Citizenship and Immigration Committee on May 28th, 2008

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Order. Time has expired--

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

[Inaudible--Editor]...so can you please come clean and tell us where--

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Order, Mr. Karygiannis. Order, please.

I will ignore that question, Minister, and move on to Mr. St-Cyr.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

Mr. Chairman, a point of order.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

A point of order.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Souris—Moose Mountain, SK]

The member was referring to some documents. I didn't quite catch them, but I wonder if he could file them perhaps for the record.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Can you, Mr. Karygiannis?

[Jim Karygiannis, Liberal, Scarborough—Agincourt, ON]

Copies for everybody. As I gave them to you before, I'll be more than glad to give them to you today. And if you do the math, it comes out to exactly--

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

Order, please. Refer any comments to the chair, please.

Mr. St.-Cyr.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

The Bloc Québécois tabled a bill to establish the Refugee Appeal Division. The Senate is expected to pass the bill in the near future. I take it the Conservatives do not intend to delay its passage.

When you established your budget, did you set aside the funding required to establish the Refugee Appeal Division?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

That isn't necessary at this point because Bill C-280 is still under consideration. If the bill passes the Senate and the House of Commons, then the funds will be submitted as part of the supplementary estimates (B).

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

Have your officials costed the annual amounts that will be required?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

Yes.

[Richard Fadden, Deputy Minister, Department of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Chairman, we expect it will cost some $32 million a year.

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

Thank you very much.

You spoke of the Foreign Credentials Referrals Office. The Bloc Québécois maintains its opposition to the establishment of that office because anything to do with credentials is under Quebec and provincial jurisdiction. We think that the money would be better invested where the decisions are made.

Since the office was set up, how much money has been spent so far and how much will be spent over the next year?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

This year, we spent $2.4 million, or the same amount as last year.

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

This issue is of concern for all three parties of the National Assembly of Quebec. More and more people want this issue to be resolved. If the Government of Quebec were to ask that these amounts be transferred to a Quebec organization charged with carrying out this work, would you be willing to accept?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

We would like the Foreign Credentials Referrals Office to acknowledge the jurisdictions of provinces and regulatory bodies, in collaboration with each and every province. We do not recognize credentials. We are simply providing immigrants the opportunity to have their skill and competencies assessed.

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

A large proportion of Quebec immigrants are selected by the Government of Quebec. They primarily have dealings with the Government of Quebec, and any involvement they have with the federal government concerns health and safety issues. In this context, it appears to me much more logical to hand over these sums to the Government of Quebec and let it provide information to immigrants, as other provinces would be doing in the rest of Canada. Since the Government of Quebec is the main interlocutor in that province, it is up to the government to take charge.

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

You are right, and that is why the minister and myself have discussed this; and why my departmental officials have done the same with their Quebec counterparts. We want to make sure that all newcomers to Quebec have the skills required by regulatory bodies in Quebec so that they may work in their area of expertise. We are working together; but we need to make sure that immigrants can succeed as soon as they arrive.

[The Chair, Conservative, Norman Doyle]

I will have to cut it off there and go to Ms. Chow, but undoubtedly you'll have an opportunity again, Mr. St-Cyr.

Go ahead, Ms. Chow.

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

Thank you.

I have to congratulate you, Madam Minister. You've picked up some friends. At the finance committee yesterday the Liberal MPs agreed with the Conservatives to fast-track Bill C-50, and at the Liberal-dominated Senate, you got it fast-tracked again. We haven't even finished dealing with Bill C-50 here in the House of Commons, and right now, as we speak, the Senate is considering Bill C-50. It's quite amazing that you found these Liberal friends, even though they said they were against the bill. Having said that, I don't know how you managed to do it, but it's quite amazing.

The numbers don't fit. The budget in front of us says the main estimates this year are for $164,860,000 for the immigration program, which is a drop from last year of $18.9 million. In the ads you've been saying it's going to be over $100 million and it's going to deal with the backlog, etc. In your presentation you said there is $8 million for this year. I can't square that number, because what I'm noticing is that the immigration program will have to cope with a significant reduction in financial resources, a cut of 32% over two years. On top of that, I saw that in 2007 there was a decrease of another $2.6 million due to “cost efficiency savings”, so last year there were cuts already, and there are more cuts coming, cuts of 32%.

If there are fewer resources for the immigration department, that goes completely contrary to and in a different direction from what the ad seems to be saying, which is that there will be millions of dollars invested in reducing the backlog. Can you explain that?

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

I will try. I don't mean it to sound convoluted, but the process is very convoluted.

If you take a look at the mains to the mains, in fact we're forecasting to spend 58% more than before we took government, which was in 2006.

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

I'm talking about the immigration program; I'm not talking about the settlement program.

[Diane Finley, Conservative, Haldimand—Norfolk, ON]

I'm talking about the whole.