Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Hindsight is 20/20. I think I'd prefer to take my time and look at the future. I think we all can agree where we are right now in Canada and what's best for Canada right now.
Where we are right now is that we have a ticking time bomb ready to explode, with the aging baby boomers ready to retire in the next 10 or 15 years. Close to one-third of our population is not going to be in the labour force in the next 10 or 15 years. We know that today.
We also know today that the Canadians we have right now aren't giving birth in high enough numbers to keep the population stable. So the only way our population can stay at the level it is today is through immigration, and if we want to go beyond that, if we want to grow our communities and grow our society, then we're going to have to increase the level of immigration even that much further.
So our choices, then, involve how we go about doing that, what is the most fair, open, transparent, and objective way of doing that. I think the point system satisfies that model. The new bill, on which I know you can't comment, goes in the complete opposite direction and puts the power into the hands of the minister to pick and choose exactly who's going to come into Canada. The point system has its problems. It's not perfect, but it's far superior to putting all the power into the hands of the minister to decide the fate and the future of Canada.
With that in mind, we have the other question we've got to answer. What type of Canada do we want? Do we want a Canada filled with temporary foreign workers, which is the way the Conservative Party and this minister are going, and with all due respect one of the ways you had suggested? Do we want temporary foreign workers or a Canada filled with full-time Canadian families? I think the fabric and the quality of life of Canada are enhanced immensely by going down the path of having families here.
You know, we can bring a foreign worker in to work at Fort McMurray or up at Whistler in one of the resorts for the 2010 Olympics, but that foreign worker, whoever he or she is, is alone. His or her family is back in some other country. I'm sure the productivity level, the satisfaction level, just the overall quality of life for the community as well as that individual, would be greatly enhanced if that person could bring his family here. Canada is in the unique position where we can choose the full-time Canadian immigrant over the temporary foreign worker.
We just had a discussion with the minister. There are 925,000 people on the waiting list. I could understand if we were a country like Norway, which has nobody on the waiting list, and the only way we could get people in were as temporary foreign workers. But we aren't. The minister has 900,000 potential full-time Canadians who want to come into Canada, who want to work. That should be the avenue we go to first, and I'm hopeful this committee will continue doing its good work and take a look at the point system, to reform the point system to allow the department to operate in such a way as to open up Canada's doors and let more Canadians in.
Is there a way we can modify the point system to allow more Canadians into Canada faster?