Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Oct. 27th, 2016

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

As we all know, the backlog is this high, whatever amount it is. They cannot be processed instantly for today, tomorrow, this year, next year. The super visa helps.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Twenty seconds, please.

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

Is there any suggestion for the super visa? What would be the changes?

Anybody can take it.

[Avvy Go]

Get rid of the minimum income requirement.

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

Chantal.

[Chantal Desloges]

I was going to say get rid of the requirement that the parents have to prove that they're going to go back to their home country within a certain period of time. That's very limiting, especially for widows.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Thank you.

Ms. Dzerowicz, for five minutes, please.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

First, thank you so much to all of you. I want to delve right in because I only have five minutes.

I'm going to start with Ms. Go. Ms. Go, I believe with all my heart that family reunification is very good for Canada, very good for our immigrants, very good for our economy. Do you have any studies that you could share with us? It doesn't have to be now, but if you could forward them to the committee, I'd be very grateful.

[Avvy Go]

I referred to the CIC's own evaluation report. It was released in February 2014. It's called the “Evaluation of the Family Reunification Program”. It actually looks at a cohort of sponsored immigrants, both spouse and parents and grandparents, over a time period. Some of the stats we included in our submission came from that report. That's one study, but there are a number of studies.

No study actually tracks sponsored immigrants, because the government does not provide funding so academics do not do that kind of study. There are studies on, let's say, racialized families' income levels and then looking at individual versus family that show the discrepancies. You are more likely to live in poverty if you're not with the family, or you don't have a multi-generation family, versus racialized groups who have multi-generation families. They are less likely to live in poverty.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Thank you.

Chantal, you spoke very eloquently and gave a lot of excellent suggestions. There was one part that you covered really quickly and I wonder if you might review it again for me. You were talking about a number of immigrants trying to maintain the residency requirements, having issue with it, and then their having great difficulty because they had to take care of parents at home.

Could you run through that point again for me?

[Chantal Desloges]

If you're a permanent resident, the rule is that within every five-year time frame, you have to spend 730 days physically in Canada, with some exceptions. The problem is that when people run up against a situation of aging or ill parents, they end up having to spend protracted periods of time outside the country and then put their own permanent residency in jeopardy if they haven't been able to maintain enough time in the country.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

That's very helpful. Thank you very much.

For the CBA, my colleague Mr. Saroya was on the same wavelength as I was with some of his questions. The question I wanted to ask was whether relationships of convenience really are an issue. Often when you try to solve one problem, you really hinder something else. I think that's been the case with some of our immigration rules around family reunification. I wonder whether you might have a recommendation. One is the relationship of convenience being a problem. What would be your recommendation on how we address that?

[Vance P. E. Langford]

Relationships of convenience, or a relationship that's formed for immigration purposes, is against the principles and the laws of Canada. The Canadian Bar Association agrees with that. We would never suggest that it be appropriate for people to marry or get into a relationship so that they can get immigration status in Canada. We rely on our visa officers abroad in order to—

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

That's not what I'm asking. I'm asking whether you think it's happening, and if it is happening, how you would recommend that we deal with it so that it's not negatively affecting the family reunification that we would like to have in this country. That's my question.

[Vance P. E. Langford]

I've been an immigration lawyer for about 18 years. I've seen it relatively infrequently among my clients. I guess people who come to me want to hire a lawyer, so they're probably not going to come with an illegitimate relationship. I have seen some, and I have one right now, where people have gotten together, and I think a Canadian citizen is being victimized by a foreign person in order to gain citizenship in Canada, so it is a live issue.

As to how it should be dealt with, I think it has to be dealt with the way it is being dealt with by our visa officers abroad, who do very good work to discern the truth, and to the extent—

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

You have 10 seconds, please

[Vance P. E. Langford]

—that they cannot, and they make a wrong decision, then there is access to appeal, and we need faster access to appeal.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

That concludes the first hour of our hearing today.

I'd like to thank the panellists for their appearance before the committee and for their tremendous insights.

At this point we'll suspend for two minutes to allow the second panel to assemble.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Committee members, just before we begin hearing from witnesses on the second panel, Ms. Kwan has requested the floor for five minutes for committee business.

Ms. Kwan, please proceed.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to move our motion, if I may, and the motion reads:

That pursuant to Standing Order 108(2) and in light of the House of Commons unanimously voting in favour of the motion for the Canadian government to use its full authority to provide asylum to Yazidi women and girls for escaping genocide within 120 days, that the committee undertake a study to invite officials from the German government that led the German initiative to expeditiously resettle 1,000 Yazidi women and girls, so that Canada can learn from their experiences; and that this study comprise one meeting and that the committee report its findings to the House and that pursuant to Standing Order 109 the government table a comprehensive response thereto.

Copies of the motion are being distributed, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Thank you, Ms. Kwan.

Mr. Sarai.

[Randeep Sarai, Liberal, Surrey Centre, BC]

I would ask if Ms. Kwan would be open to have a friendly amendment to add to also have the department officials who went to Iraq and assessed the situation there to come back and give their findings, but do it in camera. Would that be okay?

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Absolutely, thank you very much. I would accept that as a friendly amendment, Mr. Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Ms. Rempel.