Citizenship and Immigration Committee on May 23rd, 2013

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Good morning, everyone. This is the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, meeting no. 79, Tuesday, May 29, 2013. This meeting is televised.

The committee was asked on May 7 by the Standing Committee on Finance to consider the subject matter of clauses 167 to 168 of Bill C-60, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 21, 2013 and other measures which amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.

Mr. Rajotte, the chairman of the finance committee, has invited this committee to provide recommendations, including any amendments, no later than nine o'clock on May 27. That's next Monday.

Please note that other clauses in division 9 of Bill C-60 will amend the IRPA, but these will be considered by the Standing Committee on Human Resources. Clauses 170 to 172 in division 10 of Bill C-60, which amend the Citizenship Act, are also before this committee.

We have before us members of the department to answer any questions or comments made by members of the committee.

Good morning to all of you.

Ms. Melis, good morning to you. I believe you are going to introduce your colleagues.

You have the floor.

[Caroline Melis, Director General, Operational Management and Coordination, Department of Citizenship and Immigration]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

It's our pleasure to be here this morning to answer your questions related to these particular clauses of the budget implementation bill.

My name is Caroline Melis and I am the director general of operational management and coordination at CIC in the operations sector. I am accompanied today by Alexandra Hiles, the acting director of the citizenship program delivery and promotion division within my branch; Karine Paré, director of cost management within the finance branch at CIC; and, André Baril, director of asylum policy and programs within the refugee affairs branch in the policy sector at CIC.

It is our pleasure to answer your questions, and we can begin.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Ms. James, you have the floor.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and welcome to our officials. I am likely going to split some of my time with my colleague Mr. Menegakis.

I'll start by asking a couple of questions on user fees, specifically on costs associated with processing citizenship applications. Do you have on hand what it costs someone to apply to have it processed and go from start to finish?

[Karine Paré, Director, Cost Management, Department of Citizenship and Immigration]

Thank you for your question.

Right now, the fee for a citizenship application is $200 for an adult and $100 for a child. The actual cost to the Government of Canada to process the application for a grant of citizenship is based on our 2010-11 data of costing, which was $555 for the total cost.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Is that the same cost regardless of whether it's an adult or a child? I should imagine it is.

[Karine Paré]

It's an average cost. I have to say that our costing model takes the totality of the cost for processing an application, and it's the average cost of all applications that we process for citizenship.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

What you're saying is that someone, an adult, who is not a Canadian citizen today but is applying for citizenship is paying only $200, and for dependants or children, $100 per child, but you just said the actual average cost is $555. Where is the rest of that money coming from? Who covers that cost?

[Karine Paré]

The money is in our budget that Citizenship and Immigration has to process applications. The revenues generated from the fees go to the consolidated revenue fund of Canada. The CIC does not have access to these funds. They go to the consolidated revenue fund.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Essentially what you are saying is that average Canadian taxpayers, Canadian citizens, are footing the bulk of the bill for processing applications.

[Karine Paré]

Yes.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

I know I can't ask you whether that's fair because that would be your opinion, but I'm sitting here thinking that's not really fair. In my riding of Scarborough Centre, a very modest-income area of Toronto, hard-working individuals are trying to make ends meet. Asking them to foot the bulk of the bill for someone who wants to become a citizen….

Has this changed recently? Have these fees been standard? Has it always been $200? When was the last time this was addressed?

[Karine Paré]

The last time we increased the citizenship application fee was in 1995.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Okay, so it's more or less time for a change. Thank you.

I'm going to pass the remainder of my time to Mr. Menegakis.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you for appearing before us today.

I have one question today. In 2012 we issued a record one million visitor visas, which was a 40% increase since 2004. We also issued 100,000 international student visas. That's a 60% increase since 2004.

Can you tell us a bit about the consequences of wait-time increases? The fees remain static while the cost of processing rises.

[Caroline Melis]

Thank you very much for the question, Mr. Menegakis.

I think we're here today to discuss the issues of citizenship and the refugee appeal division, so I'm not able to answer your particular question. I'm not the right official.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

Okay. Thank you.

