Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Nov. 28th, 2012

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Shall I report the bill to the House?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[An hon. member]

On division.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Unless something happens, I will report the bill to the House first thing tomorrow morning.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Shall the committee order a reprint of the bill?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

You've done it, ladies and gentlemen.

I want to thank the two clerks for assisting me.

I want to thank all of you for being so nice to each other.

I will indeed report the bill to the House first thing tomorrow morning.

I want to thank the staff from the department for assisting us in our questions. You've been a great help. Thank you very much.

We will suspend for a few moments.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Ladies and gentlemen, we're going to continue. We're behind schedule, but here we are, with supplementary estimates (B) for 2012-13, votes 1b and 7b under the Citizenship and Immigration Act.

We have the Honourable Jason Kenney before us, who is the minister, and he has with him his usual assistants.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Citizenship]

They're actually extraordinary, not usual.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

They are your extraordinary usual assistants, Mr. Minister. You have a few moments to make a presentation to us.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Chairman, first of all, thanks to all members of the committee for your consideration of Bill C-43, which I understand has just been adopted here at committee. I look forward to its return to the House for report stage.

Chairman, I'm here to present to the committee my department's supplementary estimates (B) for the current fiscal year.

In the last few years, we've implemented many positive reforms to our immigration system. I don't quote from the media often, but I will make an exception today. The Globe and Mail said that these reforms were “badly needed, long overdue, and well executed”. They've helped to reverse unacceptably long wait times, reduce crippling application backlogs, crack down on fraud and abuse of the system, and improve the timelines of the services we provide.

While these reforms have better focused our system on fuelling Canada's economic growth, there's still a lot more to be done. Our number one priority remains economic growth and job creation. Our immigration plan next year will further this objective by maintaining high sustained levels of immigration to help address labour shortages and the aging of our society.

Now, as tabled last month in this year's “Annual Report to Parliament on Immigration”, we plan to admit between 240,000 and 265,000 new permanent residents next year, for the seventh consecutive year. The 2013 immigration plan will also build on our economic success by bringing in more of the world's top talent. This is important, because to ensure that our immigration system benefits our economic future, we need to welcome those who are ready, willing, and able to adapt to Canada's labour market, especially in those occupations and regions where we have skills shortages.

In other words, we have to make sure the skilled immigrants we choose are the ones our country needs, and are the most likely to succeed when they get to Canada.

I will outline some of the transformational changes we are making to bring about a “just in time” immigration system that is fast, flexible and responsive to Canada's economic and labour market needs.

First, as you know, we are improving our flagship immigration stream—the federal skilled worker program—with new criteria to select skilled workers who will be better positioned to succeed in our economy. The new criteria will help to select younger skilled workers proficient in English or French who will be able to hit the ground running and contribute to the economy for a longer number of years before retirement.

Also, we'll be ensuring that educational points are given based on their relevance to Canadian educational standards. This is a very important change. It means that applicants will be required to have their educational credentials assessed by a designated and qualified third party to determine their value in Canada at the time they submit their application. I anticipate that we'll release the list of designated assessment bodies early in the new year.

Our goal is to have these improvements and the points grid in place at the beginning of 2013. In addition to these changes, even more dramatic ones are expected in 2015. We will be moving from a supply-driven system where anyone can apply and we passively process all applications, to a demand-driven system that actively selects applicants based on the needs of employers and others, better meeting Canada's economic needs.

As proposed in the economic action plan for this year, we're developing as well an expression of interest management system, which is essentially a big pool of skilled workers who are pre-qualified to immigrate to Canada. Under this system, if applicants meet certain eligibility criteria, they'll be placed in the pool, from which they could be selected based on identified needs in the Canadian labour market.

Under such a system, there would not be an obligation to review all applications, nor in the order in which they are received. The department would invite only selected candidates to apply for a visa to come to Canada. Individuals who are not selected after a period of time would be removed from the pool, so application backlogs would not accumulate.

This would be a win-win situation for potential skilled immigrants and for the Canadian employers. Skilled workers would experience a simplified and expedited immigration process.

Canadian employers, provinces, territories and the federal government would have access to highly-skilled workers and future citizens in a more timely fashion.

Yet another change is the creation of a new federal skilled trades program to make our immigration system more accessible for skilled tradespersons in the construction, natural resources, transportation, manufacturing, and service sectors, which are in high demand. I'm very excited about this program, and we look forward to launching it at the beginning of the new year.

