Evidence of meeting #37 for Citizenship and Immigration in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was families.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Canada Research Chair in Child, Family and Community Resilience, Child and Youth Refugee Research Coalition, Dalhousie University
They were 62, so they were actually—
Conservative
Canada Research Chair in Child, Family and Community Resilience, Child and Youth Refugee Research Coalition, Dalhousie University
So they were older. My sense is that many immigrants are arriving with their parents, whom they want to bring in, actually. If the process were quicker, they would be coming in during much more productive years, when retirement is not imminent, but it's the delay of the process....
Also, by the way, this focus on grandparents isn't totally accurate, as we know, because most of the family reunification is not just a case of elderly parents coming in. It's about aunts and uncles and brothers and siblings and spouses. It's actually a lot more than just about the grandparents, which I think sometimes is the picture here.
I will also say this. The numbers are arbitrary, but the needs are not. It would be interesting to introduce some sort of family assessment from which we'd have more information, so that we can say, it's funny that employers get to justify, when they bring in temporary workers, and yet a family which has a definite need because of a long commute and who could bring in someone who could actually assist, we don't assess. We don't have any mechanism, it seems, to get into adding another element of proper assessment to this process.
Maybe it's my analytical mind, but as a researcher, I would want to ask more questions, so that we get in a sense to open this up. Maybe the number's not the right thing, but some sort of case management system is.
Conservative
Bob Saroya Conservative Markham—Unionville, ON
What sort of delays...? We've heard this over and over in the last number of weeks, that delays are too long. I agree with all of you. Fifty-one months, 48 months.... What would be an acceptable number, in your opinion?
Canada Research Chair in Child, Family and Community Resilience, Child and Youth Refugee Research Coalition, Dalhousie University
Do you want it from the field?
Former Research and Policy Manager, Ethno-Cultural Council of Calgary
Do you mean us?
Executive Director, Ethno-Cultural Council of Calgary
This is the reason I mentioned our experience in the 1980s.
Conservative
Bob Saroya Conservative Markham—Unionville, ON
That part I know. My parents came within one year. That was a different time. There were limited applications processed.
Executive Director, Ethno-Cultural Council of Calgary
That's right.
Actually, two years is an acceptable process, because if a woman has a child and she sponsors her parents.... Based on the people we have contacted, processing time took them seven years. By the time the grandparent is here, the child is already eight years old.
The other question there was—
November 3rd, 2016 / 3:55 p.m.
Executive Director, Ethno-Cultural Council of Calgary
In sponsoring the parents, the basis for the income requirement is the last three years. That also needs to be reviewed: what a reasonable time is for the minimum income.
NDP
Brigitte Sansoucy NDP Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
My first questions are for the representatives from the Ethno-cultural Council of Calgary
I am the member for Saint-Hyacinthe-Bagot, Quebec. Since very early in January, we also have had to tell people who come to ask us to help them with their applications that it is no longer possible to submit applications. From the end of January, in February and throughout the year, we have been telling people to come back to see us in November and then we can help them file an application for next January.
Even those who submit an application on time have it processed one year later. They are told a year later that they are actually missing a particular document and that their application is not complete.
This brings me to the question: do you think this system should be in fact abolished?
Former Research and Policy Manager, Ethno-Cultural Council of Calgary
Do you mean to clarify the quota system, the cap?
Executive Director, Ethno-Cultural Council of Calgary
In fact, our first recommendation is to remove the cap. That's why we couldn't answer the question about what is a reasonable cap. We're starting from the premise that it be based on the needs. Remove the cap, and determine the applications based on the needs.
NDP
Brigitte Sansoucy NDP Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
Absolutely. This is what we are seeing this year. We will soon reach the ceiling of 20,000 people.
Do you have anything to add, Mr. Ungar?
Canada Research Chair in Child, Family and Community Resilience, Child and Youth Refugee Research Coalition, Dalhousie University
I'm not hearing anyone raise that this is a security issue, yet it's a bureaucratic processing issue. It just strikes me as profoundly odd that for some reason, this has become so.... You had the example of that one missing piece of paper. I've heard stories like this. I think all of us have heard such stories. This is not often raised as a security discourse. It begs the question, isn't this more about case management? We want to expedite this.
I agree with my colleagues. If someone has a young child, we would triage that to perhaps the top of the pile. If we're talking about an older family, maybe that's a lesser priority. I think we have to introduce some reasonableness into our assessment of the prioritization and expedite this. For a young family, I would say six months to a year is a reasonable time frame. For an older family, two years might function okay.
NDP
Brigitte Sansoucy NDP Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
I'll continue with you, Mr. Ungar.
You talked about acceptable processing times. You said family reunification is an important protection factor, and you talked about seven areas that need to be considered. You took the opportunity to tell us that the bureaucracy is very cumbersome and that we have to simplify things.
If you had to change the family reunification system, what would you propose?
Canada Research Chair in Child, Family and Community Resilience, Child and Youth Refugee Research Coalition, Dalhousie University
I guess I was inspired, if I could, by what Canada just did with the refugees. Now, I understand that it was a huge financial investment. I'm not naive about that, but what struck me was that there was a moment in time when Canada processed.... It was not only in late 2015 and early 2016. This is something we have done before.
We have a backlog, as you pointed out, of 80,000 families or more. Is there a potential to perhaps clear this up as a one-time effort and simply assess families to see if they can justify the need to expedite this, with the same resources we just showed internationally? That is not to mention the goodwill this just brought Canada internationally in terms of what we did with the Syrian refugees.
My simple answer back is that I think there could be a net gain if we simply got rid of the wait-list to within a reasonable limit of 10,000 or something and then started again to see what we got. That would be my wish.
I wonder what the net gain of such an exercise would be if someone actually crunched the numbers. I have not, but I have colleagues who could. Would this rush to bring in family reunification, in a sense, create enough of a momentum?
I'm from Nova Scotia. You guys are out in Alberta. In Nova Scotia, the one thing we keep saying to Minister McCallum is, “Please, give us more”. Nova Scotia and P.E.I. have done a shining job of this. We are looking for more people. I'm going hat in hand here a little bit.
NDP
Brigitte Sansoucy NDP Saint-Hyacinthe—Bagot, QC
For the Ethno-cultural Council of Calgary, what would your suggestions be for improving the system in financial terms? I am talking about the financial burden of paying for an application, additional medical examinations, income requirements, and so on.
If that aspect of the system had to be improved, what would you propose?
