Mr. Chairman, I have always believed and thought, having applied it personally, that the way to manage or prevent a flood of false refugees—let's call them that—was to enforce a visa policy. We did it with Costa Rica, in particular, when we were in power, and it worked.
Putting forward a policy that asserts that such and such a country is a safe country strips Canada, in its scheme of values and its most firmly established program, of all its power to say that each case is specific. That means, for example, that Mexico could be perceived as a safe country, whereas, at the time, more than 1,000 refugees from Mexico were accepted. That's only one example among many others.
Instead of starting to consider refugees or future refugees as people who may abuse the system by suggesting that they are from such and such a country, why not do what we did with the United States, and sign a bilateral agreement with exemption measures, like the Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement? That would be better than starting to prepare a list of all safe countries, whether it be Greece or other countries. Ultimately, such a list will give refugees certain impressions. There may be abuses because, in order to take the pressure off his shoulders, the minister will be free to respond as he did during the Olympic Games. To one refugee claimant from Japan, he answered that Japan was a safe country and that that made no sense. We don't know what is going on in one country or another. There may be problems for reasons of sexual orientation, religion, gender or other matters.
So why put two fundamental elements in this act? I think we have to retain humanitarian and compassionate grounds—we can discuss that later, when my colleagues talk about it. However, why add this matter of designated safe countries, when all we wanted was to establish a much fairer process, similar, for example, to the provisions on the Refugee Appeal Division that we agreed on in Bill C-11? I'm entirely in favour of that. We didn't need to say that we're going to establish a list of safe countries and subsequently send somewhat contradictory messages.
Saying that you'll have a panel means you're in favour of the principle.