Minister, I want to say that I understand Mr. Telegdi's concerns about the Citizenship Act. I think the committee did some excellent work last time, and there was unanimity, except for the former parliamentary secretary's particular exception. I'm not quite as intent at expressing my frustration to you in this situation, because I think the previous government needs to take the blame for not getting that on the agenda. They promised it a number of times, and it never showed up. So I think more of the responsibility and the opportunity lay with them. But in any case, I think excellent work was done, and I recommend it to the government for consideration.
I wanted to ask you about a couple of specific things. During the last Parliament, the committee heard from the Vietnamese community about the situation of 2,000 Vietnamese boat people in the Philippines. They have been stranded there since the refugee movement, without any legal status or hope that this is going to change. The government did institute a limited program that would have accepted up to 200 of those folks. My understanding is that only 27 met the conditions.
Eight of them arrived on Sunday, and Ms. Grewal and I were at the Vancouver airport. She was able to stay long enough to see them. I waited three and a half hours, then had to catch a flight.
Maybe we need to do something about processing times coming through customs and immigration at the airport.
But eight of them arrived and up to 27 are expected shortly. But there are still 148 in the Philippines, folks who didn't meet our criteria and who've been left out of the efforts of other countries. Is it possible that Canada might address the circumstances of those folks? The Vietnamese Canadian community is certainly willing to put effort into settlement arrangements. The mayor of Ottawa has said that Canada should accept more. Is that a possibility?