I'll pass it over to Mr. Opitz.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

All right. I wasn't expecting that pass, but that's good.

In following through, you're here to speak specifically to the refugee issues and things like that. That has been significantly streamlined.

Can you tell us how that's operating right now, in terms of the number of refugees coming in and the statistics for the new system of refugee reform compared to the year before?

[André Baril, Director, Asylum Policy and Programs, Department of Citizenship and Immigration]

Yes. In terms of volume under the new system as opposed to the past system, as of April 2013, under the new system we've referred to the Immigration and Refugee Board approximately 3,000 claims. This represents a 60% decrease over the average of the last three years—

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

Decrease?

[André Baril]

Yes.

—which was at this time of the year about 7,600 claims.

[Ted Opitz, Conservative, Etobicoke Centre, ON]

That's significant. Thank you.

I'm going to pass the next question to Mr. Weston.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you.

Again, my thanks for being here this morning.

The summary of the bill states that division 9 of part 3 of Bill C-60 authorizes “the revocation of temporary foreign worker permits, the revocation and suspension of opinions provided by the Department of Human Resources and Skills Development...”.

I'm wondering if any of you can comment on how that relates to the government's express priorities on promoting jobs and stimulating the economy.

[Caroline Melis]

We didn't come prepared to discuss those particular issues today. We were focusing on the RAD effects and the citizenship issues.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Which effects?

[Caroline Melis]

The refugee appeal division, and the citizenship issues related to the User Fees Act.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Okay, then maybe you could give me a bit of clarification. Could you elaborate on what you've come to discuss and how that relates to our committee's work?

[Caroline Melis]

We understood we would be coming to discuss the issues related to the changes in the User Fees Act as they relate to the citizenship program, and also the issues in the bill related to the refugee appeal division.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

I guess our witnesses are here to answer questions on the clauses that were referred to this committee. Some of those other questions perhaps apply to another committee; that's our problem.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Okay, well—

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

But I guess they'll tell you. They're doing a good job at telling you.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

That's the best thing in life: to know what you know, to know what you don't know, and to know what you're not supposed to know. Right?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Your time has expired.

I took some of your time, so I'll give you another few seconds.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Could you elaborate on how taxpayers are subsidizing citizenship fees?

I think that falls into what you're talking about today. Right?

[Karine Paré]

As I mentioned earlier, right now the fee for an adult is $200. The fee is composed of two elements: $100 for the processing of the application and $100 for the right of citizenship. The actual cost of processing an application based on our 2010-11 costing model, where we captured all the costs of processing an application for a child or an adult, was around $555.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you, Ms. Paré.

Ms. Sims.

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

Thank you very much.

I want to thank our witnesses for coming before this committee at such short notice. We really appreciate it.

I also want to express my disappointment that we are facing yet another massive piece of legislation from this government. The bill in its entirety includes a wide variety of complex measures, few relating to each other. The objective, it seems, is to ram all of these changes through Parliament as quickly as possible without the opportunity to scrutinize them.

Just to put it on the record, the official opposition did make a concerted effort to have this legislation separated so that the citizenship and immigration committee could study those parts that related to our area in great depth. For instance, the changes to the temporary foreign worker program—and I know that my colleague tried to ask a question about this—did not even make it before this committee, which I find particularly disturbing, since it is the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration who ultimately issues those work permits.

Nonetheless, I don't want to waste any more time, because we have a very short amount of time. I have a number of questions.

Under the clauses we're examining today, two tiers of refugee claimants are created in Canada. Is that correct?

[André Baril]

I wouldn't call it two tiers, but there are—

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

Two groupings.

[André Baril]

There are different groups, yes.

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

Okay. That's—

[André Baril]

There are those that come from a designated country of origin, those countries that don't normally produce refugees, and those that come from other countries.

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

Yes, so basically it's those who have access to appeal under the new system and those who don't. To clarify, it was the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration alone who decided which countries would make that list; in other words, which refugee claimants deserved a second look at their cases, which ones deserved individual attention, versus which ones could be assumed to be, to quote an adjective he uses often, “bogus”.

