Evidence of meeting #60 for Citizenship and Immigration in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was young.
A video is available from Parliament.
Conservative
Rick Dykstra Conservative St. Catharines, ON
Mr. Shore, I asked my first question already. You stole my thunder a little bit on the second question with how you responded to Ms. Groguhé. Could you respond directly to the issue around criminality and the extent of what a minor crime would be?
There is an overlap of what could potentially be seen as a minor crime and what would potentially be seen as a serious crime. There is a big difference in how it's been skewed in terms of understanding where that serious crime threshold begins.
Partner, Gowlings, As an Individual
Again, I do believe there are sufficient safety valves in the system as it is defined right now in the legislation, with the exception in certain circumstances of those which have been identified as extremely serious. Those are the three I mentioned earlier, with regard to national security issues, with regard to criminality in the context of criminal organizations, and also with regard to humanitarian and compassionate grounds.
I realize we are looking at extremes, but recognizing the system as I understand it to be after 32 years of practising law in Canada and appreciating the work that I've done through the courts and public policy work, it is unimaginable that someone who has committed that kind of an act would be thrown out of the country without the ability of.... I appreciate what my new friend here on the panel said, that there would not be a right of appeal. It's undemocratic. I don't think that in our country we would throw that person out of the country. Part of it is also this. There is an element of, what officials are going to run after that person to do that. There are a number of instances where the decision to throw the person out or not is made. Who's going to act upon that? It comes down to this. When we look at the unreasonableness of a situation like that, I would think a minister or his delegate would appreciate that an individual like that should not be thrown out of the country.
Then I keep on going back to my underlying theme that we have to make sure that individuals appreciate their obligations, their rights, and their responsibilities.
Conservative
Rick Dykstra Conservative St. Catharines, ON
I think that's fair. I think those who are presenting would agree with you, certainly, on that matter.
Partner, Gowlings, As an Individual
I don't think it's a blind faith. I think it's a faith based on reasonable judgment.
Conservative
Rick Dykstra Conservative St. Catharines, ON
Blind faith isn't what is suggested in proposed section 42.1, which gives the minister—
Conservative
Rick Dykstra Conservative St. Catharines, ON
—a new authority to prevent someone from being thrown out of the country.
I appreciate your bringing it up. It's where I was leading with my next question. I continue to not understand why folks—and maybe, Mr. Rico-Martinez, you can enlighten me on this—do not mention proposed section 42.1 in terms of saying that it does augment and give a threshold for the Minister of Public Safety to prevent someone from being thrown out of the country if, in fact, they've done something of a minor offence that has been interpreted as a serious one.
There is another point on this. How do we pass legislation that says a youth should be given a second chance? I don't know how you define that in legislation. If someone commits a crime and they're convicted of that crime, regardless of their age, I know you're talking about the whole issue of mental health and how they're doing psychologically. Those are issues faced by the courts every day.
Mr. Shore was involved in a case that took years to determine. I know for a fact that the issue of mental health and the capacity from a psychological perspective to stand trial is one of the issues that is faced on a daily basis in the court of law. If it is an individual regardless of age, why then shouldn't a senior citizen, someone who is 83, who commits a crime, not be waived in the legislation? We have to define within the legislation how we're going to and not going to treat people in the court of law.
If you're going to say we have to help youth—and I agree with all of those things—but you're going to define it in legislation, explain to me how.
Regional Director, Toronto, Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI)
For me, second chance means an appeal.
Conservative
Regional Director, Toronto, Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI)
The minister, I agree, has to have the last word, if you want to put it like that, but the quasi-judicial system that you have in place in Canada would be a good idea. Then the person would have a chance to explain the situation in an appeal.
Let me finish with this. We included the appeal division in the IRPA because we didn't have one, and a person has to have a second chance to go there. Now here we are cancelling that. In my opinion, that's not possible to use a double standard. You have to give the right to appeal to people. That's part of democracy.
Conservative
Rick Dykstra Conservative St. Catharines, ON
Mr. Shore, are we giving a right to appeal within this new legislation?
