Evidence of meeting #19 for Citizenship and Immigration in the 39th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was process.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Bloc
Meili Faille Bloc Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC
So you do not know whether the department has some sort of complaint mechanism.
Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada
I have no idea at all.
Bloc
Meili Faille Bloc Vaudreuil—Soulanges, QC
The reason I want to know this is because it would constitute the next logical step. When the board denies people's applications, the fact that there is no appeals section to determine the merit of a case, the only remaining recourse is a judicial review.
Now, when it comes to judicial reviews, judges say they are not mandated to carry out an in-depth review of most cases, and that a decision may be reviewed, but that it is not within their purview. The fact that the government, be it Liberal or Conservative, does not have an appeal section has an impact.
In most cases, the same person holds the position of PRRA officer and officer in charge of reviewing applications based on humanitarian and compassionate grounds. Apparently there is currently about 15,000 files held up at stage 1 of the process which, overall, takes the Department three years to complete. You may not be able to answer that question, but the fact remains there are direct consequences associated with the lack of an appeals division.
Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada
I don't think you expect an answer. It was a departmental issue.
Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada
You are making a connection with the appeal.
Conservative
Ed Komarnicki Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
Mr. Fleury, as I review a lot of the questions, I find that many of the problem situations we have, such as Mr. Ellis and others, have been previous appointments made by the Liberal government. I think Elinor Caplan was minister then. There was Lucienne Robillard. We talked about the Bourbonnais case. We've also talked about Fournier. Mr. Denis Coderre was the minister at that time.
I think the common theme that devolves from all this is that at that time, those appointments were made for various reasons. They were outside, obviously, your control, but were outside the process that was established in 2004, I suppose, to take issues like patronage out of the question and make it more an issue based on competence and the ability to serve in the position. Is that correct?
Conservative
Ed Komarnicki Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
Secondly, having said that, the issue is to get as broad a pool of people as possible who are competent and qualified to serve in a very important capacity. And to that extent, this government has done something that hasn't been done since 1992, and that's advertise broadly to get as big a pool as possible from which to select. Is that correct?
Conservative
Ed Komarnicki Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
In your mind, is that a good way to proceed, and in fact the way the board process should go in looking at these appointments to prevent the kinds of things we've seen happen in the past?
Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada
Mr. Chair, I really have to take time here to explain a bit. I've been 41 years in the government, 38 of which was in human resource management. I've done executive recruiting. I've been involved in all aspects of labour relations. Then you go back to competencies and merit systems.
When I was asked if I was interested to stand for the position, I made a point to indicate that when I was executive director eight years ago, one of the biggest problems we had was credibility with Canadians because of the politicization of the board and the way the appointment process ran, the selection. So I indicated that they should go to a merit-based system.
What I want to share with you is that, to me, it was fundamental that a high-quality competency, with no political interference of the selection process, was fundamental to the success, the credibility, and the competence of the board.
Conservative
Ed Komarnicki Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
Mr. Fleury, is it fair to say the present minister agrees with you wholeheartedly and is taking the position that competency and merit are the issues?
Conservative
Ed Komarnicki Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
Now, in terms of the facts of what happened, in this particular case, the Ellis case, and others, they are beyond sometimes the process itself, and they are most unfortunate. It happens from time to time. In your system, one of the issues, of course, is not only professional standards or quality, but also discipline and a discipline process when you find those are out of order.
Do you have a discipline process? What is it in the case of the most recent Ellis matter? What's the process?
Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada
We gave you the protocol and the code of ethics conduct.
In the case of Mr. Ellis, again, it was obvious it was unacceptable behaviour, independent of whether I knew all the facts, and I am still working on that. It was unacceptable, and I immediately proceeded to use the only power I have, because I can't suspend; the government can suspend, and the government can rescind Governor in Council appointees. What power I had, I took, and that was to stop this person from hearing cases, to not have access to the premises. That's what we did. I'm not missing the instrument; I'm missing the power in the sense of the power to exercise discretion in terms of discipline.
Conservative
Ed Komarnicki Conservative Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
Do you have the discretion or power to decide when you suspend whether the member continues to get paid or not, and is there a process to develop that?
Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada
I don't have the power to withdraw a salary from an individual I send home. That would be called a suspension. What I've done is rescind his capacity to exercise his function.
I'm sorry. Am I too long in the answer?
Conservative
Conservative
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Thank you, Chair.
Mr. Fleury, I wonder if you could tell us how many people are currently before the panel. What's the pool that the advisory panel is looking at in terms of their considerations?
Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada
That's advice to the minister. I don't have that liberty. We are sending names to the government; there's a pool.