In your experience with this department, you must see.... Maybe you don't want to go that far. You must have had some of the same concerns we've had, one of which is the concern around denying individuals from designated countries any right to an appeal. We feel that this is a denial of due process and a denial of justice to people who are potentially very vulnerable, and this government wants that cemented in legislation.

This could very conceivably, and I have little doubt will, result in sending someone back into a situation where they are being persecuted or worse. How can we afford this option to some and not to others?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Off the record.... Stop the clock.

It's partially a political question—

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

Oh, I—

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

I'm sure the witnesses are capable of doing their best to answer the question, but there's no question that some of that question is political.

Go ahead.

Start the clock.

[André Baril]

Thank you.

In terms of the provisions that are in this bill, it was never the government's intent to provide the refugee appeal division right to claimants who are in the previous system. This was due to a drafting error in which a subsection that was brought into force on August 15 brought the whole section into force. That created a four-month period where claimants in the old system would have access to the refugee appeal division. That's what we are aiming to correct in this particular bill.

In terms of the claimants in the old system and the ones who are coming from a designated country of origin, the one principle that hasn't changed in Canada is that every claimant, irrespective of the country they come from, will have access to an independent hearing at the IRB and will continue to have access to judicial review by the Federal Court. That is not changing.

In terms of designating country of origin, you're quite right. It's the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration who designates, but the legislation that was approved by Parliament indicates that there are some boundaries in terms of how this should be done. In terms of looking at a country that does not generally produce refugees, what we look at are the data of the acceptance rates and refusal rates of the IRB over the last three years, and so—

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

Thank you very much.

Basically, under the new system now, those from designated countries will not have access to appeal.

[André Baril]

They will not have access to the newly created refugee appeal division—

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

That's all I needed to know.

[André Baril]

—but they will continue....

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

Thank you.

My next question is around citizenship.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

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

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I didn't hear the end of his answer to the question about where they will have appeal to.

[André Baril]

They will have access through the Federal Court for a judicial review of the refugee protection division decision.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Start the clock.

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

They have no right to appeal, but a judicial review. I understand that. Thank you.

My next question is around citizenship. You have thrown quite a few numbers out about the cost you have put on processing citizenship fees.

When I look at the current costs of paying $100 towards processing and $100 towards getting citizenship.... I've been to some of those citizenship ceremonies, by the way. A room is rented; there's a judge there; there's red serge there, right? The ones I've been to have been beyond that. That's about it. People walk in, get their certificates, and they leave.

When you're taking into consideration the costing, are you taking into consideration the rental of those rooms and everything?

[Karine Paré]

Yes. The average cost I mentioned is the total cost of the process, so it includes the ceremonies, the processing of the application, the security screening, and the costs of all the processes we need to follow for the citizenship grant.

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

And it includes the very complicated form-filling and everything else you put into place like the new language requirements and all of those things. I presume all of that is taken into consideration.

What I'm finding hard is that right now it's going to cost a family of four $600, and that's not the only cost. They still have to get themselves to the ceremony. They usually have to take a day off work, and do all of that. I do not see how we can justify doubling that process in one go. We're sort of putting up barriers to citizenship, and I question our wisdom. That's more a comment.

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you.

Mr. Lamoureux.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Paré, when you mentioned a $550 average cost for citizenship and yet we're charging $200, I could imagine Ms. James in particular, but we'll no doubt hit the cabinet table, which is going to be thinking that this is another area where we could possibly get some tax hikes.

I would like to caution the government that at the end of the day we need to have a better understanding of exactly what is happening at Citizenship.

For example, how many individuals would have been given citizenship in the year in which you came out with the average costing of $550 per person?

[Alexandra Hiles, Project Lead, Citizenship Modernization, Department of Citizenship and Immigration]

Thank you for the question. I can give you an answer regarding the volumes.

In 2010 there were 143,595 people who became Canadian citizens. In 2011 there were 181,288 people who became Canadian citizens.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

All right. So the costs really fluctuate depending on the number of individuals who are becoming citizens. Is that not a fair assessment? In one year if you give out 250,000 citizenships, for example, compared to a year in which you might give out 150,000 citizenships, that $550 variable might change by $20 or $30. Is that a fair assessment on my part?