The proposed new program will create a means for skilled tradespersons to be assessed based on criteria geared to their reality rather than academic degrees, putting more emphasis on practical training and work experience and job offers, rather than academic post-secondary education. It will be in place early next year.

Another immigration program we will be improving is the immigrant investor program. Our goal in this regard is to best determine how we can encourage more active foreign investments in the Canadian economy.

We need an investor program that brings in real capital, to ensure we have long-term growth in jobs and the economy. And so we are exploring ways in which to attract immigrants who want to invest in Canada's future by making significant investments in private sector innovation and growth.

We also hope to tap into the entrepreneurial spirit that so many immigrants seem to have by developing new approaches for a start-up visa entrepreneur program, which we plan to implement in early 2013.

The idea is to proactively target a new type of immigrant entrepreneur, people who have the potential to build companies that can compete on a global scale and create jobs for Canadians.

Finally, through the Canadian experience class, we're also making it easier for skilled workers who are already in Canada on a temporary basis to stay here permanently, including foreign students who have completed their degrees. As you know, this program is now our fastest growing, and I think it's a great success. We plan to admit 10,000 people as permanent residents through the CEC next year.

I just welcomed our twenty-thousandth person admitted as a permanent resident since the program began in 2009. He's a bright young guy in Toronto named Gaurav Gore, who is from India. He did his MBA at the University of Toronto and was hired by one of our big banks. He got his permanent residency in—get this—eight months. Therefore, the system is actually working. He's making over $70,000 a year. He speaks perfect English and is in his early twenties. This guy is representative of what's going to happen with this program. It's very exciting.

That sure beats the old experience of having someone wait in a queue for eight years, come here, and end up driving a taxi, being frustrated. I'm very excited about these reforms, as I know many of you are.

With that, let me conclude with my department's 2012–13 supplementary estimates (B), which include net new appropriations of $1.663 million, including $1.12 million in funding to eliminate the backlog of pre-2008 federal skilled worker applications. As many of you know, we reached an unacceptable number of backlogged applications. It was up to 640,000, as you noted in your study. Today, we are left with a backlog of barely 100,000 in the skilled worker program.

Today we are on track. By the end of next year, we will have the ability to process new federal skilled worker applications upon receipt, process them within the year instead of nearly a decade later, which was the unacceptable situation in the past.

As we have embarked on these changes, we have been happy to see that Canadians from all different sectors have shown strong support for these reforms. What we envision is a system that can help us meet our economic and labour market needs much more quickly and efficiently, allowing us to invite immigrants to realize their potential, fully contribute to our economy, and that's what it's all about.

So thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your attention, and I and my officials are available to respond to any questions.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you, Mr. Minister.

Ms. Sims. No, I apologize. Ms. James, go ahead.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

I was just about to raise a point of order, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Indeed.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, for the floor.

Welcome, Minister Kenney and our guests as well.

Minister Kenney, it is my understanding that the interim federal health program continues to provide temporary coverage of health care costs for government-sponsored refugees who have received refugee status from the UNHCR, for other eligible protected persons, and for asylum claimants from non-safe countries.

Obviously I'm on the immigration committee, but I have to tell you that a lot of what I do in my constituency is related to immigration. My constituents of Scarborough Centre were not only shocked but also upset and angry to find out that illegal immigrants and bogus asylum claimants were receiving better health care than were many of the constituents themselves. They were most upset about the fact that some of these bogus refugee claimants were receiving eyeglasses, and their kids were getting braces, and so on. I know the opposition is against the changes we made. It's very unfortunate.

I want to reference the supplementary estimates (B). I see there are several million dollars put aside for additional funding to support the interim federal health program, IFHP, which provides temporary health care for refugees.

I'm wondering if this is normally where we see this money coming from. Is this the normal process? Have we made changes to the support of bogus refugee claimants and illegal asylum claimants? Is this more money you've asked for, or is it less money than usual?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Thank you for the question, Ms. James.

It's less than usual. One of the reasons we rescoped the interim federal health program is that every year the cost of it was growing much beyond the budgeted resources. Typically in the past few years the budget would include a $50 million allocation for the IFHP, but towards the end of the year or mid-year we would find the demand was far exceeding the available funds, and we would often have to come back to Parliament for supplementary estimates in the range of $25 million. Typically we're spending $75 million. That's going up to $80 million. We projected that without changing the program we would be moving up to a $100 million expenditure in the program.

