Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
We are all well aware of the challenge of processing times. We know the existence of the backlogs. I don't think we need additional witnesses to provide whining and complaining. We need creative solutions to the backlog problem. What I'd like to do is look quickly at the big picture, focus on the two strategic backlog areas where solutions are needed, and then go controversial and provide policy solutions.
In the big picture, 60% of Canada's immigration inventory is fixed, cured. I'm speaking of the economic class, the skilled workers. The politically courageous decision to cap intake of federal skilled workers in 2008 was the appropriate solution at the time. In respect of the pre-2008 skilled worker backlog, we still have a chicken in the python to digest. I anticipate that this will disappear in the next two fiscals. So the complaint is not about federal skilled worker immigration to Canada.
We have also, better late than never, cured the inventory issue when it comes to Canada's investor immigration inventory. We accomplished this by capping the intake in 2011 at 700 cases. Operationally, there are big question marks on how it was done, but the fact is that by shutting intake you reduce the backlog growth trend: pure math.
Where we cannot fix things are in the categories affecting parents, grandparents, and spouses.
The spousal category should not be on the table, because, frankly, it's a just-in-time inventory. Processing times have been growing, slight slap on the wrist operationally or tug on the ear. That's 80% of cases being done in a lot more than the nine months committed to by this government. So that may need a quick tweak.
As to the parents and grandparents, that's going to need a novel approach.
So we have two inventories, backlogs, in Canada that merit the attention of this committee. One is investors, who represent $9 billion cash to be transmitted to the Government of Canada, not into private sector businesses. This money is wire-transferred to the Government of Canada, $9 billion in 22,000 cases.
The other inventory is an inventory of love and respect, parents and grandparents. The challenge is to introduce a temporary backlog measure that will create within the backlog inventory of parents and grandparents two new processing streams. A processing stream with an addition to our existing stream would require a political decision taken by the members here.
Let's face it, parents and grandparents are not expected to work when they arrive in Canada. There's no taking of jobs. They're not criminals, and they're not security risks. As a matter of fact, they're not even presenting significant health risks, because they must successfully pass immigration medicals. The real concern is money. When they are here, they have access to medicare. Unfortunately, during their working lifetimes they did not have the opportunity to pay premiums into Canada's medicare system.
My proposal is to allow them an opportunity to pay a lump sum to the Government of Canada in compensation for 20 to 25 years of medical insurance, the same way parents must provide travel insurance when they want to visit Canada for one year. It's not all parents should pay. This is a temporary measure. If you like analogies, it's like a bagpipe. You need to put an additional pipe into that inventory to reduce the pressure and outflow it.
The amount of $75,000 is more than sufficient to defray the cost of medicare. I've gone into the field and asked families across this country what they think. In the greater Asian community it's a no-brainer. When the parents retire, they sell their property and the first $75,000 off their million-dollar-plus residence goes to the government. The greater Indo-Canadian community have similarly responded, saying they do not expect a free ride, they do not want something for nothing. They say, tell us the amount, our family will raise it, especially if we're already paying $6,000 a year in babysitting.
Economically, it makes sense. Ask Canadians if they would like these two additional streams: one, for $75,000, you priority-process within the backlog; for the second stream, it would be the same deal, $75,000, but if there's insufficient quota in that year you allow them forward—after they pass screening, criminal, and medical—on payment of the $75,000 to the Government of Canada, on a 10-year visit to Canada. They can wait until their number comes up, cost-free to this government and to the taxpayer.
That's my opening eight minutes.