Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Feb. 11th, 2008

[Mark Davidson]

When the committee tabled its report in December, it asked for a formal response from the government on the report. And in the normal course of events, the government will be responding to all the recommendations in the bill. I'm here today to give you information about Bill C-37, which certainly is an element. The government will be tabling a response to the provisions not related to C-37 in the normal course of events.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

From what I understand, steps have not yet been taken to act on recommendations 7, 8 and 9.

[Mark Davidson]

You should not, sir, interpret it that way. What I'm saying to you is that we are working on a formal response to these recommendations. As I understand it, the rules of Parliament give the government 120 days to provide a formal response, and I think it would be premature for me to give you that response today. It will be coming within the parameters of parliamentary rules.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

I realize that the Committee will receive an answer and the government has some time to respond to the recommendations. However, recommendation 7 reads as follows:

The Committee recommends that Citizenship and Immigration Canada put together an information package for all Members of Parliament and their constituency offices to assist them in helping members of the public get the right answers to their citizenship queries.

This is not a state secret. Has it been done? Don't worry; this is not a criticism.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

You have 30 seconds. Give a brief response, please.

[Mark Davidson]

Honestly, I don't know the answer to that question.

[Thierry St-Cyr, Bloc, Jeanne-Le Ber, QC]

According to recommendation 10, Canada should “take steps to address repeated complaints received concerning any specific CIC agent”.

Has that been done, or is it under review?

[Mark Davidson]

My understanding is that when the assistant deputy minister, Janet Siddall, appeared before this committee in early June, I believe, she made an undertaking. She spoke about this. Certainly we understand, when we're passing on significant information to our clients, either citizens or non-citizens, the importance of being sensitive to that message and, where appropriate, of providing them with avenues of resolution.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you, Mr. St-Cyr.

We'll go to Madam Chow for seven minutes.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

On recommendations 7, 8, and 9, on which my Bloc colleagues just questioned, are there any funds put aside in the immigration department's budget to do the notification and promotion to let people know what could be changed and to do general education?

[Mark Davidson]

I can't answer that question. I'm not prepared for an answer to that question.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

I know that a lot of figures were quoted earlier at the meeting. My question is in regard to the children who are born of citizens in another territory, the second generation, who we're talking about right now. If we say that citizenship would be granted at birth by operation of law for that second generation, why is it a problem for your department to do so, if such an amendment has been moved? What impact would it have? It seems to impact on a good number of people. I can't tell precisely how many.

[Mark Davidson]

My department is here to implement the policy that has been set either by the government or by Parliament. So I wouldn't say we would have a problem with that policy or another policy. We are here to implement the policy that has been set.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Okay.

I haven't seen the figures that were released over the weekend. In your estimation, how many of that second generation would be from Asia or Hong Kong or China, for example? I've heard different figures being bandied about.

[Mark Davidson]

I think it's important for me to reiterate a comment that has been made many times to this committee. That is, we do not know the number of either first-generation Canadians born outside of Canada, second generation, third generation, fourth generation, or fifth generation. One way of putting it is that we know the individuals that we know about. We don't know about all the others. And there are first generation, second, third, fourth, and fifth generation that are being born, as we speak, outside of Canada who have never come forward, of whom we have no record.

The way the present act works, those individuals are citizens, and because of the provisions of section 8, as Mr. Telegdi has indicated, they can continue for sixth, seventh, eighth, or ninth generation without any ties to Canada. So it's important to understand that the figures that were shared with you were those of individuals who have come forward who we know about. But we're not suggesting that's the total population, because we don't know those people who have not come forward. There's no requirement under either the 1947 act or the present act for Canadian citizens who are having children born outside of Canada to report those births to the Canadian government. If they want citizenship for those children, or if they wanted citizenship for those children, they might have had to take action, but there's no law that says they must report their foreign births.

So we simply do not have a total number of the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, or twenty-fifth generation.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Earlier on you said that the citizen can come back to Canada and then sponsor their young daughter. As long as she's under 23, I guess, they can bring the daughter over. How would that daughter, who might be stateless, then travel to Canada?

[Mark Davidson]

Let me just add that actually that sponsorship can take place overseas as well.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

So a Canadian citizen can—

[Mark Davidson]

A Canadian citizen who is resident outside of Canada can complete a sponsorship for a dependent child. A dependent child includes children up to 22 years of age, so they have at least a 22-year window to do that sponsorship.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Don't you have to be in Canada for three to five years, or three out of four?

[Mark Davidson]

No, the sponsors in the context of sponsorship of a dependent child do not have to be resident in Canada. So they can do the sponsorship, the processing can take place, and in fact these cases are expedited.

In the rare event that an individual may be stateless, as I indicated in answer to Mr. Telegdi's question, there are other kinds of travel documents that can be issued. There's something called a certificate of identity, for example, that can be issued to these individuals. Likewise, the International Committee of the Red Cross has a travel document that can be issued for stateless persons. Either of these kinds of documents can be used for the individuals to return to Canada, and those documents are certainly recognized by Canada to permit them to come back to Canada.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Thank you, Ms. Chow.

Mr. Batters, for seven minutes, please.

[Dave Batters, Conservative, Palliser, SK]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the departmental officials for appearing before us today on this important topic.

I'm not sure who to identify this to—Mr. Davidson, probably to you, but I'll let you determine who's best to answer these questions.

Can you share with the committee the reasoning behind the bill with respect to the pre-1947 cases, the Joe Taylor types of cases, which cover the people who did not automatically become Canadian citizens on January 1, 1947, when the first Canadian Citizenship Act took effect? Can you tell us why the bill does not cover these cases?

[Mark Davidson]

Thank you, Mr. Batters. This issue is covered, actually, in the first issue paper that I spoke about.

Citizenship in Canada was created by Parliament on January 1, 1947. Before that date, individuals in Canada had the status of British subjects with Canadian domicile. So the significance of January 1, 1947, is historical fact. The significance of that date has also been confirmed both by the Supreme Court of Canada in the Benner decision and also more recently by the Federal Court of Appeal in its decision in the Joe Taylor case. So Bill C-37 is continuing that, to recognize that significant historical event that took place on January 1, 1947.

I think it's important to understand, though, that there will be individuals born before 1947, either in Canada or outside of Canada, who will benefit from this bill. These are individuals who did become citizens on January 1, 1947, under that first act, and then subsequently lost their citizenship either because they failed to retain their citizenship or they took out another citizenship and suffered because of the dual citizenship provisions of that 1947 act.

So Bill C-37 will actually assist a number of individuals who became citizens on that day, January 1, 1947.

[Dave Batters, Conservative, Palliser, SK]

Thank you, sir.

For the cases the bill does not address, it's my understanding--and I'm relatively new to this committee--that the minister has, under subsection 5(4), I believe it is, of the Citizenship Act, a provision for people who are not covered, and that's a remedy available to the minister. Is that correct?