What you see in this, I think, $5 million increment is reflective of the fact that we're going to be spending more than the $50 million budgeted, but it's still a lot less than the $80 million we spent last year for example.

Amipal, would you care to supplement that?

[Amipal Manchanda, Assistant Deputy Minister, Chief Financial Officer, Department of Citizenship and Immigration]

No, I think that's exactly it. In the past we've always had a base level of $50.5 million. We've always come back through supplementary estimates for additional funding. That has reached up to $30 million in previous years. This year we're seeking $5.2 million so that reflects—

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

It reflects the $25 million in savings.

Normally at the end of the year we would actually end up having spent $80 million. This year we anticipate we will end up having spent $55 million or so.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

I thank you for clarifying that, because I can tell you I welcome these changes. I guess I should thank you on behalf of my constituents of Scarborough Centre, because I know they welcome these changes as well.

We've heard that the opposition was opposed to these changes. In the media we've heard from a small group of activist doctors who were against these changes. I'm wondering what you think and what you've heard back from all Canadians across the country, not just in my riding personally, but from coast to coast to coast.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

I know there has been some controversy around this, and I understand that. I respect diverse views on this issue, but certainly from the direct feedback to my parliamentary office and the consultations we've had, and in my contact with ethnocultural and immigrant communities, I've received overwhelming support.

Just yesterday I was at a meeting at Carleton University and was approached by people from the South Asian community, including a couple of very prominent medical doctors who said they appreciated what we had done because they have seen the abuse.

We had cases, for example, of people who were rejected asylum claimants in the United States, who had lived there for many years, who got sick and then came north to Canada to make an asylum claim, because they didn't have insurance in the U.S., and they would get comprehensive plus extended benefits here in Canada. I think that's the wrong signal to send to people.

We will continue to provide comprehensive care and permanent residency and then provincial health insurance to bona fide refugees. We will absolutely do that. The vast majority of asylum claimants in the future will continue to receive the same essentially basic package of medically necessary physician and hospital services that most Canadian residents receive. But we do think there needs to be a balance here, and we think the program was out of balance.

Certainly the point we were at before these reforms in no way reflected the original intention of the program, which was to be a short-term stopgap for catastrophic care for newly arrived displaced persons from Europe. It became something much bigger than that, and frankly when I met Canadians who told me they were upset that they had to pay out of pocket for pharmaceuticals, dental care, and eye care ,but that even rejected asylum claimants who were delaying their deportation from Canada were getting those benefits from their tax dollars, it struck them as a lack of social equity.

I think this reflects the Canadian value of balance and equity.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

For me in my particular riding, eyeglasses came up time and time again. They're something that most Canadians may not have full coverage for and may have to pay a substantial amount out of their own pockets for. I'm glad you brought that up as well. Thank you.

I know that under this government, Canada has welcomed the highest level of sustained immigration in Canadian history, since our government came to office.

Now the NDP's official platform on immigration is asking us to double what we currently have right now. What do you think of the NDP's plan?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

My understanding is that they've proposed to create a target of at least 1% of the population, which would be 340,000. In addition to that, they have proposed granting permanent residency to all temporary foreign workers in Canada, which would be an increment in the range of 140,000, because that's the number we admit currently on temporary visas who do not ultimately end up obtaining permanent residency. So 340,000 plus 140,000 is 480,000—sorry, my math's not very good. Then, as well, I believe the NDP continues to support the private member's bill introduced by Olivia Chow to allow every Canadian citizen or resident to sponsor a relative from abroad who does not currently qualify for family sponsorship programs.

That would add potentially millions—

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

There's a point of order. Stop the clock, please.

[Mylène Freeman, NDP, Argenteuil—Papineau—Mirabel, QC]

When the minister is here, we should be able to discuss things about the ministry. Ms. James did talk about things that weren't exactly supplementary estimates, but I think that's fine. When she's talking about refugee cuts, I think that does have to do with the purpose of our committee today, but when you're asking the minister about another party's platform, I think that's pretty far from what this committee is supposed to be doing and what the government is here to do today. I don't think that line of questioning should be allowed in committees, and it should not be allowed when we're asking ministers questions.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Well, the time is up anyway.

Ms. Sims, it's your turn.