one category priority will only serve to reduce the number of applications in other categories because there is a limit to the number of immigrants accepted in any one year.

The government would go ahead with a subjective selection of applications without imposing any limits on the minister. It would also focus its attention and resources on economic immigrants, those who are wealthy and more qualified.

Obviously, there must be a focus on qualified immigrants. In fact, before its defeat, the Liberal government organized a number of major projects with the provincial governments as part of bilateral agreements with each province. The federal government would ask each province to submit the number of immigrants they would like in each of the trade categories, for example. That is something very important that my colleague across the way did not mention. Agreements already exist between the federal government and each of the provinces that allow them to make their needs known in terms of qualified immigrants.

On this side of the House, we ask that qualified immigrants be able to continue to enter the country and meet the needs of the provinces. More importantly, we ask that family reunification not be forgotten.

[Yasmin Ratansi, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I commend my colleague for an excellent presentation on the bill. I would like to ask her opinion on a couple of issues.

If the bill is so important, as the minister claims, why is the minister trying to hide this bill under a budget implementation bill? Why is this bill not going to its respective committee? Standing committees have been established under the democratic process of this Parliament so they can review bills thoroughly. Why is the minister trying to hide this under a budget bill and force an election if the bill does not go through?

Why does the minister want the power to choose? What is the minister's hidden agenda? If she wants to choose the people and instruct the people, why is she bypassing those bureaucrats who make the decision to choose and review because they have been given the tools to do so? Why is the minister trying to take on that power?