Thank you, Mr. Chair and members of the committee, for the invitation today to appear before you.
I am Chief Superintendent Joe Oliver, Director General of Border Integrity for the RCMP. I will focus my brief remarks on the RCMP's enforcement role in relation to immigration offences, with specific reference to offences committed by immigration consultants, and the new provisions proposed under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.
Investigations of immigration offences, including offences by immigration consultants, are a responsibility shared between the RCMP and the CBSA. As Canada's national police force, the RCMP works closely with CBSA and CIC as well as with domestic and international law-enforcement partners to secure Canada's borders and to protect the integrity of our immigration system.
The CBSA is the lead agency responsible for investigating most offences under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, including general offences, misrepresentation, counselling misrepresentation, smuggling, and document fraud.
The RCMP plays a leadership role in combatting serious and organized crime by developing and implementing strategies to disrupt organized crime threats. As part of the continuum of investigations into immigration-related offences, the RCMP has primary responsibility for investigation of offences under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act involving criminal organizations or national security, such as organized human smuggling or trafficking in persons, and investigations requiring the employment of special police techniques. The RCMP is also responsible for investigation of Citizenship Act offences relating to immigration consultants and Criminal Code offences such as fraud, forgery, uttering forged documents, trafficking in persons, and conspiracy.
Immigration fraud cases are not new to Canada. Due to the clandestine nature of immigration fraud and the reluctance of some witnesses and victims to come forward, it is difficult to make an accurate assessment of the extent of the problem in Canada.
For some time RCMP immigration and passport units have been working closely with partners, including CBSA and CIC, to investigate cases of unscrupulous immigration consultants producing fraudulent citizenship applications and providing people with advice to commit fraud.
Generally, when the RCMP becomes involved in fraudulent immigration consultant cases, there is a criminal network implicated. These investigations are a priority for the RCMP, both due to the highly organized nature of the crimes and the effect this crime has on a vulnerable sector of the population.
Currently, there are several ongoing criminal investigations into the activities of certain immigration consultants who have subverted or are attempting to subvert the legitimate immigration process. While for operational reasons I cannot discuss the specifies of a particular case, I will give as an example the case of an individual who was found to be operating an immigration consultant business in British Columbia. This individual would receive money from victims to process immigration documents that were never completed. The accused would also obtain and keep original documents belonging to the victims to use as leverage, demanding more money from the victims and saying that there was an issue with the documents. If the victims requested the return of their documents, the subject would threaten them with deportation. An undercover operation was initiated by the RCMP to investigate this criminal activity, and the subject was charged with fraud and several other offences under the Criminal Code.
The RCMP welcomes the new provisions being proposed, as the legislative amendments would provide another tool to assist law enforcement in combatting immigration fraud. Since the new provisions fall under section 124 of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, CBSA would be largely responsible for investigating the new offence.
However, the CBSA might refer certain cases to the RCMP where special police techniques such as undercover operations are required to achieve a successful operational outcome. The RCMP will also continue to investigate cases of immigration fraud where organized criminality is detected.
In those cases where immigration consultants are part of transnational organized crime operating in Canada or abroad, the RCMP engages its extensive liaison officer network overseas to solicit the assistance of our foreign law enforcement partners in the investigation. Collaboration with foreign partners is critical to successfully targeting those crime groups behind immigration fraud operating overseas.
The RCMP recognizes that crimes committed by unscrupulous immigration consultants undermine the integrity of the immigration system. For this reason, I wish to assure the committee that criminal complaints involving immigration consultants have been, and will continue to be, vigorously investigated in the context of organized crime or national security investigations undertaken by the RCMP.
Thank you.