[Karine Paré]

Thank you for the question.

As I mentioned earlier, the budget for CIC is appropriation based, which is pretty fixed in terms of capacity. Usually the budget we have to process citizenship applications allows the department to process 170,000 applications per year. That was in 2010-11. It's been a bit less in the last few years.

We are able to process a bit more—and my colleague mentioned 181,000 for one year—when we have an injection of temporary funding.

The cost is a unit cost, so it's the cost of processing the application. It's not related to the volume we process, because it's a unit cost.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

When we talk about the huge increase in processing time—and we have been strongly advocating the need to reduce the amount of time it takes to process a citizenship application—is it because of not having enough money, or is it because of what we're asking individuals to go through in order to get their citizenship?

What is the root cause of the increase in time to process a citizenship application?

[Caroline Melis]

If I may just say here that over the last decade or so, we've had the highest sustained rate of immigration to Canada in our history. In that timeframe many more new immigrants have come to Canada. Canada continues to have a high interest in making new immigrants Canadian citizens, and many of those new immigrants want to become Canadian citizens. About 85% apply. So the volume is what has—

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

I'm going to stop you there for just a moment. With all due respect, we have also seen a larger percentage of immigrants landing who are not applying for citizenship. So I don't think it's a fair comparison.

What is causing the delay in processing times? Is it strictly money?

[Caroline Melis]

It's volume, the number of people in the process. We are funded to a particular base level. We have increased our capacity to process more cases by injecting fee-based money, which is money from within the department which we internally reallocate to help maintain and not increase the processing times.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Can you provide the committee with a graph that clearly shows the number of individuals applying for citizenship for the last 10 years?

[Caroline Melis]

I'm sure we could provide that.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Chair, I think that would be a valuable piece of information. I know in the past we've asked for information to be provided to the committee. I'm very much interested in receiving that. A copy could be sent to the committee, either electronically or a paper document, but I would personally like to have a copy sent to me.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you. Your time has expired, Mr. Lamoureux.

That document will come to the clerk and then the clerk will distribute it to members of the committee.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Chair, given the nature of the request, once the clerk receives this information, how long does it usually take for committee members to get a copy?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

She will get that out as fast as she can.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Over the last couple of years, I've put in requests for information, and I don't know to what degree I'm receiving information. Is it because we're not necessarily receiving it? I would really and truly like to see this information. Perhaps they could advise where I could see it.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have a question and any remaining time I have I will share with my colleague, Roxanne James.

In order for Canada to remain competitive in this global economy, we need to track both capital resources and human resources. We attract capital resources by having a stable economy, a stable political system, and a low-tax regime. To attract human resources, we need to have qualified immigrants, and so on. How does Canada compare with countries like the United States and Australia, which I believe are our major competitors, in terms of service fees for visas, applications, and processing times? Perhaps you can share with us our competitiveness on a global scale.

[Karine Paré]

Since we are here to discuss division 10, on citizenship, I have the comparison for citizenship, if it's of interest for you.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

That's fine.

[Karine Paré]

For Australia, the fee is around $275. In New Zealand, it's $385, approximately. The fee in the United Kingdom is around $1,500. In the United States, it's approximately $675. Those are all in Canadian dollars.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

The United States is actually the highest.

[Karine Paré]

No, the United Kingdom is $1,500.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

What about the average processing time? Do you have any numbers?

[Alexandra Hiles]

On average, our competitor countries take about two to six months in terms of their processing times for citizenship. I don't have the breakdown per country.

[Chungsen Leung, Conservative, Willowdale, ON]

That's fine.

I'll share the rest of my time with Roxanne James.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you.

I just want to go back to the citizenship processing fees. You've said that the last time we made changes to that fee schedule was back in 1995.

We've heard the question from my colleague across the way about the number of applications that have been processed. I apologize if I missed it, but I didn't hear him ask this: what was the actual cost of processing applications back in 1995? Do you have that?

I'm just trying to get it in relation to what we charge to process compared to the actual costs and the fact that we haven't done anything on this in almost 18 years. I would imagine that the costs have gone up. I'm just wondering if you have that type of statistical information on hand.

