Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Welcome, gentlemen. Thank you very much for your presentations here today.
The intent of Bill C-31 is to help facilitate the process to make it faster. The intent was not to penalize people who legitimately seek our assistance. With the new measures in the bill, the time to finalize a refugee claim, a legitimate refugee claim, would drop from a current average of 1,038 days to 45 days for claimants from designated countries of origin, or 216 days for all other claimants.
So we can imagine what a huge benefit this will be to somebody who's really seeking and needing asylum from persecution in their own nation. In my opinion, that's a big positive of this bill.
Mr. Collacott, let me preface my question by saying that human smuggling seeks to circumvent the proper channels. In your opinion, are human smuggling rings becoming more elaborate?