Bill C-35 (Historical)

An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act

This enactment amends the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act to change the manner of regulating third parties in immigration processes. Among other things it
(a) creates a new offence by extending the prohibition against representing or advising persons for consideration — or offering to do so — to all stages in connection with a proceeding or application under that Act, including before a proceeding has been commenced or an application has been made, and provides for penalties in case of contravention;
(b) exempts from the prohibition
(i) members of a provincial law society or notaries of the Chambre des notaires du Québec, and students-at-law acting under their supervision,
(ii) any other members of a provincial law society or the Chambre des notaires du Québec, including a paralegal,
(iii) members of a body designated by the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, and
(iv) entities, and persons acting on the entities’ behalf, acting in accordance with an agreement or arrangement with Her Majesty in right of Canada;
(c) extends the time for instituting certain proceedings by way of summary conviction from six months to 10 years;
(d) gives the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration the power to make transitional regulations in relation to the designation or revocation by the Minister of a body;
(e) provides for oversight by that Minister of a designated body through regulations requiring the body to provide information to allow the Minister to determine whether it governs its members in the public interest; and
(f) facilitates information sharing with regulatory bodies regarding the professional and ethical conduct of their members.

Cracking Down on Crooked Consultants Act

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member for Timmins—James Bay is quite correct when he says that the system has become Kafkaesque.

What is required, and, hopefully, one of the changes that will take place in committee on this particular issue with these charlatans who abuse potentially new Canadians, is that a statutory body be created. Self-regulation is perhaps a good idea in the case of professional engineers and lawyers, but in this case we are dealing with people who are not Canadians, who do not know Canadian laws, who do not know where to turn and, unfortunately, do not know what rights they have to deal with those who have abused their desperation. That is in terms of this specific law.

However, we need a little bit of common sense when we revamp the whole act. I have stood watching a line of potential new immigrants outside one of our embassies. In that lineup there were young fathers. Their clothes and the size of their hands showed that these were young fathers who had worked with their hands and who had this incredible drive to build a better life for their families. The country that happened to be in is a country in terrible economic turmoil and in transition.

It was sad to watch because I knew those individuals would not get into our country. Under our current point system, it was guaranteed that the barrier would prevent them from landing in Canada and yet they had exactly what we wanted: the will to work, to work hard and to succeed.

On the other hand, in that same lineup I saw a couple of men dressed in flashy Armani suits and dripping in gold. I knew that with an investment of a few hundred thousand dollars, and we know how they arrived with that money in that particular country, they were guaranteed to land in Canada expeditiously.

The system must be revamped. We must apply some common sense and we need to look at the past to see why we succeeded in the past and why we are failing today.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, the member gave an impassioned speech about the importance of immigration to our country and the importance of this bill which, I am sure, will pass.

I had an opportunity this morning to read the minister's speech. Interestingly enough, one of the earliest statements that he made was that people do not have to go to consultants. I know that one of the reasons he was thinking of but did not mention was the fact that members of Parliament become one of the most significant players in applications, whether it be for sponsor information or for visas, et cetera.

What the minister did not address was the resources that are made available to make the system work well and to incorporate the responsibilities of members of Parliament in this process. The irony here is that new members of Parliament do not even get any orientation on how to advise people with regard to immigration. This is an oversight. We do not have the resources and we do not have the training when staff turns over. This is a real travesty. I think the government has let it go.

Maybe the member will want to comment on this.

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, I remember with fondness, as a small child in Toronto's Queen-Bathurst neighbourhood, where my grandparents, as new immigrants, set up their first business, a bakery. The member's mother was one of the customers who would come in to buy hot bread. What a wonderful reflection of what immigrants contribute to our country.

The member is quite correct in pointing out the hypocrisy of what the minister said, which is that potential new Canadians do not have to go to consultants. My goodness, where do they turn to when the system, as has been referenced, has become Kafkaesque? Some of them turn to the minister.