[Karine Paré]

Unfortunately, I don't have that information with me. I can tell you, based on the trends, that the cost went up, but I don't have that information for 1995.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Okay, thank you.

Do we have any idea of what the actual costs are for processing temporary resident visas? An average cost, an actual cost, and whether there has been a trend that it has gone upwards? I wonder if you could speak to that for just a moment.

[Karine Paré]

Because we were supposed to talk about division 10 today, and not division 9, I don't have that information with me.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Okay. Is it possible that you could provide it to the committee as soon as possible?

[A voice]

Yes.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you.

Do I have any time left, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Yes. You have a couple of minutes.

I'm not sure whether your last question is relevant. We're pretty easy this morning.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you. I appreciate that.

I just want to touch base on the tax hike Mr. Lamoureux referenced. I wanted to clarify something. A user fee to have someone pay for something they're receiving is not a tax hike. In fact, our government has reduced taxes over 150 times for Canadians across the board. I just wanted to clarify that.

Perhaps at this point I could talk a little more about the user fees. Is there any indication that fees should be going up, or will be going up, or that there's a need for fees to go up? I know that we've talked about the variance in the actual cost and what individuals are actually paying.

I know that you can't answer the question as to whether you think it's fair, but I'm just wondering whether you have any indication that this is something we need to look at. I think it's something we need to look at.

[Karine Paré]

In order to answer your question, maybe I can explain to you the process we do when we review our fees. There are many factors we look at when we review fees.

There's the country comparison, as I mentioned before. Usually we compare with the Five Country Conference countries, which are the countries I mentioned earlier—the U.K. the United States, New Zealand, and Australia—in terms of looking at fees they're charging and the fees that we have here in Canada for similar services.

Also, we look at the cost of processing the application. The changes that we're proposing in division 10 in terms of amending the act are that we're seeking a User Fees Act exemption to allow us to have more flexibility and to be able to shift the burden from the taxpayer to the actual user of the service.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

The actual fees are published somewhere, obviously, so people can see what those fees are. Are the actual costs associated with what you're receiving published anywhere? I'm just wondering if the average Canadian taxpayer can actually look this up anywhere and find this information. Or is this something that someone who might be watching today would be taken aback by and would say, “Oh my gosh, I didn't know that”?

[Karine Paré]

All the departments are required to report in their departmental performance report on a yearly basis. There is a schedule, a table, on the user fees, where we need to outline the total costs by business line and the total revenues that we're generating. This information is public. It's not a unit cost that we're presenting, however, but a total cost and a total revenue figure.

[Roxanne James, Conservative, Scarborough Centre, ON]

I thank you for bringing to light the actual costs on an average basis, because I wouldn't have known that, and I'm sure the average Canadian wouldn't have known that either. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you.

That concludes the first round.

I will say to members of the committee that if you have any amendments, I will be signing a letter later this morning that's for the chairman of the finance committee, and enclosing any amendments. We have agreed that we will not debate any amendments.

The letter, I can tell you, will be going out probably within an hour, so I presume that if you have amendments you will deliver them to the clerk.

Mr. Lamoureux.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Chairperson, if I wanted to move a motion that before the government decides to increase the processing fees for citizenship, they would be required to have a debate inside the immigration committee, can I do that at this time as opposed to having to wait to submit something to you?

I do think there would be a great deal of benefit if we had that discussion here. We do not want members of this committee to report back to the government that they want to see citizenship processing fees increased when we know that in fact there is distortion in terms of the actual cost versus the number of people applying for citizenship. I think we need to get a better understanding of that issue.

If it's appropriate, I'd like to move that motion right now, if I could.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

The problem is, Mr. Lamoureux, we agreed—you were one of the people who agreed, and it was unanimous—that we would not debate amendments to these clauses, that those amendments could be made, that they would be delivered to the clerk, and I—

[An hon. member]

No.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

No, that's not what we agreed to.

Our original agreement was to have witnesses come in and for staff from the ministry to come in for the last half hour. That didn't work with witnesses, so we had staff in.

