Evidence of meeting #48 for Citizenship and Immigration in the 39th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was board.
A recording is available from Parliament.
12:30 p.m.
Liberal
The Vice-Chair Liberal Andrew Telegdi
If we're going to salvage anything from today, then we'd better deal with the concept of maybe coming back after the vote to do our questioning of the witnesses; otherwise we're going to waste one meeting on it.
Yes, Mr. Siksay.
12:30 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Chair, I think that if we were going to consider reconvening now, I agree with the parliamentary secretary that it's inappropriate, given that the bells are ringing. We should have done it maybe at the beginning of the bells ringing, but I think it's inappropriate now, given that we do have to leave to make the vote. Maybe we should try to come back at one o'clock and see if we can salvage something of the meeting, or immediately following the vote. Unfortunately, our schedule has been taken out of our hands this morning.
I have to leave now to go to the vote, and I will be doing that.
12:30 p.m.
Liberal
The Vice-Chair Liberal Andrew Telegdi
Before you leave, we have to make a decision that we're going to reconvene and we're going to extend the meeting time.
12:30 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
I don't think we can do that, because I think the meeting is improperly convened at this point.
12:30 p.m.
Conservative
12:30 p.m.
A voice
You can just suspend.
1:20 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Norman Doyle
We will resume the meeting. The meeting will now come to order.
I believe we had been in the middle of your statement, Mr. Summers, and I think you were finished, were you not? We can go to questioning directly.
Our first line of questioning will come from the Liberal side. Mr. Alghabra, do you want to open questioning, please?
April 17th, 2007 / 1:20 p.m.
Liberal
Omar Alghabra Liberal Mississauga—Erindale, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you both, gentlemen, for coming here today. I apologize for the confusion. Votes sometimes force us to change our schedule.
I want to take this opportunity to hear further evidence from you today. It's very informative and interesting to hear both sides of the situation.
I'll start with Mr. Harrison. You summarized the nine recommendations that were a product of your report. What was the impact of merging the advisory panel and chairperson selection board? How many members are there now on the newly recommended board, and who selects those members?
1:20 p.m.
Senior Associate Deputy Minister, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, Deputy Head, Indian Residential Schools Resolution Canada, As an Individual
First of all, the recommendation in the report was that the merging of those two bodies be considered; we did not recommend that it take place immediately. The reason, as you can see, is that the roles of those two different boards deal with different competencies.
That said, we had a third-party review of the process. There were two different groups of people coming to grips with two complex sets of information, namely the backgrounds for the candidates; it was generally felt that there could well be efficiencies in merging those two. Our recommendation was that it be considered. How that has unfolded in the last three months I'm not in a position to tell, because I do not know, but the aim was to promote efficiency.
1:20 p.m.
Liberal
Omar Alghabra Liberal Mississauga—Erindale, ON
Is there any mechanism for how the individuals on that recommended or suggested new board would be selected?
1:20 p.m.
Senior Associate Deputy Minister, Indian and Northern Affairs Canada, Deputy Head, Indian Residential Schools Resolution Canada, As an Individual
The recommendation was that the minister and the chair of the IRB be responsible for identifying and appointing an equal number of members of that board. The actual number would be for consideration from an operational point of view by the IRB.
1:20 p.m.
Liberal
Omar Alghabra Liberal Mississauga—Erindale, ON
Your recommendation was that the minister have the ability to appoint half of the new board.
I will tell you why this raises some concerns. I have a quote here to read for you from Mr. Poilievre. He's a Conservative MP who said in committee that the government will never appoint people who don't agree with its agenda. I'm going to quote:
We've always been clear that we will be appointing people who will further the agenda. It's nothing new. In fact, it's worth saying twice. We are going to appoint people who agree with the agenda that we intend to implement—
This new structure that is being suggested undoubtedly has raised a lot of alarms and concerns.
I'm going to move now to Mr. Summers. Is it fair to say that things have been improving in the selection process over the last few years, before these recommendations and before these changes? Can you describe that for me? Have things been worsening?
1:25 p.m.
Former member of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada Advisory Panel, As an Individual
Thank you for the question.
Before I answer, there is one thing I want to say. In my opening statement I indicated that we felt the fix was in when I talked about Mr. Harrison's report. I didn't mean to say that Mr. Harrison was in cahoots with anyone. I regretted it as soon as I said it. He at all times was very honourable and honest with our group when we met with him. My concern was that from what we had heard from the minister's office and other sources, and given the terms of reference of the report, we felt we knew where it was going. It turned out that we were right.