I mentioned Iryna Ivanie who has four Canadian children and has been separated from her husband for over five years. She wrote a letter to the minister because she had nowhere else to turn. I also wrote to the minister at the start of this year. What was the response? The response was, no. That is not good enough individually and in terms of the whole system.

I certainly hope that Bill C-35 does not become window dressing that hides the reality of what is going on behind that wall, a system that has become dysfunctional. The minister has been on this file for a number of years and knows it well. He must get the job done.

[Alan Tonks, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Madam Speaker, the Canadian Society for Immigration Consultants was established by the Liberals a number of years ago. It was a genuine attempt to create an oversight body that would be effective and that would separate and address the kind of issues that have been raised. Obviously the hearings have indicated that it is not working effectively.

Could the member suggest ways in which that body could quickly be turned around and made an effective oversight body similar to the Law Society and similar to other oversight bodies, and not risk going back many months and not get something to address the kind of concerns that he has raised?

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Madam Speaker, yes, in 2003, CSIC was established by the Liberal government because it identified that these parasites were preying on the confusion of new Canadians. However, it has also been shown that in the past seven years that it is not good enough. What we need to have is a statutory federal body that oversees. We need a professional association but we also need federal government oversight.

I want to further illustrate what has happened over the last couple of years. I have mentioned that of the skilled workers coming from Kiev, 80% of the cases are finalized today in six years and eleven months, 83 months. Horrific, seven years. In 2004, under a Liberal government, it was 34 months. That was still not good enough. It was just under three years.

However, today, under the Conservatives watch, it is now six years and eleven months. That is unacceptable.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to speak today to Bill C-35. I listened yesterday to some very good speeches regarding the bill and some very good ideas. I might say at the outset that this bill is long overdue. I hope this Parliament lasts long enough for us to get the bill to committee and see that it does find its way through the system and into law.

As the last speaker indicated, this is not an issue that just came up in the last seven years. It might have taken the Liberals up until the last seven years to recognize this as a problem, but I can tell members that this was a rampant problem back in the 1980s.

When I was elected provincially in Manitoba in 1986, one of the concerns we had at that time as a provincial government was how to regulate the immigration consultants. In order for us to come to grips with that issue and deal with it, we had to find out just how big the problem was because immigration consultants were everywhere.They were not just lawyers doing it. In fact, lawyers were probably in the minority in terms of participants. We had many travel agents doing immigration consulting on the side. We had all sorts of people from all walks of life involved in one way or another in the immigration consulting business and charging big fees. As a matter of fact, some of these people were so well connected that they knew people on the Immigration Board who, in those days, were political appointees and oftentimes local, well connected people. Of course the immigration consultants would develop a rapport with them and try to get special considerations. I realize that the government has gone beyond that stage and tried to take steps to make that process a little better than it was.

I see this as a work in progress. I do not feel that proceeding with the bill and passing the bill will solve the problem because whenever in society there are large monetary rewards available for people to access, they will find a way to do it. Therefore, no matter what rules we set here in Parliament, there will be unscrupulous people who will find a way around whatever rules we set.

However, while it is late in the game, it is good that we are coming to grips with it. I am very happy that we are concentrating on the problem, and whether this solves the problem or even part of the problem will be something we should applaud. We certainly need tough rules against people who take advantage of vulnerable people. We not only need tough rules but we also need tough enforcement.

For the last several hundred years we have had immigrants coming to our shores for a whole number of reasons. If we look back in history we find the early explorers, starting with Leif Eriksson, I believe, but certainly Christopher Columbus and other explorers who were out to find new resources and new lands for their kings. It became a policy of kings to expand their empires by looking for more resources, whether it was new trade routes, new products, furs or gold. There have been various stages of immigration over the years.

We know, for example, in parts of Australia, where I was a number of years ago, many of the original immigrants to the Tasmanian area were from penal colonies. People were taken from prisons in Europe and sent to those colonies.

We had stages in our history when people were involved in the gold rush. Just south of Manitoba is the Black Hills area. The gold rush in that area brought thousands of immigrants to our country. There was the California gold rush and the Yukon gold rush.

The member for Timmins—James Bay talked about how people came here for jobs and for a better life.

