Thanks.
My name is Avvy Go, and I am the current director of the Metro Toronto Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic. We're a member of the STATUS Campaign, which is also part of the migrant justice workers conference.
The campaign itself is made up of individuals and community organizations concerned about the plight of non-status immigrants in Canada. For the past several years, we have been working with other concerned grassroots organizations to push for the regularization of non-status immigrants living in Canada.
There are an estimated 20,000 to 200,000 individuals living without status in Canada. They are our neighbours, co-workers, and classmates, the people who build our houses, clean our clothes, cook our food, and look after our children, but as persons without status, they are not entitled to receive any benefits that ordinary Canadians take for granted. Often children of non-status parents are denied the right to education, sometimes even the right to health care. As taxpayers, non-status individuals contribute to the funding of public services that they themselves do not enjoy.
People find themselves without status in Canada for a variety of reasons. Most of them relate to their status as oppressed people on the basis of their race, gender, social status, economic status, and so on. Among them are refugees who should have been granted protection but who have been refused status due to flaws in our determination system. They are survivors of trafficking. They are women who are under family sponsorship and who have left their spouses due to domestic violence. They are people who have worked for some time on temporary worker programs and are not granted permanent resident status.
Contrary to public perception, the vast majority of non-status immigrants are law-abiding individuals and do not pose any threat to our national security. Yet they are the easy targets for the media or for public backlash, since they do not have a voice in our political system.
The only avenue open right now to a person without status is to apply for permanent resident status under humanitarian and compassionate grounds, the H and C application. However, with such a low success rate, the H and C option is not a real one for the thousands of non-status immigrants in Canada who have established their homes in this country.
The end result of these and other systemic problems is the creation of the underclass of non-status immigrants in Canada. We believe these individuals exist because of the unfairness, inequities, and restrictiveness found within our refugee and immigration system. Therefore, we believe we have a collective responsibility to address the issues facing non-status immigrants. We also think this is the right time for the government to establish an inclusive regularization program that will grant non-status immigrants the permanent resident status they deserve to receive.
I want to note that throughout our history, the Canadian government has from time to time implemented policies to deal with people who are living here without status because of the recognition that our system has failed them. STATUS, along with the Canadian Council for Refugees and the Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants, among other groups, has proposed a comprehensive plan for regularization. I would just highlight some of the elements of that proposal.
One element is something that this committee actually has unanimously adopted, and that is to immediately implement the refugee appeals division. Then there are other ideas--for instance, creating a regulatory class permitting survivors of trafficking to apply for permanent resident status; providing an opportunity for seasonal agricultural workers and other temporary workers to apply for permanent residency; and establishing a more relaxed humanitarian and compassionate application process. Above all, we suggest that the government should bring in an adjustment of status program, similar to the one the government introduced back in 1970, whereby anyone who was already in Canada by a certain date, for an amount of time, may apply for status.
I'm sure you will have questions about our proposals, but I just want to say in closing that the time to act is really now. The issue is very pressing. You will hear from Cecilia and Stan about some of the conditions that these workers and other individuals are living in. It's really our obligation to deal with their issues immediately.
Thank you.