Citizenship and Immigration Committee on March 20th, 2017

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

One thing we have done as a government is get rid of the four-years-in, four-years-out rule, which was very much an irritant to stakeholders and members, folks who had participated in the temporary foreign worker program. That's a key deliverable we made.

We continue to look at this situation with an eye to creating pathways to permanent residency for these people. I don't have a specific timeline on this, but I can assure you that this is something we are working on. We feel very strongly that we should have pathways to permanent residency for these individuals.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Thank you.

I'll follow up a bit on the 6,000 or 6,500 legacy cases. In my riding, I have two wonderful refugee houses, Adam House and FCJ, which are huge advocates for legacy refugees. We talked a little about efficiencies, Minister, and I wonder whether you could let us know if there is a commitment to processing these legacy cases during this mandate.

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

Addressing this legacy backlog is included in the asylum reform. It is a very important matter that is within the line item for asylum reform in my mandate letter.

The IRB is already moving ahead with a lot of reforms and efficiencies within its system to address this particular issue, and backlogs generally. Part of that will be a need for extra resources so that they can process many more cases even faster. That is certainly something we are looking at in order to assist them to do that. We work very closely with them. I meet with the chair of the IRB very frequently to follow up on some of the work they are doing to tackle the backlog in general, and specifically the legacy cases.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

Thank you.

Many people don't know this, but my mom is actually from Mexico, so I consider myself a Mexican Canadian, and I am very proud that we have lifted the Mexican visa.

Mr. Wex responded to an earlier question about the $261-million cost to government over 10 years to lift the visa. I wonder if I could get Mr. Wex to just finish his answer in terms of the benefits, just because I felt I didn't get a complete answer to that. To me, this is very important because it is a point of pride for me. I am very proud that Canada has done this, and I think it is very beneficial for Canada.

[Richard Wex]

What I was proposing to say was that while there are net costs that have been included in the lift, they are offset by some monetized benefits, which are essentially $172 million over 10 years. That's related primarily to increased tourism, which was easier to forecast than some other non-quantifiable benefits such as increased trade and investment, business-to-business and people-to-people ties, and quite frankly this was a major political irritant between the two countries so there were a number of indirect benefits once that political irritant could be resolved.

When you factor all those things in, they add to the benefits but we were not able to cost those benefits for the purposes of the regulatory impact assessment, which the member previously was referring to when referring to the operational costs associated with the lifting of the visa.

[Julie Dzerowicz, Liberal, Davenport, ON]

I appreciate that. My next question is about settlement agencies. I have a lot of settlement agencies in my community. I am very anxious that they get the resources they need to be able to do their job, not only to settle refugees and immigrants as quickly as possible but also to help them fully contribute back to Canada as soon as possible.

I worry a little bit. Sometimes I wonder whether they have the resources they need in some areas, or whether they have too much in other areas. I wonder if the minister could update us on where his priority lies around settlement agencies. I know that two-thirds of our budget is actually spent on settlement agencies. I wonder whether there is a bit of a review that's going to be under way and whether we can make sure that they have the support they need to settle our new Canadians.

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

On settlement, I can't agree with you more on the importance of settlement services for refugees, newcomers, and everyone who is new to Canada to restart their lives here. It's critical, those services that settlement agencies provide, such as language training, job support programs, and so on. It is why in 2017 we are allocating $664 million for settlement programs. That is outside of Quebec. That is an increase of $76 million over the previous year. It shows you that we take settlement services very seriously and that it's a key priority for our government.

In addition to those extra resources, we are always looking to make sure that the delivery of those services has the best impact for newcomers and refugees. The way we do that is to have a very rigorous data collection system. We are implementing an improvement in that area. We also consult widely with settlement agencies and other stakeholders in the settlement business. It's one area in which we also work with provincial and territorial governments to have a better delivery in our system.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Thank you, Minister.

Mr. Saroya, you have five minutes, please.

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

Thank you so much, Mr. Chair, and thank you to the minister and the entire staff. Congratulations to the minister for this promotion.

Minister, last week we had an off week, and we had this stuff coming in—from the people, not from me—which I will squeeze into five questions. First, as you know, my riding is the most diverse riding in the country, and 60% of the people are of Chinese descent. People are losing sleep over border issues. Is there any way you can assure them that they are safe and that the country is safe? Do you have a plan and how are you going to fix it?

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

On general border questions, I usually defer to my colleague, the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, but what I will say from my perspective and my responsibility is that we have international obligations to people who are seeking asylum. Our obligation is with respect to giving them a fair hearing so that they can make their case. Having said that, we have very rigorous standards for security screening people who cross our borders. They go through health, criminal, and background checks to make sure that anyone who is a threat to Canada is not let into this country.