Partner, Gowlings, As an Individual
I think it's a different venue to address issues. I think we do see that here. My sense is that sadly, too often we see people who are seeking that right to appeal only for the purpose of delay. Again, it creates frustration and a cost to the system. I think what we need to do is focus on other ways in which to address those issues. This is a reasonable way of going forward as the legislation is identified right now.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative David Tilson
Thank you very much.
Mr. Shore, Mr. Rico-Martinez, and Ms. Casipullai, thank you very much for giving us your views.
Partner, Gowlings, As an Individual
I'd like to thank someone who is with me here today, Julia Wernberg, who was very helpful also in the research.
Conservative
Conservative
The Chair Conservative David Tilson
Okay, we'll start the second hour.
We have three witnesses before us. Rear-Admiral Donald Loren, good afternoon to you, sir; Walter Perchal and George Platsis, good afternoon to you.
Mr. Perchal, we'll start with you. The three of you each have up to eight minutes.
Lieutenant-Colonel Walter Perchal Program Director, Centre of Excellence in Security, Resilience, and Intelligence, Schulich Executive Education Centre, As an Individual
With your permission, Mr. Chair, my colleague is going to start. We've prepared this in a slightly different order.
Conservative
George Platsis Program Director, Centre of Excellence in Security, Resilience, and Intelligence, Schulich Executive Education Centre, As an Individual
Chair, members of the committee, once again, thank you for your invitation. With me today are my colleagues, Rear-Admiral Don Loren of the U.S. Navy, and Professor Walter Perchal of York University. We're all part of the Centre of Excellence in Security, Resilience, and Intelligence at the Schulich School of Business, but today our comments are our own and do not reflect any organizations we may be associated with.
As a child of immigrants, I've been fortunate to win the lottery and to be born in this great nation, a country that has provided countless opportunities to people like my parents. They came here in search of a better life with a view to adopting Canadian values and contributing to Canadian society. I believe that the majority of our immigrants are like my own parents: honest, law-abiding, and love Canada.
With that in mind, I would like to draw the committee's attention to this stark reality: we do live in a world that has considerable dangers. We must accept that there are those who seek to take advantage of our welcoming system, undermine our interests both here and abroad, and even maliciously hurt us. As previously noted, technology is an enabler creating an asymmetric capability for the individual. Flight patterns have changed. Communication systems have kept us connected, and our dependence on cyber systems should really force us to rethink how we educate our citizens both young and old as we further expand the use of them.
Within that context, I would respectfully say that much of the current discussion surrounding this bill views the world from a very reactive perspective. I believe this to be a mistake. As a consequence, the discussion has focused on law enforcement, judicial process, and review boards. Respectfully I ask, why is there not more discussion on a proactive approach? From local community engagement to foreign intelligence collection, information is ultimately what gives our visa-issuing officers the ability to make informed decisions about individuals entering Canada. I believe proactivity that is more related to national security would result in fewer cases of deportation, lower rates of incarceration, and a reduction in fraud, which in turn should make resources available to new immigrants and refugees.
With respect, much of the analysis has focused on rare cases. On one end, we have cases that are tragic, of police officers that are killed. As somebody who works closely with law enforcement and first responders, many of whom I call friends, incidents like this trouble me. But these cases demonstrate that there's a gap in the legislation and shouldn't be used for sole justification for the amendments.
There have been also cases about persons with potential mental illness. Respectfully, I don't think we should be tossing away amendments due to rare cases or issues that may take years to materialize, especially when they don't address the root cause. In this specific case, I would say the solution is better training of visa-issuing officers who could potentially identify cases of mental illness, and immediately refer the case to a counsellor.
Another case has been the threshold for right of appeal. An example of six marijuana plants has been used. I ask the committee to consider this. One plant on average can produce about four ounces of marijuana. At a street value of $350 per ounce, six plants are worth about $8,400 and can produce 24 ounces. Where the average ounce can produce 30 joints, 24 ounces produces 720. Respectfully, I think this is trafficking, and Canada doesn't need any more drug traffickers.
I also have concern about—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative David Tilson
Mr. Platsis, this is being translated into French, so you will have to slow down.