Citizenship and Immigration Committee on June 19th, 2006

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Borys, are you sharing your time with Andrew?

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Yes.

I would like to return to questions that Mr. Telegdi had in the previous round. They deal with security concerns for young adults who are youths but not infants.

These changes envisage bringing about equivalency between birth children and adopted children. There isn't an equivalency at birth. We are not envisaging changes for adult adoptions. If we truly want equivalency in law, is there a definition for infancy that would be a category more equivalent to children born to parents as opposed to adopted? Are there categories for youth beyond 18 and under 18?

I've travelled in a number of countries where you see indoctrination begin at a pretty early age. Does the law envision different categories of youth? To what ages would infancy and a young adult be?

[Stephen Green]

I think your question really centres on the security issue with regard to adopting children. The Canadian Bar Association certainly commends the department for coming out with a policy that does not do that. I think the purpose of this bill is to put everyone on an equal footing.

Unfortunately, we have natural-born children of Canadian citizens. They may have been born in Romania, as an example, lived there for 30 years, and got into trouble in Romania. They have the absolute right to come back to Canada. This bill is trying to give an equal footing to an adopted child who got into trouble, in the same type of situation, to be permitted to come to Canada.

So I don't think the philosophy or the policy here, which is to put everyone on neutral ground and treat them as in the McKenna case, which we heard about, would be able to stand. As we heard from a previous witness, if this is not a true child-parent relationship, and it was done for the purpose of bringing a person to Canada, I think there are enough safeguards in the present legislation and in this bill to stop it.

We would not want to see a distinction between someone who is over 18 and someone who is under 18. As far as we are concerned, and as you've heard today from the department, the law requires that everyone be treated the same.

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

What you're saying is that although this deals with child adoptions, the same should hold true with adult adoptions.

[Stephen Green]

Yes, because under the way the legislation is written there must be a parent-child relationship existing before that. I think that's enough of a safeguard that the department could say prove to us, establish to us, that there was or was not a parent-child relationship. Maybe that's another reason why it's important that we have the IAD to look at the full sphere of whether there is a parent-child relationship, because I don't know how the Federal Court would be able to do something like that. Therefore, I think there are enough safeguards to protect.

[Borys Wrzesnewskyj, Liberal, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

You have about a minute and a half left, Borys. I think Alan wanted to use that minute and a half, and that will conclude the seven.

Do you want to do that, Mr. Tonks?

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

Yes, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

A very simple question. You've indicated that adoption comes under the jurisdiction of provincial governments, of course, and you talked about the complexities of that. In the administration of an application for citizenship, certain discretion lies with the immigration officer. What are the tests that the immigration officer uses simply to make a decision that an application can begin or that there can be a process at all?

[Stephen Green]

Unfortunately, we can't answer that, because the bill talks about just the framework. I think it's the regulations that will answer those questions, and that's why the Canadian Bar Association feels very strongly that every regulation with respect to this should go before a committee like this, to discuss it, because we don't know.

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

I see.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Madam Faille.

[Meili Faille, Bloc, Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC]

I put my questions to departmental officials who appeared just before this group.

I have the same concerns as the Canadian Bar Association. We don't know how this bill is going to work. In Quebec, there are specific procedures in place that are well known. There are three possible options: one for cases where the children are adopted in countries that have ratified the Convention; one for cases where the children are adopted in countries where the adoption is finalized before the child arrives in Canada; and a third one for cases where the parents become guardians, and then parents, once they have fulfilled their obligations as guardians. In Quebec, many adoptions fall into the third category.

There is also the fact that citizenship is granted prior to adoption. In our briefing notes, it says that citizenship will be granted once the case is finalized--in other words, before the provincial courts have determined that the adoption is final and official. That is the case in Quebec, because of the Civil Code.

Under the proposed legislation, could a child being granted citizenship eventually have his or her citizenship revoked? According to the bill, the federal government retains the right to intervene, but we don't know at what point the process ends. I don't know whether this applies to the other provinces, but have you looked at the Quebec model in that regard? There is a danger that the child could see his citizenship revoked at some point. That is one of the provisions of the current Citizenship Act.

[Stephen Green]

There is a whole provision within the present Citizenship Act dealing with revocation. There's a process available for that. I think that still exists--

[Meili Faille, Bloc, Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC]

It still applies.

[Stephen Green]

--and would apply. I don't think it affects anything in this regard. An issue that you may look at or perhaps want to be concerned with also would be that under proposed paragraph 5.1(c) in this proposal, it states:

(c) was in accordance with the laws of the place where the adoption took place and the laws of the country of residence of the adopting citizen;

We're going to have to find out what “the laws of the country” means, because we've heard today and we know that the provinces are responsible for adoption, not Canada. Unless the regulations state, perhaps, that the laws of the country mean each province, then we would have clarification. Again we don't know.

The question becomes, would that stand up in court, or would someone argue and say it has to be according to the laws of the country that the Canadian is in? Well, I'm in Canada and there are no Canadian adoption laws; they are within provincial jurisdiction. We will have to find out what that means. And with respect to Quebec, of course, that's a very serious issue.

[Meili Faille, Bloc, Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC]

It's a very serious issue.

Merci.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Bill, go ahead, please.

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

Thank you, Chair.

I want to come back to the review issue and ask you to comment on this committee's past discussions. In those, we talked about having a full appeal on the merits of the case in Federal Court, on citizenship issues--and not just a judicial review, a full review with high evidentiary standards. Would that address the bar's concerns about this legislation?

[Stephen Green]

One of our recommendations is to have a full appeal at the immigration appeal division, so that it could be a full trial de novo. The judicial review process is extremely narrow. It's very difficult. Especially in adoptions, when you have to look at the best interests of the child and what it's all about. A board member has to hear all those facts, and the judicial review doesn't cut it for us.

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

But is it possible to have that kind of review at the Federal Court?

[Stephen Green]

No, it's not possible at Federal Court to have that. I guess you could make a special application under the Federal Court rules, but the general provisions would apply under the 300 rules, and it's all done by affidavit. It would be very difficult, I think, for the court to be able to intervene.

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

So your sense then is that the only effective appeal would be through the immigration appeal system?

[Stephen Green]

Right. But people will be able to have that. They'll just do both.

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

That's my question.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Ed, go ahead, please.