We agreed that if any of the parties have amendments they're going to make or wish to make to the budget, they will do so through their representatives at the finance committee. That's what we agreed to, not to submit amendments here to the clerk for her to forward to the committee. We agreed to have our individual representatives at the finance committee be our spokespersons for the amendments that we plan to put forward.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Just give me a minute.

Mr. Dykstra, you are right and the chair is wrong.

Your motion would be out of order, Mr. Lamoureux.

Ms. Sims.

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

I'm glad you ruled that way, because that was my memory.

My understanding is that...well, I know for a fact that the official opposition has made a concerted effort to make sure that elements that related to this committee would be separated from that legislation and debated separately, both in the House and here at the committee. The government used its majority to make sure that it could not happen.

Now we are here at this committee. The amendments we move here have no weight or anything, so the agreement we had was that each side could send whatever they wanted to their representatives.

Once again, we still would have preferred and would like to have had the elements that relate to immigration taken out of the budget bill, debated in the House and here separately, but we did not get that granted. As the government has a majority, they do happen to get their way.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

That's not a point of order.

On a point of order, Mr. Lamoureux.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Mr. Chairperson. If I may, I would like to know, then, if there is anything that would prevent....

I do have a motion that I would like to move. It doesn't take anything away from the budget itself, but I think it's important that at least the motion be provided to the finance committee, which will be dealing with the issue, or at least the Minister of Finance.

It's a very straightforward, simple motion: that we advise the Minister of Finance not to increase citizenship fees prior to the standing committee reviewing the issue.

I would ask if we could entertain—

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Someone might correct me, but I don't think we agreed to that.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Could I ask for unanimous consent of the committee, then, so that we could at least have that?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Of course, you can ask for unanimous consent. If the members wish to proceed with that, we'll do that.

[An hon. member]

No.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

There appears to be no unanimous consent, Mr. Lamoureux.

Does anyone else have anything to say? We still have time to proceed with one question, perhaps.

Go ahead, Mr. Dykstra.

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

I just want to make sure that your letter, I don't know if I need to formalize that.... What's your letter going to say?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

The letter reads:

Dear Mr. Rajotte, On behalf of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, I would like to thank you for your letter inviting our Committee to consider the subject matter of Bill C-60, An Act to implement certain provisions of the budget tabled in Parliament on March 21, 2013 and other measures, and more specifically the subject matter of clauses 167 to 168 and clauses 170 to 172 of the Bill. After careful consideration of your request, our Committee agreed on May 23, 2013 to undertake a study of the subject matter of the said clauses, and has met in this regard on May 23, 2013 in order to hear from officials from Citizenship and Immigration Canada. Their contribution to this study has been very valuable and informative. After hearing from the witnesses, and considering the provisions contained in clauses 167 to 168 and clauses 170 to 172, the Committee wishes to inform you that it has no amendments or recommendations to forward to the Standing Committee on Finance for its consideration. Thank you for the invitation to contribute to your deliberations and we wish your Committee a productive discussion during the clause-by-clause consideration of Bill C-60.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

I'll ask for a recorded vote on that.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

A recorded vote? I just read a letter. That's nothing. It's not a vote.

Unless you want to authorize me to send that letter.... Is that what you want?

[Rick Dykstra, Conservative, St. Catharines, ON]

I don't need you to be authorized to send that letter. You're sending it, but I'm happy to authorize you to do that, if that's what you're asking for.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

I just don't necessarily agree with the content of the letter. I don't want the impression to be that it was unanimous.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

All right, it's been moved by Mr. Dykstra that I send the letter I just read.

Is there any debate?

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

No, but I'd ask for a recorded vote, please.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

There's no debate.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Sure, I'll debate it.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

All those in favour, Madam Clerk.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

We only have a couple of minutes.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

We're going to have a vote and then I'm going to adjourn the meeting.

[Kevin Lamoureux, Liberal, Winnipeg North, MB]

Sure, we'll have a recorded vote then, please.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you, sir.

(Motion agreed to: yeas 10; nays 1 [See Minutes of Proceedings])

There doesn't appear to be any other business.

The meeting is adjourned.