Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Feb. 13th, 2007

[Claudette Cardinal]

I'm not sure it's a matter of countries. It's the persons and what has happened to them in their country of origin—and there are many, many countries where human rights are violated. But it is specific to a person and to his or her country as such. It depends, obviously, on what their facts are, what kind of work they were involved in, why they were tortured or why they were detained, or why there were these violations, but I'm not sure you can specifically say some countries are necessarily worse than others.

Because the kind of work I do allows me to see a cross-section like this and not see clients from this country or that country, and so on, I'm not really the best person to be able to say, but I don't know that you can say that, in some places....

It really depends on the individual and what has happened in his or her country.

Perhaps Richard could comment.

[Richard Goldman]

I would just like to add that the Canadian government, as I'm sure you know, at any given time suspends removals to some countries through moratoria. We feel this is a very good idea. We think perhaps some countries should be added. Right now, we have Afghanistan, Burundi, Congo, Zimbabwe, and so on. Colombia seems like a country that is probably dangerous to return most people to, but the point is, at least from our perspective, that is a good thing, that although in any given country a person may face persecution depending on what they've done, their profile, and so on, there are countries where at times it seems to be generally too dangerous to return anyone safely, and that is a good feature of our immigration system.

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

Are you aware of any actions that the Department of Citizenship and Immigration has undertaken to address these concerns?

[Richard Goldman]

Sorry, Ms. Grewal, which concerns?

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

The concerns you have regarding the appeal division and refugees returning back to the countries--

[Richard Goldman]

To my understanding, if it's the appeal division, then the position for the moment, from the last few ministers, is no.

With regard to moratoria, a number of organizations have requested that it be added--and I gave the example of Colombia--but this has been turned down.

I don't know if that answers your question.

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

Yes.

What are the acceptance rates for PRRA applications? Do they differ, depending on the office or region of the country in which the PRRA officer is located?

[Richard Goldman]

That's what we were just looking at. I have some raw statistics here, but I'd have to try to figure out the percentage in my head, and my math isn't the best. But we can safely say that the percentage is 1% to 3% across Canada.

Since it was one of your members who just handed this to me, I believe these statistics will be distributed to you.

Nonetheless, the story is that it's approximately a 1% to 3% acceptance rate anywhere you go in Canada.

[Claudette Cardinal]

Perhaps I could add something here.

People who are frightened for their lives or for their safety are returned to their country of origin and only 1% to 3% are at risk? It seems to me that someone looking at it logically would ask themselves, “Well, we might find 20% or 30%, but 1% or 3%?”

So there seems to be something wrong with the logic in terms of the way in which the exams are carried out.

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

Okay.

Do you have any idea of how many refused claimants who are issued removal orders apply for pre-removal risk assessments?

[Richard Goldman]

Virtually all refused refugees do ask for the pre-removal risk assessment. I would think it's in the high 90%. Although perhaps some feel it is safe to return to their country, for the most part, if people are asking for refugee status, it's because they believe it's unsafe.

But if they don't apply for the pre-removal risk assessment, if they say they're not interested in it, then the removal officer books a flight for them and they leave in the next few weeks.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you.

Madame Faille, five minutes.

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

Thank you for being here.

I have asked a number of questions in the committee about the pre-removal risk assessment. We have been given answers to our questions. Last week, we received the latest statistics about the PRRA.

Since there is no appeal division, many unsuccessful refugee claimants ask for a pre-removal risk assessment, or PRRA. Others do not do so because they do not have enough arguments to back up their case. So they make a claim on humanitarian grounds instead. However, the acceptance rate for people who apply on humanitarian grounds after their refugee claim has been denied is so low that their chance of success is quite limited.

One of the concerns expressed by lawyers who help refugees fill out their application for a PRRA is the number of years of experience that the officers have and what makes these people qualified to adequately assess PRRA applications.

We recently received a training manual. We asked for departmental officials to come and tell us how many years of experience these officers had and how many weeks or days of training they had received. That seemed to be a problem for the department, since these officers may not all have the skills and experience needed to carry out these assessments.

We asked the department to indicate to us what type of degree the officers had and when they earned it, without giving us the officers' names. We also asked about their experience in quasi-judicial tribunals, since that is one of the requirement for carrying out a PRRA, as well as the language profile of the officers and the number of decisions they had rendered.

Unfortunately, our request was turned down. In my opinion, the department did not understand that we did not want the names of the officers. We simply wanted to have an exact profile of the officers doing the PRRAs.

