Citizenship and Immigration Committee on March 20th, 2017

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I thank the minister and his staff for being here today and I congratulate the minister on his appointment.

I'll first ask a quick question on cessation claims. I'm sure the minister knows what they are.

Your predecessor, the former minister, Mr. McCallum, agreed at this committee that the government would be bringing in legislation to address that issue. I'm asking a quick question of the minister as to whether or not that commitment is still on the table.

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Everything related to asylum, including cessation, is under review, and I'm happy to look at that. All the commitments the previous minister made are still a priority for me, including looking at cessation.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

I'm going to ask a quick question on legacy claims. The chair of the IRB, Mario Dion, said:

The IRB had reallocated available internal funding to reduce the backlog of legacy cases from 32,000 to 6,500 since coming into force of the new refugee...system. In 2016–17, the Board’s ability to reallocate funding internally will be severely limited....

He went on to say:

As a result, commitments made by the Board in relation to refugee protection claims that are not subject to statutory time frames, such as the remaining 6,500 legacy claims, will have to be revisited unless additional temporary funding is made available.

I see nothing in the supplementary estimates to support legacy processing claims, and I don't see anything specific, with respect to the main estimates, about dealing with the specific backlog. There's a huge backlog. The minister knows about that as well.

How will this be dealt with, and will there be additional funding so people are not in limbo? Their lives are literally in limbo.

I'd like a quick answer if I may, because I have one other area I want to get into.

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Very quickly, the department has been working with the board. As you know, the board is independent, but we've been working very closely with it to address the issues around backlogs and specifically the legacy cases.

It has implemented some efficiencies to make sure it addresses the backlog. However, doing that has somewhat been hindered by the increase in asylum claims this year.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Okay, so my question is this. Are there additional dollars allocated to it? Their problem is, as stated by the chair, that unless additional resources are made available to it, it can't deal with it. That's the reality. It will do efficiencies and do all of this stuff as well as it can, but the reality is that it doesn't have enough resources to process these claims.

Will there be additional resources? A yes or no would be great.

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

I think the approach should be efficiencies plus extra resources. I don't think this is exclusively a resource issue.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

It is doing efficiencies, so my question to you, Minister, is will there be additional dollars?

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

We're working with it for even more efficiencies. We are always happy to look at its request for more resources.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Will there be additional dollars?

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

I can't commit to that at this current time. What I can tell you is that any request from the IRB for extra resources will be considered by my department.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Okay. I take it to be no, because so far there haven't been. I will look very carefully at this year's budget, the budget that's going to come down on Wednesday, as to whether or not there will be additional allocations, because if there aren't, those cases are just going to be stuck. People's lives are on hold. The minister, I know, understands that.

I would like to move on to the safe third country agreement. I know the minister falls back on the notion that UNHCR says everything is all cool, but in reality things are not so cool, and the minister knows that as well. The border communities are struggling. The Premier of Manitoba has raised the need for additional resources to deal with this situation. The minister himself acknowledged that there are additional claims coming through, which, therefore, create a further backlog with the legacy claims.

I believe the minister's insistence on refusing to suspend the safe third country agreement is wrong. Will the minister reconsider this given the fact that Harvard has issued a report on this, given that there are some 200 law students who have issued a report on this, and given that Amnesty International has interviewed some 30 individuals who have crossed over, all of whom have said it was not their intention to come to Canada until Trump?

This is having a real impact on Canada, and my question to the minister is whether he will reconsider suspending the safe third country agreement so people will go through the front door instead of the back door, so there can be order with respect to those who are seeking safety.

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

As you know, your assertion that we should eliminate the safe third country agreement to have order is actually going to do the opposite. If we eliminate that agreement or suspend it, we will have disorder.

That agreement between Canada and the United States allows us to handle asylum claims in an orderly manner.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

With all due respect, Minister, if I may, the reality is this. When people go through a border, they can actually do so legally if the safe third country agreement is suspended, but right now they are being forced to go through illegal channels to go to the unsanctioned borders to do this, and they are risking life and limb in order to do this.

If you think that's order, I really have to question what you think, because that troubles me greatly, Minister.

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

What I am relying on is our review. We review this agreement constantly, and we have an obligation to do that. From our analysis, the U.S. domestic asylum system is fair. It has due process, and therefore the agreement applies.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Ms. Kwan, please finish your question.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Yes, I know, but that is the minister's opinion. The reality on the ground is something very different, and the people on the ground are telling the minister, and everyone else who cares to listen, that it's very different. They are not trekking through the snow for fun. They are not taking a toddler for fun.

There was a report out there. I don't know if the minister saw it. A young toddler, a two-year-old, said to his mother, “I can't go on anymore. It hurts too much. You go on to Canada on your own.” This is not a joke. This is not something you can say is normal. People don't do this unless they feel the urgency and the desperation to do it. That is the reality, so I would urge the minister to reconsider this.

I want to ask a last question on transportation modes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

You have 10 seconds left.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

The former minister said they would review this for all refugee claims. Nothing has come forward with respect to that. Can you give us a quick update?

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

You didn't actually let me answer your previous question.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Sorry, I am asking this question.

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

Were you just making a statement?

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Minister, there was a question, but unfortunately the time has run out for this round.

[Ahmed Hussen, Liberal, York South—Weston, ON]

I didn't get a chance to answer your question.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

There will be another round. Perhaps we can follow up on that very specific question.

Ms. Dzerowicz, you have seven minutes, please.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Thank you so much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you so much, Minister. Thanks to the whole team for being here today.

My first question is about the work for temporary foreign workers. In my riding of Davenport I have a large number of union workers, and many of them are temporary foreign workers. They are mostly in the building trades, and they are very much here working on the heavy infrastructure investment that our government is implementing. Many of them have been here for a few years, and they're looking for pathways to citizenship so that their families can more fully contribute to Canada.

I wonder if the minister can give us a very quick update, or just give us a sense of the timeline for putting a pathway to permanent residency or citizenship into place.