Citizenship and Immigration Committee on May 12th, 2016

[David Manicom]

I don't believe we have those statistics with us. We'd be happy to provide them to the committee. The number of one-year window cases each year is generally known in advance as sort of a formula from our experience.

The Syrian movement, of course, is a very large one and new to us on that scale. Because we were focusing on intact families in our government-sponsored movement, we would expect the number of one-year window cases to be relatively modest, but we could find the information out for the committee.

Perhaps Dawn has something.

[Dawn Edlund]

I would just add, Mr. Chair, to give a sense of context, that from 2011 to 2016 the department received over 1,600 one-year window applications for 2,400 people, and they're generally speaking in this context from African countries. So it is a program; it's part of our levels plan. We deliver on it, but it's not a very high number in terms of the number of people we settled.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

The dental services that are covered under the federal interim program have a huge procedural problem with access. People go and they get approval, and when they go for their appointment, the dentist's office has to phone, and they wait for another 45 minutes before they can actually do the actual work. Can the minister fix this problem?

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

Yes. There was a group of dentists I was supposed to meet on these issues yesterday. Something came up, and I did not meet them, but I will find out what they said and try to resolve that issue you just mentioned.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you, and can we get a report back?

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Thank you, Minister.

Thank you, Ms. Kwan.

Will you report back to the committee, Minister?

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Mr. Chen, you have seven minutes, please.

[Shaun Chen, Liberal, Scarborough North, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I will be sharing the last two minutes with my colleague Ms. Zahid.

Thank you very much to the minister and to staff for appearing today.

I know in my previous work at the Toronto District School Board how important it is for us to successfully integrate newcomers and provide them with the settlement services that they need. In my riding of Scarborough North, in fact, there's a great partnership between IRCC and the Toronto District School Board to establish a newcomer services office, and I was fortunate enough to have helped launch that program as a local trustee several years ago.

I know from a report published by the Centre for Refugee Studies that privately sponsored refugees are less likely to access settlement services. They are also less likely to access language training compared to government-sponsored refugees. Recognizing how important it is for us to successfully integrate all refugees into Canada and that the department has allocated an additional $38 million in the 2016-17 budget year specifically for settlement services, can you share how that money will be used to encourage all refugees, including those who are privately sponsored, to access the services that they may need?

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

I'll ask one of my colleagues here to answer that question in general, but let me just make one point.

I'm not surprised that the government-assisted refugees access those services more. I would hope both of them access them a lot, but the typical profile of our government-assisted refugees from Syria is that they speak not a word of English and not a word of French, so all of them will clearly need language services and other services. I'm not surprised they requested those services more than the privately sponsored, who are more of a mixed group, but perhaps one of my colleagues has a more specific answer.

[David Manicom]

I'll start and then perhaps pass to my other colleague.

We would certainly agree, sir, that we want all refugees to be aware of the services that are available to them, and we work with the private sponsorship community quite intensively. We have training programs and so forth for them to make sure that they are aware of all the services that are available to refugees.

But, of course, as the minister said, privately sponsored refugees often already have family, social, or cultural links to Canada. A number of them have official language skills of some sort. About 60% of the Syrian refugees self-declared as speaking some English or French, for example. I think this would explain the rate of the differential usage, while at the same time we certainly encourage all refugees to access the settlement programs they are entitled to use.

[Dawn Edlund]

I would just add, Mr. Chair, that under the iCare system that my colleague Ms. Tapley referred to earlier, our report from the middle of April, in terms of how many Syrian refugees have come forward to seek settlement or resettlement services—and there's some double counting because they do seek several types of services—is about 17,192 people, of whom 4,062 were privately sponsored refugees. Just under a quarter have come forward as privately sponsored refugees. Privately sponsored refugees are coming forward in terms of language assessment, language training, and those kinds of things.

[Shaun Chen, Liberal, Scarborough North, ON]

Minister, you mentioned that 98% of government-sponsored refugees are now in permanent housing. I think that is an incredible accomplishment. I'm going to ask a question like a parent would ask to a child who's brought home that test and achieved 98%. What happened to the other 2%? My question to the minister is, do we have a profile of that remaining 2%? What are the greatest challenges, and how can Canadians help and work together to ensure all those government-sponsored refugees receive the housing supports they require?

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

You're quite a tough parent. You don't think 98% is a good mark?

[Voices]

Oh, oh!

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

I'm told the numbers should be 100% within a month, by mid-June. I am not sure. Perhaps my colleagues could tell you places that are well below the average and where there may be more work to do. Even though we have a 98% mark, we're not satisfied. We'll find out whether we've missed a dot.

[David Manicom]

Dawn will answer the question, but I would add that once you get to 98% or 99%, you have a number of special needs cases in certain communities, and you're working individual case by individual case.

Perhaps Dawn will have some data.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

If we could have a quick response. We're into Ms. Zahid's time now.

[Dawn Edlund]

Mr. Chair, I'm happy to give a quick response.

There are a couple of communities that aren't at 98% yet. The one that is the lowest at the moment is Victoria, but that's only because they only started taking in folks mid-February.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Thank you.

Ms. Zahid, one and a half minutes, please.

[Salma Zahid, Liberal, Scarborough Centre, ON]

Thank you, Minister, for joining us today.

Before I go into my question, I wanted to clarify one thing.

It was mentioned that for 2015-16, your department allocated $298 million for the Syrian refugees' integration, and $187.4 was spent by IRCC. Does that mean we under-spent?

[John McCallum, Liberal, Markham—Thornhill, ON]

What I know for sure is that we under-spent. Not all the numbers are necessarily all in, so I can't tell you we under-spent by exactly how much. I know we were under budget before the deadline date, so that is good. Perhaps somebody can comment on the degree of under-spending.

[Dawn Edlund]

Yes, Mr. Chair, I can.

We under-spent by about $110 million, between vote 1 and vote 10.

If I could correct an answer that I gave earlier to Ms. Rempel, the actuals for the entire Government of Canada—I read the wrong column—is in the neighbourhood of $314 million. The variance of under-spending was the number that I gave you, which is about $142 million.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Thank you.

Mr. Saroya, five minutes, please.

[Bob Saroya, Conservative, Markham—Unionville, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and thank you, Minister, and especially the officials. They always do a good job. Thank you.