Evidence of meeting #12 for Citizenship and Immigration in the 39th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was karygiannis.
A recording is available from Parliament.
4:05 p.m.
Director, Legislation and Program Policy, Citizenship Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
There's no problem in the French. As I say, it was a typo that—
4:05 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Norman Doyle
Okay. That's not a problem. I think that can be done very easily.
Is somebody moving that we include the word “or”?
4:05 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Norman Doyle
Okay.
(Amendment agreed to [See Minutes of Proceedings]
(Clause 13 as amended agreed to)
4:05 p.m.
Conservative
4:05 p.m.
Bloc
Thierry St-Cyr Bloc Jeanne-Le Ber, QC
I would just like to propose a minor amendment, as was the case with another bill before a committee. Unfortunately, I cannot recall which one. I propose that the following words be added at the end of clause 14: “ but no later than 180 days after the day on which this Act receives royal assent”.
This would be a purely technical amendment aimed at ensuring that if the government does not have time to pass the orders to proclaim the act in force, because of elections or for some other reason, then the act will come into force six months after it receives royal assent. This mechanism is already included in other bills.
4:10 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Norman Doyle
You're modifying clause 14, so could you read into the record what you're saying there?
4:10 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Norman Doyle
We're on the last page, page 10 of the bill, which is page 46 in your binder, and clause 14: “The provisions of this Act...”.
Mr. St-Cyr.
4:10 p.m.
Bloc
Thierry St-Cyr Bloc Jeanne-Le Ber, QC
I will read it slowly, so that the interpreters can keep up. I propose that the following words be added at the end of clause 14: “ but no later than 180 days after the day on which this Act receives royal assent”.
4:10 p.m.
Director, Legislation and Program Policy, Citizenship Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
Mr. Chair, the bill was written in such a way that the coming into force of this provision would be structured so that it was coordinated with regulatory amendments that are required.
As I indicated before on the issue of the communication plan, this is a complex bill, and the communication plan, the training, the preparation of forms, and making sure that those messages to the Canadians outside of Canada are ready and have been finely tuned is a complex area. We would want to make sure we are ready not only from the regulatory perspective but also from the communication plan perspective.
Bill C-14 came into force in six months with an amendment very similar to that proposed by Mr. St-Cyr, and the department implemented the bill as planned within six months. This bill is significantly more complicated, more challenging from an implementation point of view, and so I would caution the committee that having a very firm implementation like this runs the risk of our not being ready in time, should we identify any regulatory challenges, for example, as we get ready for implementation.
4:10 p.m.
Director, Legislation and Program Policy, Citizenship Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
I'm sorry, I have one final point.
But let me assure the committee that this is a bill that the government clearly sees as a priority, and so there's no question that we want this bill to come into force. It's simply a question of making sure we're ready to bring the bill into force in such a way that it accomplishes what the committee themselves would like us to do.
4:10 p.m.
Conservative
4:10 p.m.
Liberal
Andrew Telegdi Liberal Kitchener—Waterloo, ON
If the government saw this bill as a priority, it would have been here over a year ago.
But anyway, let me ask whether you would you have any trouble with 360 days.
February 13th, 2008 / 4:10 p.m.
Director, Legislation and Program Policy, Citizenship Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
It's a challenge now to say exactly what period of time would be required. The advantage of structuring the bill as it is, which is quite common with pieces of legislation, is that if we find, as we get ready to implement, that there's a glitch with it that we hadn't anticipated, we're not caught with a hard deadline, so that we are sure we have all of our mechanisms in place, that the communications that are necessary are there. With a hard deadline, the challenge is that we may be forced to implement when we're not 100% ready.
4:10 p.m.
Liberal
Andrew Telegdi Liberal Kitchener—Waterloo, ON
Maybe you can give me some idea as to when you see this implemented. How many lost Canadians are going to die as lost Canadians? Do you have any idea?
4:10 p.m.
Director, Legislation and Program Policy, Citizenship Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
As I've indicated, we believe this bill needs to be implemented, but we also believe it needs to be implemented when it's ready and when the regulations are ready.
4:10 p.m.
Liberal
Andrew Telegdi Liberal Kitchener—Waterloo, ON
The committee would like to have some kind of idea. Is it ten years from now, fifty years from now...?
4:10 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Norman Doyle
We've made a great effort here at committee to get this bill into the House and over to the Senate, and now we find that 180 days is not good, 360 days is not good.... We need to get some indication.
I have a list of people here, so I'm going to go with the list I have.
4:15 p.m.
Liberal
Andrew Telegdi Liberal Kitchener—Waterloo, ON
Let me just finish the last question.
But you're going to start implementing the part about people born abroad right away, aren't you?
4:15 p.m.
Director, Legislation and Program Policy, Citizenship Branch, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
As I indicated in my summary in the last question, we need to be ready with those communication messages before the bill comes into effect, because we need to be warning people in advance that the provisions will come into effect.
4:15 p.m.
Liberal
Andrew Telegdi Liberal Kitchener—Waterloo, ON
But after the bill passes and somebody is born abroad under the definition of this thing, does this apply to them at that point?