Having said that, for folks who need protection who claim asylum, we have international obligations that we can't simply walk away from. We have to maintain our tradition of being a compassionate country, and these are people who are in need of protection and they get to make their case in front of the Immigration and Refugee Board.

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

Minister, the second question comes from one of my constituents. This person has a networking contract in the United States and also has a company that has maintenance contracts and software networking contracts there. He came to see me yesterday and this was his question. He said that when he goes across the border, he has all his clients' information on his phone, and he wants to know what happens when the immigration officer asks for his phone and looks at the details on the phone. In the meantime he's breaking the law, giving private information to the immigration officer. What should he do? If he says no to the immigration officer, he'll be sent back. If he says yes, he's breaking the law.

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

That's a very important question. Unfortunately, it falls within the purview of the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, so I wouldn't be able to answer that question.

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

One of the things in your mandate letter from the Prime Minister is to grow the economy and create jobs, and to bring more families into the middle class. In the meantime, in 2016, the economic and business category was cut by 47%. Do we have a plan this year to bring it back to the 2015 level?

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

Under our levels plan for this year, we have 300,000 expected landings in 2017. The vast majority of those landings are in the economic class. There are 172,000 in the economic class, so that shows you that we have a particular focus on economic migration within our overall historically high levels.

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

Minister, I'm looking at this, and according to the Immigration website, it was cut by 47%.

Anyway, I can move on to the next question. This question comes from a senior citizen who needs a caregiver. He is having a rough time finding a caregiver. Do we have a plan to bring the caregiver program back to the 2015 level?

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

Since 2014, historically high permanent resident admission levels have been in place for caregivers and their families. This is a particular program that has had a lot of applications, and basically there is a backlog in this program. But I want to highlight for you two new streams within the caregiver program that allow for much, much faster processing of those applications. I'll actually bring in my official Robert Orr to speak to that.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

You have ten seconds, Mr. Orr.

[Robert Orr, Assistant Deputy Minister, Operations, Department of Citizenship and Immigration]

As the minister said, there are two new categories—the caring for children and the high medical needs cases—and at the moment those applications are being processed for permanent residence within three months of applying.

[The Chair, Liberal, Borys Wrzesnewskyj]

Thank you. Unfortunately, the time is up.

Mr. Sarai, go ahead for five minutes, please.

[Randeep Sarai, Liberal, Surrey Centre, BC]

Thank you, Minister, for coming in for your first visit.

We've been discussing something that is kind of common knowledge. It has come up in our meetings as well and I believe it was in our election platform; that is that siblings or those who immigrate to Canada have an easier time integrating and settling if they have siblings here. That has been documented and has been brought up in the testimony of many witnesses. There was discussion that economic class applicants who have siblings or family members in Canada would get extra points in order to qualify. Has that been studied any further? Are there any plans to implement that anytime soon?

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

There's no definite plan in place to implement that anytime soon, but we have been looking at that issue and receiving input from affected stakeholders. I can tell you it's something that I was aware of prior to assuming this new role and subsequent to that, but there's no definite timeline for an announcement. It's something that is being looked at carefully.

[Randeep Sarai, Liberal, Surrey Centre, BC]

Thank you.

The main estimates include an increase of $18.1 million to reduce application processing times and achieve higher admission levels for permanent residents. Budget 2016 included $25 million for reducing processing times for family sponsorships. What results were achieved with the money identified in budget 2016?

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

Thank you for the question. I'll let my official answer it.

[Richard Wex]

Thank you, Minister. I'll turn it over to Mr. Orr in a moment.

The $25 million from budget 2016 was dedicated to attacking the inventory and reducing the processing time for the family class. At the time when this was announced, the processing times for family class both within Canada and outside of Canada, in terms of sponsoring a spouse or a partner, was 18 months to 26 months respectively. The previous minister announced in December of 2016 that those processing times will come down to one year. For existing applications, they will be completed by December of 2017, and any new applications will be completed within 12 months.

The results achieved from the $25 million in budget 2016 included two things: a major reduction in the inventory, and significant improvement in processing times associated with spousal applications.

I don't know whether Mr. Orr might like to add anything.

[Robert Orr]

Very specifically on that—I think it largely has been covered—since June 13 when the announcement was made about spousal processing times, the inventory of the in-Canada spouses has been reduced by 49.3%, which is a very significant increase. We're well on track to 12-month processing for 80% of cases by the end of the year.