Thank you for the question.
What's being proposed is a four-year pilot project aimed at encouraging more voluntary returns. It would essentially provide counselling to claimants throughout the refugee determination process with respect to failed claimants' rights and their obligations. For example, many people just don't realize that if they are removed from Canada, that is, if they are deported, they're banned from ever returning.
The pilot project would be delivered in partnership with an independent service provider. The pilot would be located in the greater Toronto area and would consist of two phases. The first phase would be for failed claimants who are being returned to Mexico, the Caribbean, and Central and South America. That would essentially be for the first two years of the project. The second phase—again located in Toronto—would be for failed claimants being returned to all other parts of the world.
In addition to counselling, the pilot project would provide a number of other features. For example, it would provide failed asylum claimants with a plane ticket to return home. It would provide funding up to a maximum of $2,000, to be given to the service providers who will be working to facilitate re-integration in the country of origin. The kind of support that is envisaged is educational assistance, employment assistance, and things of that nature. I want to underline that the funding would be provided to the independent service provider to administer; these funds would not be provided directly to the failed claimants. There would be strict eligibility criteria for this program, in particular, no criminality, complete adherence to reporting to the Canada Border Services Agency, complete compliance in obtaining travel documents, and there would also be a temporary bar from ever returning to Canada.
So those are the features of the program. As my colleague mentioned, other countries have very mature programs, in particular, the European countries. The U.K. has had a program along these lines for the last decade. Australia conducted national trials recently and implemented a national program in 2009.
The benefits that we anticipate from the AVR program include: more removals within the one-year timeframe as a result of the incentives to comply; cost savings, including significant cost savings with respect to enforcement activities; less detention; less complex investigations; and less escorted removals. There would also be less risk of failed claimants not appearing for removal, in view of the educational assistance and counselling that would be provided, as has been witnessed by other countries with such programs. The last feature, and perhaps one of the most important ones of the AVR program, would be the way it would facilitate failed claimants' acquisition of travel documents. Individuals would have to cooperate with the CBSA in obtaining travel documents, which has been one of the key impediments to removal.
Those essentially are the highlights of the proposed AVR program.