Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Feb. 16th, 2012

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

I have five minutes, so I don't mean to be rude if I kind of jump in.

The RCMP do a tremendous amount of work in regard to checks. In fact, now what we're suggesting is that anyone who has a temporary visa—refugees and everyone—would have to go through this biometric test or provide fingerprints and so forth.

Do you have the resources or the technology to be able to implement that on that type of a scale?

[A/Commr Todd G. Shean]

As I stated earlier, I believe it was introduced this morning, so I expect we'll be back before this committee for further discussion on this. We have to have a lot better understanding of what is contemplated, and then I think we'll be in a better position to answer your question, but I couldn't give you a fair response right now.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Currently, what percentage of refugees do you have fingerprints for?

[A/Commr Todd G. Shean]

I wouldn't know that percentage off the top of my head, sorry.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

I guess a guesstimate would be a poor thing to ask.

[A/Commr Todd G. Shean]

Yes.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Could you anticipate? Let's say if you're talking about 35,000 refugee claimants a year, administratively is that something that's doable, or are you going to need six months or a year to be able to implement something of that nature? What type of timeframe are you looking at?

[A/Commr Todd G. Shean]

It goes back to my earlier comment. Depending on what's contemplated, I think anything is doable. However, it's what's being contemplated and then it's to determine if it's viable, if it's something we should be doing. I guess anything is doable, but I feel it would require further dialogue and further thought.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

In terms of addressing the security issues, fingerprints and the live picture are all we need at this stage, from your perspective. They would address the issue of refugees who leave the country and then attempt to come back with a different ID. That would put the issue to rest, just by having those two?

[Geoffrey Leckey]

I think the answer is that the government—and other parts of the government in consultations that certainly have included CBSA—has come to that conclusion.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

We've heard from other agencies. Individuals who come here under temporary visas in particular, let's say visiting visas...does the RCMP play a role in any fashion in terms of the deportation of individuals who overstay visiting visas, or are there any checks done by Immigration of people who might be overstaying...?

[A/Commr Todd G. Shean]

We would be involved in doing the checking and then providing the information to our partners in the visa vetting process.

[Geoffrey Leckey]

But the actual removals are conducted by CBSA.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

You do get contacted today by CIC with regard to requiring fingerprints and so forth, regarding visiting visas and working visas, student visas, that sort of thing?

[Geoffrey Leckey]

We don't at the moment because the program hasn't been set up yet.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

I'm going to go back to the backlog idea. I understand the RCMP put a new system in place whereby they do have the date of birth and the name, and if there's a match, they require fingerprints. It's really slowed down the process for a lot of volunteer organizations to be able to get people in the door. I was told by the RCMP that they're going to a new system. Has that happened?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

We have a time problem, Mr. Lamoureux. I'm sorry. You'll have to go another time.

Mr. Weston, you have up to seven minutes.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Merci, M. le président.

Let me just ask, adding to the comments of my predecessors, how many countries in the world have as their national icon a police officer? We're pretty proud that you're here today. I only have one concern about your presence. Our chair has never acted as much like a police officer as today, and I think he's obviously subject to your influence.

Thank you for being with us. I'm going to get disciplined later.

We've seen the numbers in your presentations about the numbers of checks you're doing, but I didn't see the numbers of people who are intercepted. In other words, what percentage of people are denied access because of your security checks, and then how often does this lead to some sort of an incarceration in our country or in another country, due to your vigilance?

[A/Commr Todd G. Shean]

We would receive a request to check our databases and then we would provide the information to our partners at CBSA, up to CISC, so those numbers would rest in my colleague's area, I believe.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Are you saying, “It's not my dog?”

[A/Commr Todd G. Shean]

We do the checks and are involved in it; however, we pass what we discover as a result of the checks to our partners.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Mr. Venner.

[Tom Venner]

Out of just under 300,000 requests to the service—immigration-related, permanent resident, refugee determination, citizenship—in the last fiscal year, 667 briefs were provided with that information to CBSA. That translates into a different number in terms of what they do with it, but it gives you a sense of the rate at which we are finding information we have to provide to CBSA.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Can you repeat that?

[Tom Venner]

Roughly 300,000 requests came in to the service, and 667 times we responded to those requests by going to CBSA and saying, “Here is a brief with some concerns about the individual in question”. So it's a very small number in relation to the total volume that we do checks on.