Evidence of meeting #43 for Citizenship and Immigration in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was beijing.
A recording is available from Parliament.
9:20 a.m.
Liberal
Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC
I'm sorry, the 2,300 for New Delhi, for example, is under the current 11,000 target that you're operating.
9:20 a.m.
Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
That's correct.
9:20 a.m.
Liberal
Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC
So last year, for example, when we were at 15,000 for the year, what was the number?
9:20 a.m.
Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
The number last year was 5,000.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC
Okay.
And for Beijing last year it would have been lower. You were saying it was increased.
9:25 a.m.
Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
It was lower.
9:25 a.m.
Immigration Program Manager (Beijing), Area Director (North Asia), Department of Citizenship and Immigration
It was 1,150.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
9:25 a.m.
Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
Last year it was 1,175.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC
Okay.
In the case of New Delhi, for example, that's a significant decrease, more than half. What impact is that going to have on, first of all, the backlog of 12,000 people and the significant six-year total wait times? Wait times will go up, and the backlog will increase as well?
9:25 a.m.
Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
That's correct.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC
Okay.
In the case of China, if we increase the numbers accepted per year, what kind of dent is that going to make in the 7,000 backlog?
9:25 a.m.
Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
First, I should clarify that not all applications are approved.
So out of the 2,500....
I'm not sure what would be the percentage, but over 3,000 applications at some point will be reduced in Beijing.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC
Why has it been determined that India, for example, is not going to be receiving as many parent class applications? With the size of the backlog, I'm assuming there are lots of applications.
9:25 a.m.
Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
There is the backlog and then there is the age of the backlog. So when I look at the older cases, those from before, say, 2008, the inventory in Beijing was larger than the one in New Delhi. So what we're trying to do is to finalize most of the older cases to try to reduce the difference from mission to mission. Currently in New Delhi it's 31 months, and in Beijing it's 37.
So what we're hoping to achieve over time is to have it be more even from one mission to the next. Those are two examples, but we have to do that for the 60-some missions where we have these targets.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC
I understand that.
What is the average age of the parents and the grandparents in the application, in general?
9:25 a.m.
Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
They would be in their late fifties or early sixties, but I don't have the data with me.
9:25 a.m.
Liberal
Justin Trudeau Liberal Papineau, QC
One thing that was made reference to was a concern about fraud. Obviously, every mission has mechanisms to sort of stream out the fraudulent cases.
Other than what was mentioned in the case of New Delhi and the attendance feedback for student frauds, for example, what sort of monitoring is there of potential fraud cases or the cases that turn out to be fraudulent that slip through the system, and what sort of processes do we have in place around that?
9:25 a.m.
Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
They are different from place to place, so maybe I could ask my colleagues to describe what's in their office.
February 15th, 2011 / 9:25 a.m.
Immigration Program Manager (New Delhi), Area Director (South Asia), Department of Citizenship and Immigration
It varies from category to category, of course, sir.
With regard to parents and grandparents, for example, local staff in the local office have a great deal of experience with the types of fraud that tend to be used.
When we have children in the upper end of the eligibility range and there's a very large gap in ages between siblings, or when we have children who seem to have remained in school long past the normal best-before date, we will, for example, verify those documents. In some situations, we'll even require DNA tests. We use things like that.
9:25 a.m.
Conservative
9:25 a.m.
Bloc
Nicolas Dufour Bloc Repentigny, QC
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I would simply like to say that I am going to be sharing my time with my colleague. Many thanks to the witnesses for being here today.
Mr. Gilbert, do you have a process that allows for the sharing of best practices between the various regional offices? Indeed, we have seen that the wait times can vary from one place to another.
9:25 a.m.
Director General, International Region, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
First of all, the wait times are not necessarily the result of best practices. As I indicated at the outset, because of the characteristics specific to the different offices, it sometimes happens that a best practice used in one centre cannot necessarily be applied in another. In certain regions — and this has been proven —, a good many clients have very similar backgrounds. The efficiency of the processing of these applications therefore varies from mission to mission. For example, in the Nairobi office, an officer may process applications from people originating from eight different countries in the course of one and the same day. It therefore varies.
We do hold meetings on occasion. As a matter of fact, my colleagues are here, by pure coincidence, for a meeting that starts tomorrow and will continue until Friday. During these meetings, we have a lot of discussions with regard to these best practices. During our monthly conference calls, we have similar discussions. We publish a bulletin on best modernization practices. We also speak with each other every day by telephone. Also, since our officers cross-post with colleagues, in other words move around from office to office, our best practices are transferred from office to office.
Mr. Frank, Mr. Manicom and myself have all filled the same position at different times. I did things that they benefitted from, and vice-versa. We share a lot of this kind of information.
9:30 a.m.
Bloc
Nicolas Dufour Bloc Repentigny, QC
Perfect. Thank you.
Ms. Aucoin, a little earlier you stated that you have eliminated some of the steps for the family reunification category in low-risk cases. Could you talk a little about this with us?