Many people came here because of religious persecution in their home countries. They came here during certain periods when their governments back home were treating them badly, and that was their way to escape. People came here because of political problems in their home countries. There are numerous reasons why people have come to our country over the years.

Many people from China came to Canada to help build the railway. Perhaps John A. Macdonald would never have been able to get the railway built had it not been for Chinese immigrants coming in by the thousands to do what was essentially a very dangerous job. Many of them died during the process.

People have observed that there were fewer rules for immigration in those days. Several hundred years ago, people could simply come to our country and essentially get in, but today we are dealing with many more rules that have been brought in by different governments.

The Liberals, by virtue of the fact that they have been the government for most of the last century, have, in fact, been making the rules. To their credit, they have certainly encouraged immigration over the years. People with another view have said that they created the problems with the present immigration system that we are now trying to solve.

Several members have indicated that MPs' offices are deluged with immigration questions and immigration problems. Generally speaking, if that is a problem, that is an indication of a systemic problem within the government. I can think of other problems, on a provincial basis, for example, that people in large numbers have complained about to their elected officials, and finally, the political system wised up to the fact that something needed to be done about the problem to move it away from elected officials, because it is not really our job as elected officials to be running government programs.

One of the things I was surprised about as a new MP was that many MPs' offices are spending inordinate amounts of time and effort on immigration problems. Immigrants will oftentimes tell me that when they had a problem, it was their MP who solved it. When we are using up so much of our time on one particular problem, we have to deal with the problem through new laws and new enforcement and major changes.

This is not a problem that has developed in the last half dozen years, or even in the last 10 years. This problem was very much alive 25 years ago, and probably long before that. Why all governments have taken so much time to come up with a solution is really a big question.

The member for Winnipeg Centre made a fabulous speech yesterday on this subject, and he dealt with a number of areas. His riding is in the core area of Winnipeg, and he sees a huge number of immigrants who come to Manitoba.

The Manitoba government had enough foresight about 10 years ago to come up with a provincial nominee program, which, by the way, has attracted about 15,000 immigrants in the last year or so. The program has been a winner since the NDP government of Manitoba actually set it up. As a matter of fact, it was so successful that the government of Nova Scotia looked at it, studied it, and I believe adopted, or copied, the program.

The same thing happens all over the country. When there is a good program in a province, in Quebec, for example, other provinces will take a look at it. This program developed in Manitoba got such immediate, positive results that the Nova Scotia premier at the time, John Hamm, a Conservative, took a special interest in this area and came to study the program.

The member for Winnipeg Centre points out that when many immigrants first come into the province, initially they settle in his riding, so he has had a first-hand view of the immigration problems. He also sees the consultants at work. He indicated that he uncovered a situation, and I am sure that there are many such examples, where consultants were telling people that for $3,000 they would get them a letter from the person's member of Parliament, as if that was going to be their ticket through the process. That was one of the examples he discovered. The question is how many more examples of people paying these huge fees for something that, in fact, would have been free have gone undiscovered.

Before the member for Winnipeg Centre was the terrific member that he is for that constituency, that seat, for a very brief period, was held by the Liberals under Mr. David Walker. I know that he too had a lot of time to spend on immigration problems. As a matter of fact, my wife tells me very often the story of when she was trying to get her father in from Peru. They went to Mr. Walker's office, and he did a terrific job of getting them through the paperwork and the problems they had getting her father into Canada.

The question is whether MPs' offices have now become the official funnel through which all immigration issues and problems have to pass. Perhaps it is better that they come to the MPs' offices than to the immigration consultants.

The fact of the matter is that the immigration consultants catch them at an earlier stage. The immigration consultants are sitting in positions as travel agents. They are the ones selling the tickets.

The previous member who spoke before me made some good points. Yesterday the member for Winnipeg Centre talked about issues with the temporary worker program and how that program is being abused and profited from by some consultants. CBC did a big exposé about 20 years ago about immigration consultants in Manitoba who were involved in the immigrant investor program. The members will know all about that program and how it works. It basically attracts richer immigrants to the country.