You have before you the number of months of experience that the PRRA officers have. In the Montreal office, 18 of the 31 officers have less than two years of experience, which seems worrisome to me. In the files that I looked at, the officers were between 22 and 25 years of age. At that age, people are fresh out of university. I have never seen a board member that was 22 years old. I do not know whether you have ever seen citizenship judges that age. I have never seen anyone that age on a board where it would be possible to acquire the quasi-judicial experience needed by PRRA officers.

I find this troubling, given the importance of these decisions. I would like to know whether this is something you have also seen in your work. It is one of my concerns and it is why I often ask questions about the PRRA.

[Claudette Cardinal]

In my opinion, these people are very well intentioned. Those that I have met—I do not know many—want to do their work well, but they do not have enough experience or enough life experience. I have the impression that they have learned a lot of fine theory at university, but, once they are on the front lines, they realize that it is not quite the same thing.

Since the officers do not meet the people seeking a PRRA, they have to rely on documentation. It is impossible to understand someone's situation simply by looking at documents, without having any contact except by sending out a refusal once the decision is made.

It seems to me that lack of experience is a problem. It is not the fault of the officers, who have the best of intentions. It is just that they are very young and they lack training and experience.

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

They may have a university education, but that does not necessarily make them people who have enough experience to make this kind of decision, which has such an important impact on people's lives. Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you.

Mr. Devolin, please.

[Barry Devolin, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thanks for being here today.

I have a question about the RAD. I'm really looking for your personal opinions as people who deal with these issues and live in this world.

Since the RAD was passed by Parliament, there have been many ministers. I can't count that far back, but I think there were at least half a dozen. There have been three different prime ministers and two parties in power, two minority governments and one majority government, almost a whole bunch of political circumstances, and yet it hasn't been implemented.

Could you give your opinion on why you think this hasn't happened?

[Richard Goldman]

Well, I think you'd have to ask the ministers and the government. I could only guess that it may be some fear of a perception that we are adding another layer, where if it's not properly analyzed and described, the difficulty is there.

I think if it is explained that, first of all, there's a lot at stake and it can correct human errors, and, second, it could be and was intended to be configured in a way that would in a sense streamline the process and relieve the Federal Court of a great deal of its workload, it's only a question of explaining it to anyone who objects, whether it be the public or a think tank that happens to object.

It seems to me that it makes perfect sense on all levels.

[Barry Devolin, Conservative, Haliburton—Kawartha Lakes—Brock, ON]

I'm not an expert in this area, but the explanation you gave sounded good to me. It sounded compelling in terms of why it should be implemented and why it doesn't necessarily need to add another layer.

I'm not asking this question from a partisan point of view. I'm asking you very sincerely.

You've had a whole bunch of ministers from all parts of the country, males and females from different parties. They surely would have been briefed on this by their officials, and they must have met with groups such as yours. I find the suggestion that it simply needs to be better explained to them to make them support it is hard to believe, given that it's their job.

I would think when you become Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, this must be one of the first things that lands on your desk. It would be kind of an open issue that you may be asked to deal with.

As I said, I wonder if there's not more to it than that. I quite frankly don't know what it is and why this hasn't happened.

[Claudette Cardinal]

Have some ministers not said it would be too costly?

In looking at that one aspect and not looking at what the downstream effects would be if you have to pay here but you're saving down there, it comes to the same thing. It is certainly one of the reasons that has been given.

[Richard Goldman]

I also want to be clear that I wasn't saying it has to be better explained to the ministers. I was saying you may have to ask the ministers why they didn't do it.

I was speculating that it may be some fear of a perception that we're adding another layer and it has to be better explained.

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

Is there time left?

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

You have time left.

[Richard Goldman]

Could I add one thing?

In answer to your question from the point of view of the advocacy community, this has been enormously frustrating.

If we go back to the implementation or even the drafting of IRPA 2002, there was an ongoing dialogue with the department, the minister, and so on.

A type of deal was struck whereby the number of commissioners would fall from two to one. There used to be two commissioners, two IRB members who would hear each case, which in theory reduced the scope for human error. In exchange, there would be a refugee appeal division that would save an enormous number of positions overall or would reduce the number of positions and save taxpayers' money.

It was enormously frustrating to see the part of the deal that reduced a safeguard was implemented but not the part of the deal that put in a new protection.

On at least one occasion, one minister appeared before the Canadian Council for Refugees and said they were not doing it right away, but they promised to do it within a year. The year passed and nothing happened.

At another time, your committee asked the minister to come up with something within six months or to explain why he was not implementing it. I don't believe you ever got a really good explanation.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

You have about a minute, if you want to use that minute from Mr. Devolin. You had a short question.