Citizenship and Immigration Committee on May 14th, 2009

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

I call this meeting to order. This is the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, meeting number 17, Thursday, May 14, 2009.

We have two items on the agenda for today. The first is committee business. It is a motion by Monsieur St-Cyr, and you have all received his notice of motion. The second, pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), is a study of ghost consultants and migrant workers.

The first item, as has been agreed, is the motion by Monsieur St-Cyr.

Monsieur, if you would, read your motion and say a few words, please.

Did you have a point of order, Mr. Karygiannis?

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

I wanted to ask, Chair, wasn't this sent to the subcommittee?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

I got a notice of motion, which I received last week, and we're going to allow Monsieur St-Cyr to proceed.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

This is the motion I introduced:

That, notwithstanding the referral motion adopted Thursday, May 7, the committee proceed immediately and without further delay with the clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-291 and that this clause-by-clause consideration be completed before the committee undertakes any other business.

When we met on Tuesday to prepare the committee's agenda, I agreed that we would study the issue of ghost consultants and migrant workers, which is underway this week, provided that we completed the clause-by-clause consideration of my Bill C-291 on the Refugee Appeal Division on Thursday. However, last Thursday, once our business was completed and there remained only about five minutes to vote on the one and only clause in the bill, the Conservatives introduced a dilatory motion, seconded by the Liberals. They had obviously consulted each other in advance since there wasn't even any debate on the matter. The purpose of the motion was to defer to a much later date the study of Bill C-291, on which Parliament has ruled on a number of occasions.

Parliament spoke once eight years ago, when it decided to implement the Refugee Appeal Division. In 2004, this committee unanimously held in favour of implementing the Refugee Appeal Division. In the last Parliament, an identical bill was passed with the support of the Liberals and the NDP. This time the Liberals supported the bill again in committee.

We have to be consistent. We can't support this bill in the House on the one hand and, in committee, accept a dilatory tactic designed merely to conceal a certain hypocrisy. Ultimately, you support the bill because that looks good in public, but you don't intend to pass it.

I understand why the Conservatives are trying to delay this bill. It's legitimate in their case, since they oppose it. So they are doing it in good faith. Nevertheless, today I'm asking the Liberals to show that they are in good faith as well when they say they support Bill C-291. We have five minutes left, which is enough to conduct the clause-by-clause consideration and to adopt this bill.

Although we often like to do nice things for the media that have good show value, I would like to remind you that our primary duty is to vote on and pass laws. I am opposed to deferring this item until the fall. Rather than devote time to making presentations that are often more for show than the work of a legislator, let's use the five minutes we have left to study my bill.

For all these reasons, I invite the members, particularly the Liberals, to show their good faith in this matter and to proceed immediately with the clause-by-clause consideration of the bill. It will take us five minutes, and we can refer the bill back to the House.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Just give me a moment.

The motion contradicts a motion of last Thursday, but the chair holds the motion to be in order.

I have a list of speakers.

Mr. Dykstra.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

I'm going to be supporting what I think is a motion to move this back to the steering committee.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

That isn't what the motion says.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

I didn't really have my hand up to speak.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Mr. Karygiannis.

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

I didn't hear what Mr. Dykstra just said; I'm sorry.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

He's passing; he's not speaking.

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

Chair, we had a motion to send this to the subcommittee. It was voted upon and agreed upon. Mr. St-Cyr, coming back and dumping all over his colleagues and the Liberal Party and the Conservative Party, is certainly not greatly appreciated. This is like a little child who says "If you're not going to play my way, I'm going to take my marbles and go home." That is not what we're here for.

This motion was sent to the subcommittee. It should be studied there and then brought back for us to take another look at it. It was clear; it was passed. Why are we rehashing the same old thing again?

So I would make a motion, Chair, that we send this motion to the subcommittee.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Well, there is a motion on the floor.

Ms. Mendes.

[Alexandra Mendes, Liberal, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

Mr. Chairman, I would like to point something out to my colleague Mr. St-Cyr. I'm one of those persons who requested that this motion be transferred to the subcommittee, for the simple reason that we have addressed the question as to how we can ensure that individuals awaiting status are properly assessed once they have appeared before one, two or three board members.

I think the Refugee Appeal Division issue is extremely important. I am still in favour of implementing that appeal division. However, as some witnesses told us that the structure or bureaucracy could complicate the process, it might perhaps be better to defer this study.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Ms. Mendes. I'd like you to speak to the motion.

[Alexandra Mendes, Liberal, Brossard—La Prairie, QC]

I am speaking to the motion. I'm just saying that our intention in sending it off to subcommittee was to study it better. Is there a possibility?

I'm not in any way against the basic motion. I was one of the ones who proposed that we send it to subcommittee to study it a little more, because I thought there were alternatives to strictly the border patrol. That was my point.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Monsieur Saint-Cyr.

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

Mr. Chairman, I'm criticized for going back over an already established agenda. I will point out that we are here precisely because we've done it. It was agreed that we would complete the clause-by-clause consideration at our Thursday meeting. If we want to reverse our agenda once, we can do it a second time.

The study is completed, and no further witnesses are scheduled because that's not necessary. Parliament has already studied this bill in the last Parliament. In 2004, the members of this committee voted unanimously in favour of implementing the Refugee Appeal Division immediately. We clearly have before us a dilatory manoeuvre by the Conservatives. We can understand why they are opposed to it, but we don't understand the Liberals' cooperation. No meeting of the Subcommittee on Program and Procedure is scheduled this spring or summer. At best, that takes us up to the fall. You can see that the sole purpose here is to push back adoption of this bill by a number of months, whereas it's been awaited for eight years.

For all these reasons, I think this is a good opportunity for the Liberals to show their good faith and to support this motion so that we can finish with this matter and refer the bill back to the House.

Mr. Chairman, I'm going to request a recorded vote on this motion.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Does everyone understand the motion?

We'll have a recorded vote, Mr. Clerk.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Could you read the motion, please?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

The motion is as follows:

That, notwithstanding the referral motion adopted Thursday, May 7, the committee proceed immediately and without further delay with the clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-291; and that this clause-by-clause consideration be completed before the committee undertakes any other business.

(Motion negatived: nays 6; yeas 3)

We're now going to continue, with the second item of our agenda.

Mr. Dykstra.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

We had agreed that we were going to spend an hour with these witnesses and another hour with the following witnesses. We are now into this by about an additional 10 to 15 minutes. I want to make sure that we are going to have an hour and will get all our rounds of questioning in, even if we need to extend.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Well, it's a tough division, Mr. Dykstra. We also agreed that Monsieur St-Cyr would have his motion, and I followed those instructions. I'm at the mercy of the committee, whatever it wants to do.

Mr. Karygiannis.

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

In order to accommodate everybody, can I make a friendly motion that the first round be five minutes and every other round after that four minutes, so that we all get our chance to go in?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Five and four; I see no opposition to that.

We're now proceeding with some witnesses, some guests we have invited.

I'm going to assume who you are. I see Migrante Ontario, represented by Aimée Beboso, and we have Agatha Mason, who is the executive director of Intercede.

Welcome to the committee. I'm going to suggest that each of you have five minutes to make introductory comments. We're pressed for time, so if you could stick to that, I would appreciate it.

Ms. Beboso, you are first on the list, so we'll let you proceed. Welcome, again.