Sure.
I read a letter by our colleague Mr. Kennedy this morning calling for the right of U.S. and other military deserters or war resisters to make asylum claims in Canada. They have that right. Many of these individuals have made such claims. My understanding is that in 100% of instances where U.S. military deserters have made recent asylum claims before the IRB, those claims have been rejected as being unfounded or not meeting the definition of the status of refugees provided by the UN convention and by Canadian law.
I've been criticized that commenting on that fact is supposedly interfering in the decisions of the IRB. To the contrary, I'm commenting on the decisions the IRB has already made. The decisions they've made, to the best of my knowledge, in 100% of the cases before it on this category of individuals have been negative, leading me to conclude the IRB has decided that these are unfounded false refugee claims. That means these are individuals who have come to Canada illegally. I believe we should apply the law fairly and consistently, not with political prejudice. We should not say we favour this particular group of people politically, for whatever reason, and therefore we will exempt them from the normal and consistent application of immigration laws.
What concerns me about Mr. Kennedy's Bill C-440 in particular is it says that a foreign national in Canada shall be deemed to be in a situation in which humanitarian and compassionate considerations justify the granting.... He wants to amend section 25 of the IRPA to say that individuals who make these kinds of claims shall be exempted by the minister from any legal obligation applicable to that foreign national that would prevent them from being allowed to remain in Canada.
I read that as suggesting that the obligations and requirements under IRPA on inadmissibility would not be applied to such individuals. This would be totally without precedent. It would say one particular category of foreign nationals could avoid the inadmissibility provisions of IRPA, and that includes inadmissibility for reasons of criminality. I'm concerned that this would be an advertisement to people to make claims on the grounds of military service. They would therefore be exempt from the inadmissibility provisions of IRPA, including with respect to criminality. I think that's a very dangerous thing to do.