To answer your question, things improved considerably during the time of the advisory panel I was part of. I don't take sole credit for that. Mr. Fleury is due most of the credit for bringing this new system in. We've heard from the staff of the IRB that the people who were selected and appointed to the IRB have proven to be extremely good members. They have required less training than previous appointees. They have required less mentoring once they were finished their training. And they have been found to be ready to handle the responsibilities of a board member much quicker than other appointees. So yes, the system is working. We put forward extremely qualified people and the results have borne that out.
If you bring in patronage again, of course some very good people will come forward, but we can't be sure of that.
1:25 p.m.
Liberal
Omar Alghabra Liberal Mississauga—Erindale, ON
You also said that you felt there is a perception by the current government that the current advisory panel is more sympathetic to refugees.
1:25 p.m.
Former member of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada Advisory Panel, As an Individual
Nobody came out and said that to us directly. We heard rumours that this is what was being said about us. If indeed people were saying that, they obviously knew very little about those of us who were on the panel. We were all very committed to making this non-partisan and to picking the best people.
This type of rumour would have come about because of my background as a former president of the Canadian Council for Refugees and as an advocate for refugees for many years. If somebody thinks I was there to make sure we got board members who would say yes to refugees, then they don't know me very well and they don't know the CCR very well. It has never been my position or the CCR's position that every person who applies for refugee status should get a yes answer. It has always been our position that the system should be fair, and that's all I have ever been promoting.
I can tell you that none of the other members of our committee come from a refugee advocacy background. Peter Carver is a professor from the University of Edmonton. John Scratch, is a retired lawyer with the Department of Justice, who used to represent the Department of Citizenship and Immigration in many matters.
In any event, the answer to your question is that we heard those rumours. They aren't true. It has never been the view of our committee that we should be picking people for any particular purpose other than to be qualified and to be fair.
1:25 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Thank you, Chair.
I want to thank both of you for being here on this funny morning at the House. My apologies for the interruptions.
Mr. Summers, I know you were a last-minute replacement for Beverley Nann, from Vancouver, who was another member of the advisory panel and with whom I have met about these issues. She was hoping to be here and that didn't work out.
I am glad you mentioned your long history with the Canadian Council for Refugees. The Canadian Council for Refugees also had many concerns about the appointment process over the years. I believe the CCR would have seen the change that brought about the advisory panel and the work you were doing as a positive improvement in the process. Can you tell us how that discussion went over the years, and how you came to be on the advisory panel?
1:30 p.m.
Former member of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada Advisory Panel, As an Individual
You're quite correct that the selection of board members has been a matter of importance for the CCR for quite a long time. We felt, from very personal experience for most of us, that there was an inconsistency in the quality of appointees to the refugee board.
When the new selection process was proposed in 2004, Jean-Guy Fleury approached me and asked if I would be a member of the advisory panel. I said, “Are you asking me as the president of the CCR”—as I then was—“or as myself?” He said he was asking me as myself, as a lawyer from Atlantic Canada, and they wanted regional representation.
I debated it long and hard with the CCR executive. In fact, the first vote was that I would not participate. I felt strongly that since we had been promoting change to the appointment process, we should show our support for any proposed changes by participating. After much debate my executive agreed to allow me to sit on the panel.
When I joined the panel I made a public statement to the chair and the rest of the committee that I considered myself there as a representative of the CCR, not in my personal capacity, and if at any point I felt that the government was not living up to the commitment they had made in bringing forward these proposals, I would be quitting loudly and publicly. Recent events are basically the result of me following through on that promise.
1:30 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Clearly you had that debate and made the decision to participate because you thought there was some integrity, and initially, in terms of your participation, that was borne out by what was happening at the advisory panel.
1:30 p.m.
Former member of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada Advisory Panel, As an Individual
It was. In fact, up until the last year my reports back to my executive were very positive—that things were working, this was a good system, and we should support it. Over the last year my reports have been getting less and less positive, to the point where in November 2006 I got approval for my executive withdrawal from the committee if I felt it had become untenable.
1:30 p.m.
NDP
Bill Siksay NDP Burnaby—Douglas, BC
Was there any question that the appointments to the advisory board were partisan ones, when Mr. Fleury made them?
1:30 p.m.
Former member of the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada Advisory Panel, As an Individual
Absolutely not. I don't know the political background of my fellow committee members, and I don't think it's important that I do. I can tell you that in the many meetings we had over three years, not once did any member of our committee make a comment or bring forward a consideration that could be considered in any way partisan. Politics simply had no part in our committee.