These immigration consultants were not just operating here in Canada; they were operating outside Canada. They were travelling over to, in this case, I believe, the Philippines and were operating out of there. They were running ads in the paper in the Philippines with pictures of the immigration consultant shaking hands with or standing by the mayor of Winnipeg at the time.

I guess, as a politician, you have to be careful who you get your picture taken with, because you never know how, when, or where it is going to be used. The mayor of Winnipeg at the time was a wonderful gentleman, and he was very surprised to find out that his picture was being used in another country by an immigration consultant who was attracting people by showing that he had credibility with the mayor. If the immigrant wanted easy access into Winnipeg, this was the consultant to deal with, because here he was in a picture with the mayor of Winnipeg.

He took a lot of people for a lot of money. They employed him to fast-track them into the country, but in addition to that, this guy was also a real estate guy. He was selling them businesses that they had not seen other than through pictures. In one case, he sold a bakery in a rundown building in a rundown part of town for probably double or triple its value. When the immigrant investor ended up in Canada, they found themselves in a very difficult situation, because not only had they paid this guy consulting fees, they had also overpaid for the bakery they were buying. This is just one example. There were other examples.

The member from the Conservatives who was just commenting now knows of what I speak, because he was around in those days. He knows that this immigration consultant had connections and friends in his own provincial party. They were working together as a group. There was a group of them. These people were not people that any political party would want to be involved with. However, you cannot stop people from joining your party, and in some cases, you do not know why they are joining your party. These guys were smart enough to know that if they could connect with local politicians, mayors, and provincial and federal politicians, it was good for their business. It was a good business practice.

Of course, CBC did its job in exposing this person, but by then the damage had already been done, and these investors had lost most of their money.

This is the kind of activity that gives the country a bad name, because these people have friends back home, and they will certainly relate their experiences of coming to the country. When we are trying to attract immigrants, this is not a selling point if you run the risk of dealing with these types of fraudsters.

The member for Winnipeg Centre pointed out yesterday that the goal was to have a certain percentage of immigrants come to Canada on an annual basis. In actual fact, I think in only a very few years have we actually met the target. I do not think we have ever met the target. We have come close to the target in only several years.

The fact is that the government is on the right track with this particular bill. I am not one to not give the government its due when I think it is on the right track. In this case, it is on the right track. I just hope that it stays around long enough to get this bill through the process and does not prorogue Parliament again or call a quick election because it sees some short-term, quick opportunity on the gun registry or any other idea that kind of hits the government's fancy as the days progress. I hope that we apply ourselves.

We saw what happened under Lester Pearson. For six years of minority government, a lot of things were accomplished. The Conservative government has been around for five years and what does it have to show?

I would suggest—

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

Questions and comments, the hon. Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration.

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

Madam Speaker, we went from the explorations of the explorers back in the 1700s to whether the government would stick around long enough to get this bill through. I find it quite fascinating that the member would like to use history as a guiding lesson.

In the close to five years that the government has been here, just with respect to this ministry, much has been accomplished.

If he is worried about what may or may not happen in the future, it certainly will not be because of this party. For the next two, three or four years, we will do whatever it takes to get out of the economic difficulties that the world now faces. Our country is sitting on the leading edge and there is no need for elections to move those things forward. If the opposition wants to talk about elections, that is fine. On this side of the House, we are focused on governing and moving forward.

With respect to the bill, it is very clear. I think I heard at the very end of the member's statement that he does support this bill and will vote to move it forward to committee. I appreciate the fact that there is some constructive nature to his discussions. I heard from the member for Etobicoke Centre, too.

When it comes to citizenship and immigration, there is no need to take a view that will not be positive, that will not see the bill move to committee, then back here for third reading and then implemented.

I have several quotes from the industry, and I would like to get the member's comments on what the industry has said what the bill will do for those who suffer under crooked consultants.

The first quote is from Peter Bernier, national president of Canadian Association of Professional Immigration Consultants, who said, “It is the dawn of a new era for Immigration Consultants as announced yesterday by Immigration Minister Jason Kenney”.

