Mr. Chair, whatever you deem appropriate.
Coming back to the content, for those of you who are new to this committee, in the past few years we have seen quite a few cases where couples have been married in Canada, and the Canadian spouse has sponsored the new husband or new wife. The application supposedly takes six months, and it is all done in Canada. Unfortunately, in some cases, for some reason the application has taken longer than six months. Sometimes it takes a year, two years, sometimes even longer. In the meantime, the wife becomes pregnant and the couple has kids. The family establishes roots in Canada just like any new family. What is tragic about this situation is that in the meantime, Canada Border Services Agency says that because the person is out of status, it will proceed to deport the spouse that is being sponsored. When department officials came to talk to us, we said, “Wait a second. It does not make sense for you to deport the spouse. You have not proved that it's a marriage of convenience. If you have proven it's a marriage of convenience, by all means deport the person, but you haven't made that determination. So perhaps you could not deport these inland-sponsored applicants until after that determination has been made.”
This motion is saying that the applicants be given a work permit and that they not be deported until a decision is made. Sometimes the applicants are pregnant, or they have kids, or they could be the breadwinner of the family. What happens if they are deported is that the family is thrown into total chaos and financial and emotional hardship.
In the meantime--let's say the person is from China--once the person is deported, the application to sponsor such a person has to start all over again, and it is another six months, a year, sometimes even two years before the person gets back into the country. That's a really difficult separation for the family.
This is a common-sense motion. It saves Canadian taxpayers' money, in that the application process does not have to start all over again overseas. It saves money for CBSA, as it would not have to deport the person. Some inland applicants end up appealing the decision to the Federal Court. They do all this legal manoeuvring in order to stay in Canada as long as possible while their CIC application is being processed. It's a lose-lose situation for the applicants and their families, and for CBSA, CIC, and the overseas visa office.
That's why I brought this motion back into this committee. We approved it at this committee last term, but in the meantime, I've experienced quite a few more cases where the spouses are facing deportation. In one case the woman was three or four months pregnant. She already had a six-month-old baby here. She was facing deportation around Christmas and New Year's. It made no sense. Thank goodness she got a minister's permit to stay, because it was really hard for the family.
That's why I'm putting that motion in front of you. I would hope the government would draft a response and that it would agree and would enact some legislative change.