Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Nov. 7th, 2012

[Rivka Augenfeld]

Could I just add something? Yes, we do speak to victims. We speak to people who are victims of very serious offences overseas.

We saw the case of Leon Mugesera, who was a Rwandan accused of crimes against humanity. We have spoken to many of his victims. There was a case of Désiré, the Rwandan guy Canada did bring to trial. Canada is to be commended for having brought him to trial. Many of those victims were here. Some of them were brought from Rwanda to testify.

We are not saying that people who are very serious criminals, who have committed crimes against humanity, and whose victims of those crimes are here should not be dealt with. We're saying that sometimes—and I'm sure you're going to end up seeing people in your offices. I'm not saying that to be facile. You're going to see people in your offices who are caught up in this, and you're going to say, “Well, this is not quite the person I had in mind”, and you're going to be asking for relief for these people, and you're going to find that it's very hard to get it.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Do you believe that our justice system is fair and compassionate generally?

[Rivka Augenfeld]

I think our justice system is generally fair and compassionate, but what we're doing here is denying people access to certain levels of justice and to certain levels of appeal.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

I think judges, in their wisdom, will screen out a 20-year-old kid who steals a little booze. That's kind of trivial. What we're really talking about here is a removal of serious criminals from Canada.

Are you aware that other countries, like the U.K., the U.S., New Zealand, and Australia, have provisions in place already to bar individuals who would harm the public interest and who otherwise are inadmissible? In fact, the provisions in a lot of those countries are far more broad and discretionary than those in Bill C-43. Are you aware of that?

[Richard Goldman]

I was under the impression that the U.S. or the U.K. uses a one-year threshold. We would be going to six months. Again, I'm not claiming to be the world's expert on this. We just think it's a question of proportionality.

On this issue of whether judges are prepared to look at immigration considerations, it seems to me I've read contrary jurisprudence on this. If the committee is going to base its conclusions on the idea that judges across Canada are going to fully weigh humanitarian immigration considerations before rendering a sentence, I think you had better get very solid information on that before you go forward.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

That's why we have a justice system, so that people do follow due process. They will get due process out of this and be treated fairly for it.

Do you think that the Canadian taxpayer—

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you.

I'm sorry, but we have to move on to Mr. Menegakis.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses.

Clearly with Bill C-43 we are trying to keep foreign criminals out of our schools, out of our parks, out of our shopping centres, out of our neighbourhoods. We are trying to keep them away from our families.

The notion that somebody who breaks into somebody's home just to have some booze is not committing a serious crime can be quite extensively debated. The real crime is that you're breaking into somebody else's home. If your child were in that home when that break-in happened, it would create, in my opinion, potentially lifelong irreparable damage to your family because that 20-year-old decided to break into your home. He didn't walk into a store and take a pen and not pay for it. He broke into somebody's home. I would suggest that is not a good example in your case.

Neither is the case of invoking the name of Nelson Mandela, I might add, because we can get into a whole debate about that and about whether or not we as Canadians were supportive or not of apartheid in the incredible crime that was done against the good people of South Africa.

Having said that, I'm going to refer to Mr. Tom Stamatakis from the Canadian Police Association. He said that in his experience, criminals who receive a custodial sentence of six months or more have committed very serious crimes and are quite often repeat offenders.

Do you agree or disagree with his analysis?

[Richard Goldman]

I don't know exactly what his analysis is based on. I can read the Criminal Code, like anybody else, and see that the examples I gave could lead to a six-month sentence.

Again, we could debate how serious break and enter into a neighbour's house to steal some booze is, but I think most Canadians would agree that, if the young person in question had been in the country his whole life, came from a country like Iran or Eritrea, didn't speak or write the language, then at least there should be some assessment of the humanitarian considerations. Maybe he'll be out the door at the end, but at least there should be some look at the humanitarian considerations.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you, Mr. Goldman.

Ms. Freeman has drawn to my attention that the clock at the back of the room has stopped and that our meeting, therefore, has come to an end.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

I was getting all excited. I thought I had a turn.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Ms. Augenfeld and Mr. Goldman, we thank you for your contribution to the committee.

We have some more work to do. We're going to go in camera, and we are running out of time.

[Proceedings continue in camera]