Phil Mooney, past president of Canadian Association of Professional Immigration Consultants, said:

We're delighted [about Bill C-35] because proper immigration consultants are victims of the crooked ones too. They steal our clients with lies and false promises and they give the whole industry a bad name... We've been very unhappy with the way we've been regulated. Our members complain bitterly...

The industry likes what we are doing. The industry knows it will be a good bill. I want to hear the member say that he will support the bill.

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

I remind all members that they cannot use the name of a sitting member of Parliament even when quoting an article.

The hon. member for Elmwood—Transcona.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I do not know why the member is getting so riled up. The fact is we have said we support getting the bill to committee.

The member should learn from the hon. minister who showed a lot of class in the House by attending the debate on his bill. He not only listened to each of the speakers, but asked the first question. In fact, he was the only Conservative minister to do that in the spring.

We recognized at that time that this was the proper approach. That is what is done in other legislatures and should be done here, too. What the government typically does is the minister shows up, makes a speech and then is not heard from again. Ministers are not even here.

His minister showed a lot of class with the previous legislation. Not only that, he was successful in getting support from our party, the Bloc and the Liberals. That is the way we should operate in the House. That is way Lester Pearson did it in the six years he was prime minister in the 1960s. He unified the armed forces and he brought in the Canadian flag and medicare. He did a lot of things in six years.

What do you have to show for your five years?

[The Acting Speaker, Denise Savoie]

I am sure the hon. member was not asking me what I had done for five years.

The hon. member for Mississauga South.

[Paul Szabo, Liberal, Mississauga South, ON]

Madam Speaker, there are still concerns that the changes regarding this new regulatory body will be made through regulation. This is somewhat of a concern because it will not have the power to sanction immigration consultants who are not members, nor have appropriate enforcement powers regarding membership or the dedicated resources to enable it to do the job properly.

Also, the bill and the dialogue at this point still has not incorporated any mention of the role that members of Parliament and their constituency staff play in terms of immigration and citizenship matters without any orientation, training or resources for that purpose.

The member may want to comment on that.

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, as usual the member offers excellent insight into the problem, and he is absolutely right. When we leave most of the implementation procedures to the regulations, the devil will be in the details. This is why we have always argued that we should have as much of the details in the bill so we know what we are dealing with.

The government would like to strip the bill down as much as it can and leave as much as it can to the regulations so it can essentially run things on a day-to-day basis the way the minister sees fit. As opposition parties, we do not like that approach. I am sure when we get to committee, the member will be there, he will argue his point and we will get some of these issues clarified at committee.

We are certainly in favour of getting it to committee. I am happy with the initiative that the government has shown in this area.

[Bill Siksay, NDP, Burnaby—Douglas, BC]

Madam Speaker, I am glad the member addressed in his speech things we could do to improve the system and ensure that people would get the assistance they need and were not necessarily driven to use an immigration consultant.

He mentioned that a lot of people come to MPs' offices now for those services. It is not the ideal situation that MPs should be immigration service centres, even though we are willing to offer that service.

One other idea, and something I put forward, is that we look at the office of the worker advocate in Ontario, which deals with problems surrounding worker compensation problems, and establish something similar federally, an arm's-length government funded office of the immigration advocate to do that kind of work for people to ensure the government takes responsibility to ensure people get that kind of assistance.

Does the member think this is another reasonable idea toward solving the problem that people have with the complications and the problems that arise as they engage our immigration application system?

[Jim Maloway, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Madam Speaker, I thank the member for his idea. In actual fact he is probably right. I had indicated that I really did not think that one bill would necessarily solve all of the problems. I only applaud the fact that it is actually being addressed, and it is long overdue. It is probably something that should have been done by the Mulroney government 20 years ago. We were certainly aware of the problem in the Manitoba in the eighties and it was probably around a lot longer than that.

The member's idea is a very good one and he should take it up at the committee process and with the minister and the parliamentary secretary to see whether it could be put into force.