Citizenship and Immigration Committee on June 4th, 2013

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

A couple weeks ago I had a town hall meeting in my constituency on this exact same issue of visitor visas. I saw more than a hundred people at this town hall. I think that the number of people at that town hall truly reflects the need for this study and the fact that many people in our communities are having a lot of difficulties with the visitor visa process. In that community meeting the members of my community provided some suggestions for change. One was the need for an appeal process so that they're not actually having to do full applications over and over again.

A trend that we noticed within the room was that there are inconsistencies with officers' decisions to approve or deny the applications. For example, of two families coming from the same country with very similar circumstances, one would be approved and the other would be denied. It might be difficult for you to give a reason but can you explain how or why that might happen?

[Robert Orr]

When these officers are looking at an application they are looking at a composite picture of risk. They are weighing a whole variety of different factors. There are the admissibility issues that they deal with, which are reasonably straightforward, but then there is a question of intent. That becomes extraordinarily difficult to assess. They are going to be looking at a variety of factors to try to determine intent. Will this person leave Canada at the end of their intended visit? They are trying to balance a whole range of different factors.

First of all, almost no two applications are the same. There are always some different factors that weigh into it, so it's very difficult to compare them. In any case, an officer, for very good and valid grounds—and the Federal Court respects this and acknowledges this—can look at the same series of factors and come to a different conclusion when they balance it all together. It's not a matter of lack of professionalism or lack of will to try to facilitate travel, but when you balance everything together it is possible to come to different conclusions.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Okay.

Earlier when you were answering somebody else's question you mentioned that the only process or method of an appeal, had they been denied, would be to put in a new application or to appeal to the Federal Court for judicial review.

Do you know how many applications actually reach the Federal Court for review? Is that recourse actually used?

[Robert Orr]

It is used but it's relatively rare. I believe in 2011 the figure was 64 cases brought to the Federal Court.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

In 2011 there were 64 cases. Do you know how many applications were actually denied? Out of how many are the 64?

[Robert Orr]

I don't have the actual results from that. We can try to provide that for you.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Perhaps you can send it to the clerk, please. Thank you.

Mr. Chair, do I still have more time?

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

You do.

[Rathika Sitsabaiesan, NDP, Scarborough—Rouge River, ON]

Fantastic.

We face a lot of visitor visa application denials in my office. People come to our office after they've been denied. The denial comes in the form of a checklist, and not much detail is provided with that checklist. The application doesn't prove that they'll return, it doesn't have sufficient...whatever. People ask for more detail. They want to know what's wrong with their application and how they can make it better. When their first application is denied, they're putting in a second one. But without making a substantial improvement to their application, they're going to be denied again. They want to know how they can actually improve their application, but that checklist doesn't give them that information. When they call, they're told, that's it, there are no more details.

What can my constituents or constituents across the country do to get more information about why their applications are being denied? How can they improve their applications so that when they do reapply they can have a successful outcome?

[Robert Orr]

It's one of the real conundrums we have because we would like to provide more information but it's also a matter of the time we have to be able to get through the volume of applications. If we gave a detailed list to each person of what was required, it would be a very time-consuming, difficult task. That is why we have had to go to this rather more generic checklist approach. That's done seriously, though, and we hope from that they have a good indication of why the decision was made and what the reasoning was behind that decision.

By using that information, if they want to apply again they would have to try to address that particular issue. It might be through documentation or it might be through a variety of different ways they would be able to try to attract that. As I mentioned, the number of people who reapply and the success rate on that indicates that generally they are getting information that does help them in the process of reapplying.

[The Chair, Conservative, David Tilson]

Thank you.

Our time has expired, I'm afraid.

Mr. Orr and Mr. Linklater, thank you for coming. We've asked you to appear for probably a little unusual length of time. We thank you for that and for helping to give us an introduction to this topic of study, which we're now undertaking.

We will suspend the committee. We have some brief committee business in camera.

[Proceedings continue in camera]