Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Feb. 19th, 2007

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

Canadians are known around the world for a lot of good things. That's why people from other countries, when they're backpacking around Europe, for example, put the Canadian flag on their backpacks. They want to be seen as being Canadian. It really says something special when members of other countries want to be identified as being part of our country rather than their own, because they obviously see there's a lot of value in it.

There are a lot of ways in which Canadians have been described. Probably the best word would be “welcoming”. If you take a look back, most of the growth of our country has been based on immigration, whether people came here as.... In the area where I come from, Haldimand—Norfolk, the early settlers were there in the 1790s. But even if they're people who have arrived recently, they come from all different countries of the world. We saw that last week at the swearing-in ceremony.

Maybe it's because we've all ultimately come from somewhere else that we tend to be welcoming of new people. There's a tolerance. There's a cross-cultural learning that's celebrated.

I look at my wonderful area of Haldimand—Norfolk, where we had a large influx of immigration in the fifties, mainly from eastern Europe. Those people have made a fabulous success story out of developing the area, and we still celebrate our various cultures. I see that, going forward, as something special.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you, Minister.

I would ask members to try to stay within the time limit. Of course, it's my responsibility to bang the gavel, but the questions have been quite lengthy, and the answers have been quite lengthy as well. I'm going to hold members strictly to the five-minute rule from now on to ensure that everyone gets an opportunity to address the minister.

I will now go to Mr. Gravel, please.

[Raymond Gravel, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Thank you for being here, Madam Minister.

I have a number of questions to ask, after reading the notes you've distributed to us. That's why I would have liked to have your text. I'm a new member of this committee. I have the translation, and that's also a problem. I had a number of questions to ask; you've answered some of them, concerning Mr. Taylor, among other things.

I'd like to ask you a question about the ancestors of the Mennonite community whose marriages were not recognized because they had religious weddings. Are there a number of people now living in Canada who perhaps don't know whether they're Canadian citizens or not? How do you deal with those cases?

There's the case of Mr. Teichroeb, who's been living in Canada since he was six months old. Under the rules, they say he lost his job and house. He waited for three years before finding out that he could be recognized as a Canadian citizen. I don't know whether there are a number of people in the same situation. If so, how are you going to manage that? What is meant by illegitimate marriage today? If there were illegitimate marriages at the time, it seems to me those cases would be easy to resolve today.

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

You bring up a very good point.

First of all, congratulations on joining the committee. That's exciting.

There are significant issues here. One thing we're trying to identify and are working on in this regard is the numbers involved; we're not sure, because every case has to be looked at individually to determine eligibility.

If there is a significant “attachment”, as we call it, to Canada--a demonstration that people have lived here a large portion of their lives, have contributed to the workforce, have a reason to be part of Canada or to consider themselves tied to Canada--then we consider the use of subsection 5(4), which is how we granted citizenship to the 33 original ones.

[Raymond Gravel, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Has Mr. Taylor's case been resolved, even though you filed an appeal?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

That case is currently still before the courts. As I mention in my notes, we believe there was an error in law in the last decision, so we're appealing that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you, Mr. Gravel.

There are a couple of minutes left here, so if you want to go ahead with the remaining time, Madame Faille, it's okay.

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

Again on the subject of Mennonite ancestors, based on what file or what information do you determine that an individual is no longer a Canadian citizen? When did Mr. Teichroeb realize that he was no longer Canadian? What information, what files did you crosscheck in order to determine that that person was no longer a Canadian citizen?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

I'm sure you can respect that for the sake of privacy, we cannot talk about individual cases. But each case is different. When I first arrived at CIC recently, I was amazed to see the variety of circumstances and how no two cases are identical. They may seem so on the surface, but once you start examining the documentation, there are different sources for different pieces of information.

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

It's not the case as such that interests me. I raised Mr. Teichroeb's case because I'm sure there are other people in that situation. For whoever files an application, what's your source of information for determining whether that person is an illegitimate child and is not entitled to citizenship?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

There's a wide range of documentation that we review, whether it be Canadian or from elsewhere. We have to authenticate those documents as well. Many people do unfortunately try to get into this country using fraudulent documents, because we are such a great place to be.

So we have to authenticate the documents, but we do look at a wide range of them, depending on the circumstances, and they do vary considerably.

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

So you're confirming for us that you have no electronic files containing the names of all persons who are illegitimate Canadian citizens.

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

No.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you, Madame Faille.

Mr. Devolin, please.

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

Thanks, Mr. Chair.

Thanks for being here today, Madam Minister.

This is an interesting issue because of the people it affects. We've seen the anecdotal stories in the media and we've heard a bit about some of them this morning.

About a year and a half ago, someone who was having a problem came to my constituency office. He was a lost Canadian. He was born in Ontario, moved to Australia in the 1960s when he was in his twenties, and played hockey in Australia. They wanted him to play on their Olympic team in 1968, so they rushed through citizenship for him. It was his understanding that it didn't affect his Canadian citizenship.

Anyway, he played in the 1968 Olympics and lived in Australia for ten years. He then moved back to Canada and has been here for thirty years. He married a Canadian woman and recently decided that he should get a passport to make it easier to travel back and forth to the United States. Instead of using his Ontario birth certificate, he thought he should get a Canadian passport, only to discover that he in fact wasn't a Canadian citizen any more.

