Thank you for the opportunity to address this committee on some of the issues affecting the immigration consulting industry in Canada. I'm an immigration consultant with Culture Connect immigration consultants in Regina and a member in good standing of the Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants.
I've been a member of this organization from its inception, but I've been working as an immigration agent and consultant for almost 15 years. Certainly, I was happy when an organization was created to regulate immigration consultants. My first reaction was that the public interest was finally being protected and that consultants could be regulated in Canada and abroad.
Alas, it appears that CSIC, the organization charged with the responsibility, has not lived up to my high expectations. There are many consultants practising today who are not members of CSIC, and some of these consultants provide services that cannot be justified. The question is, why are these consultants not members of CSIC? While some do not have justifiable reasons, others have legitimate, although inexcusable, reasons for not joining the organization. CSIC is not yet a self-governing profession, and the operation of phantom consultants is being fuelled by the actions of CSIC.
I'm not before the committee to destroy CSIC. I'm here to advise the committee that CSIC is not fulfilling the mandate intended for it by Parliament.
Why would I say this as a member of the organization? CSIC's initiative is suffering greatly because of actions and decisions taken by the initial board members. The initial board members have not delivered a self-governing profession, as was their task. Rather, they have usurped authority in all areas making up a self-governing profession and have denied members their rightful role. The go-it-alone attitude is, in my view, destroying the profession.
Certainly, we will say that in theory the board is accountable to its members. In 2007, in the aftermath of the Toronto Star exposé, a CSIC spokesman remarked that “evaluating CSIC is a job for its members”. But in practice that's not the case.
CSIC operates without input from its members, and in fact the board operates a dictatorship system of government. There is a huge suppression of members who have voluntarily, in the interest of the public and the profession, submitted themselves to self-regulation.
Here are some of my reasons for coming to this conclusion. First, CSIC by-laws stipulate that an AGM must be held in person and any amendment must be approved by its members. The board unilaterally decided otherwise and has not held the 2007-08 AGM to date. CSIC chose an electronic AGM, though the bylaw was against it. It does not allow members' participation. Members could not speak or make contributions. The meeting was eventually cancelled for lack of a quorum.
I agree that an electronic meeting is possible today, but the way it was organized by CSIC was a failure. Unfortunately, CSIC has failed in these areas.
Second, the initial directors were appointed to run the affairs of CSIC before members were able to complete membership prerequisites. They unilaterally removed the right of members to call for a special meeting, as is the practice in most regulatory bodies in Canada.
A third concern is the lack of transparency. This relates to other matters you're dealing with: the issue of governance within the Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants and the issue of unlicensed consultants. The board has not been forthcoming in providing information, and there are serious questions with respect to the administration of this society.
Personally, I have initiated and I've also been part of several letters and petitions to address this concern with the board. I've written several e-mails and letters to the board. It appears that all these appeals fell on deaf ears. Today, members do not have opportunities to see the minutes of the board meetings.
CSIC year-end is October 31, but up to today no financial statement has been given to any members. Another concern is the excessive spending by the board and inadequate explanation on the spending. The board approved its own compensation without members' input. The compensation was then enshrined in the bylaw without members' consent. The financial statements are presented in such a way that it is difficult to know the content of the expenses, and CSIC—in this case the board—is not forthcoming in providing explanations to members when asked.
To support the board's excessive compensation and flamboyant travel expenses, members are also charged an unreasonable annual membership fee and additional fees to attend mandatory continuous professional development. In an attempt to have a monopoly on the educational consultants, CSIC allocated greater CPD points to its own program and significantly reduced CPD points for other educational programs that have greater value and content than that of CSIC. In this way, the board undermines valid industry initiatives, to its shame. Programs with similar or better content organized by other organizations, like the Canadian Association of Professional Immigration Consultants and the Canadian Bar Association, charge significantly less than CSIC's programs, and members are made to pay $800 or more to watch a video of some of the events.
Though there are other options, CSIC chose a location for its office that is very expensive, on Bay Street--
