Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Nov. 7th, 2006

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

First of all, it's not the major concern. The major concern is that we have to protect the integrity of our system, and we have 800,000 people waiting to get here legally.

The answer to that is that if you announce a regularization and there are a number of countries with whom you don't have visas, then pretty soon Canada becomes very attractive as a place for people to flood into in the hope there will be a regularization in the future, meaning you have all kinds of people here whose security status is unknown. You don't know if they're involved with criminality, and because we have such a large open border with the Americans, it could prove to be an issue.

They're our largest trading partner; we do 84% of all our trade with them. We don't need more barriers between Canada and the United States in a way that hurts our prosperity.

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

But isn't it the reality that in terms of undocumented people in Canada we have had contact with them at some point in our immigration system, either when they entered Canada as a visitor or as a failed refugee claimant who's gone underground, unlike the United States, where they do have a significant proportion of undocumented folks who've never had any contact with their system?

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

I agree with that, but I don't think we want to make the problem worse. Relative to the United States, we have a pretty good situation. We don't have millions of people running around undocumented. But we don't want to invite problems when I think we have a pretty good solution at hand, which is to find a way for people who are currently temporary workers to ultimately become permanent residents.

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

Minister, the head of the IRB was here not so long ago, and he expressed some frustration, in his careful way, with the vacancies he has and with the fact that this situation is directly related, in his opinion, to the increased backlog they're facing. They were making progress on the backlog, but unfortunately, that's been reversed in recent months. Do you plan on filling those vacancies soon?

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

We are working on that right now. As I mentioned before, we ran an ad in August in national papers, and we had 350 applications come in. Those applications are being processed now, and our hope is that down the road, instead of waiting to invite applications every eight or nine months, we could work towards building a pool of people who could step right into these positions so we're not in this situation in the future. We would have a big pool to choose from, so we would not constantly be out there beating the bushes to find new applicants.

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

Do you have a timeline for filling the current vacancies?

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Once the 350 applicants make their way through the system, which usually takes about four months, a large percentage of those people, if you go by the usual formula, would be eligible or competent to fill these positions. We should come very close to filling all of them, based on that big stream of people coming in.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you.

We'll have Ms. Grewal and Madame Folco, please, for five minutes.

[Nina Grewal, Conservative, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

Thank you Mr. Minister, for your time.

I would like to be clear about what Mr. Karygiannis was saying. He was speaking about old age security, saying that each and every person who lands in Canada would get old age security after almost ten years. But that's not the case. When people land from European countries, if they're over 65, they get it at the same time as they land in Canada. But the people who come from third-world countries, like India and Africa, are the people who get old age security after ten years. I just wanted to make that clear.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Do you have any additional questions? Only 45 seconds have gone. Do you want to share the five minutes?

Yes, Mr. Komarnicki.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

All right. Great—

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

I have a point of order, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Point of order.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

If you want to share the time, shouldn't that be stated at the beginning, if we're operating under House rules? It wasn't stated.

[Nina Grewal, Conservative, Fleetwood—Port Kells, BC]

I've already mentioned shared time.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Hold it. She should have stated that at the beginning of her speech. I didn't hear that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Well, it's been past practice that individuals can share their time. We've allowed it on a number of occasions for Bloc members, Liberal members, and also for Conservative members.

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Mr. Chair, isn't it also tradition that at the beginning of your shared time you state the fact that you're sharing time?

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Questions are allotted by party, not by person.

Go ahead, Mr. Komarnicki.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I welcome the response by Mr. Karygiannis.

If I can maybe shift to a different area, I'm curious with respect to the funding and the fact that there has been an allocation of $307 million for integration and settlement. As well, I understand that Quebec also has $196 million allocated for the same settlement and integration of new Canadians that come there. Part of that is for language training, and I noticed that the reports we have indicate that we don't have a national standard for skills training and language training that is consistent from province to province. I'm wondering if the minister might comment on whether some of this funding could be used for that.

Also, for the funds that are distributed--the $60 million that we referenced earlier in relation to the province of Ontario--are there processes or checks and balances to ensure that those funds go to the third parties that are performing the settlement or integration services? Are they indeed paid out to the third parties, and is there a process in place to have some checks and balances?

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Thank you.

FIrst of all, with respect to language training, according to the main estimates, about $100 million was spent on language training across the country last year. This year it will be $181 million. It's an $81 million increase, which is a very large increase, with respect to language instruction for newcomers.

We're also providing funding for enhanced language training, which is relatively new language training. It gives immigrants language training by using the vocabulary they would use in their professions. In the past it has been one of the key barriers to people working in their professions and realizing the outcomes they want to achieve.

We think this is really important, and we think it's an important step forward. After years of having had settlement funding frozen and language training frozen for newcomers, it will be a substantial step forward. We think it will help a lot of people.

Yes, there are standards that different settlement agencies have to meet. They are asked to prepare reports to indicate how they're spending the money that is given to them, in most cases, from the federal government through the province or, in the case of Ontario, directly from the federal government.

If they meet those standards, the money continues to flow. If concerns are raised with those settlement agencies, they are told what we expect of them in terms of reporting and the usual standards, the accounting standards that need to be met and performance standards. We want to see these groups demonstrate that they're actually getting results.

The good news is that some of the most dedicated people in this country are people who work in settlement agencies. For every dollar we give them, I would say that in general we get three dollars worth of value. They are committed at a heart level, and they're doing a tremendous job.

I applaud them. Most of us would never work for the wages they work for to do that job. They really deserve our thanks and our praise.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

I have another quick question, Mr. Minister, with respect to minority official language communities.

I know you recently made an announcement with respect to supporting and assisting the development of minority official language communities in Canada. There has certainly been some funding allocated in that direction. The announcement, as I understand it, was actually made in Winnipeg, Manitoba. Would you care to elaborate somewhat on that?

[Monte Solberg, Conservative, Medicine Hat, AB]

Absolutely. We have extended the francophone minority community strategic agreement plan, and I'm very excited about it.

We've been working very closely with francophone minority communities to come up with strategies to first attract people to these communities and then to retain them. We've travelled with them to places like Morocco and Paris, and I think Belgium as well. We have attracted about 1,200 people to various fairs to encourage them to come to these communities.

The other day I met with people representing these communities. They're excited about the new strategic initiative. With the settlement funding of $307 million, they have good cause to believe they can really attract these people now and retain them, because they will actually get the services they need.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Madam Folco, please.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Good morning, Minister and welcome back to our committee.

You mentioned that settlement workers are very devoted and are working for very little. You mentioned a while ago that you and your government have invested $307 million.

I would like to remind you that last year, before the elections, we, the Liberal government, had invested $398 million for settlement and integration funding. As the Liberal government, we outspent the Conservative government in 2003, as opposed to 2006.

I put it to you that I agree the settlement workers are very devoted. But if you moved the $307 million up to $398 million, perhaps they could live better and still live on their devotion to helping immigrants integrate into Canadian society.

It's just a comment I wanted to make. I couldn't help but react to some of the things you have said.

I would like to come back to the annual report on immigration levels for 2007.

The end-year results show that 130,242 qualified workers entered the country in 2005. The original target was 112,500, between 112,500 and 124,500. In looking at your annual report, I see that in fact, there were 5,000 more qualified workers than expected who entered Canada during that time.

Once again during this year, the department's annual report states that 53 per cent of these qualified workers had already entered the country between January and June, or slightly more than 55,528 people, when the upper limit was 116,000 people.

There is quite a spread between the figures in your report and the numbers that we would like to see. You say that you would like to attract more qualified workers, yet your target for qualified workers alone is steadily decreasing.

Could you explain that to us, please?