When he came to my office, he had been advised by an immigration lawyer that he should get his wife to sponsor him as Canadian citizen. He pointed out that his wife was actually an immigrant. Someone who was born in another country was actually going to be sponsoring him to become a Canadian citizen. His proof of ID was his Ontario birth certificate.

There's also another group that I've been dealing with. I have a lot of retired people in my riding, and I've had a significant number of war brides come forward in the past couple of years. It seems odd that fifty or sixty years later, people are dealing with the citizenship issue. I think it is the change in the rules to enter the United States that has precipitated this issue, but these citizenship problems are long-standing issues that are coming to light now as people are coming in to get passports.

I think you said earlier that for people who think they're Canadian citizens or people who are going through this process, there won't be any interruption to their benefits, to their Canada Pension Plan or old age security. I can appreciate that some older people might be nervous about dealing with an important issue like this, because they would think they're getting their assistance now and don't want to upset the apple cart.

Can you clarify for Canadians, whether they're lost Canadians or whether they're long-time permanent residents who want to go through this process to become Canadian citizens, that by bringing themselves to light, they're not going to lose benefits?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

I'll try to make it simple, although it gets very complex and probably is outside the amount of time we have here. Basically anyone who is born in Canada is a Canadian citizen. That's the number one rule. There are cases, a few--we've identified about 450 so far--where there is some dispute as to whether an individual is a Canadian citizen, was a Canadian citizen, or is entitled to be one, for a wide variety of reasons.

We are reviewing each of those cases on an individual basis because each one is unique. While we review those, we have made the commitment that none of those individuals involved in those cases will lose their benefits, such as old age security. They will not be removed from the country, because we want to make sure that all of these determinations are made first, before anything else happens.

So while we are reviewing those cases, they will definitely retain their benefits.

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

Thank you. I think that will cause some people to take comfort from that.

As my last comment, I forgot to mention that the individual whom I mentioned actually is one of your 450 and is being dealt with now and seems to be on the way to resolution.

Also, another issue. There has been reference to the Mennonite issue, and I know there are Mennonite families who moved to Mexico in the past. Births were registered. There was a church marriage, but not a registered marriage. There are also Mennonites who come from other places, including the United States. Are there any special concerns that you have regarding Mennonites? Are there any provisions in place for them?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

We don't deal with specific groups in that way, as a rule. I wouldn't say I have specific concerns about any particular group. We always have to be vigilant, though, to make sure that whoever is applying to come to Canada, to stay in Canada, meets all of our safety and security needs, which includes having to prove that they are who they say they are and in the circumstances they say they are.

As I mentioned earlier, there are far too many people who want to come to this country because it's a land of opportunity in their eyes, And that's a good thing. The bad thing is that they're prepared to go to extreme lengths to do it, and so for the safety and security of everyone who is already here, we do have to validate all of the documentation and all of the submissions and claims that are made in the applications.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you, Minister, and thank you, Mr. Devolin.

Mr. Siksay, five minutes, please.

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

Thank you, Chair.

Minister, I wanted to come back to the matter of the children born to Canadian armed forces personnel in the Cold War period. One of the people who has been working on this issue is a woman named Christine Eden from British Columbia. In her informal work on this, pretty intense work, she says she has over 200 files of people who fall into that circumstance, whose citizenship is in question related to having been born out of Canada on a military base while parents were serving with the Canadian armed forces.

You had mentioned that you thought a lot of the passport issues were people who were applying for an initial passport, a first-time passport. Some of the examples, some of the anecdotal stories she sent me, are about people who say they've held several Canadian passports over the years, and when they went to get them renewed recently they were told that their documentation was no longer valid.

She points to a number of examples of people in that circumstance, so I'm looking forward to when she appears before the committee. She is coming to talk to us about those circumstances and her experience of this issue.

But people who have served in the military--RCMP officers, she points out--have had the same experience of renewing a passport and being told that they weren't Canadian and needed to resolve that issue before a new passport could be issued.

She also raises the issue of people who move between provinces. There's one example here of someone who moved from Alberta to B.C. and applied for a B.C. driver's licence but was told that the record of birth abroad wasn't an acceptable document provincially for proof of birth.

I'm wondering if you can tell me what kind of coordination happens between provincial agencies that issue identification documents and your department in terms of resolving issues around what's acceptable proof of citizenship and what's not. For instance, would your department have negotiations with the people who issue licences in British Columbia about what's acceptable ID?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

As the federal government, we are the national registry for citizenship and for applications. Each province obviously has the freedom and the authority to make its own decisions on what it will accept or respect in terms of proof for anything else, for its own programs. Driver's licences being provincial programs, they get to determine what they want, but we are the national registry for new Canadians.

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

So they would be able to reject a document that the department finds acceptable as proof of Canadian citizenship.

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

I would doubt that, but I could follow up for you.

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

Okay.

Minister, you said you were currently dealing with 450 cases of this. Has there been any looking back to see how many people in recent years might have fallen into these categories and had to go through a more complicated process to resolve the issues of their citizenship? Has there been any analysis of the previous requests for new citizenship documents or a resumption of citizenship, one that would determine how many people fell into these kinds of categories?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

I will defer to the deputy on that one.