As Michael said, our firm really does specialize in representing people who deal with medical admissibility issues, so I want to focus on two examples from our practice where we've seen these real problems with procedural fairness letters.
One problem is the fact that this excessive demand threshold, which is currently set at $6,655 a year, is not accurate. We saw that the Global News investigation from July 2017 found that IRCC isn't even considering the social service costs. They're costing it at $356 per Canadian per year. That number doesn't include special education services, which we know are required by one-third of the people that we're talking about under medical inadmissibility. I think there's a real problem with the number. As Michael said, the resources that the IRCC would have to pour into making this number accurate are going to be significant, so we're coming to the situation now of “is this a system that's even worth saving?”
This number of $6,655 per year is really important. It means everything to the client. If you're one dollar over this number, it makes you inadmissible to Canada.
We had a case recently in our office where the IRCC said the cost of our client's HIV medication was $400 over the excessive demand threshold. Our client had an advanced degree. He had years of management experience at an international accounting firm, and there was no opportunity to take into account the fact that he would contribute significantly to the Canadian tax base. The interesting thing is that his desirability as an immigrant to Canada was really reduced to this $400 over the $6,655 per year.
The second example that I want to give from our practice deals with the discriminatory nature of this section of the law. The IRCC has repeatedly stated that medical inadmissibility is tied to the cost of services, not to the health condition, but if every single child with a disability is getting one of these procedural fairness letters, then in fact it is de facto discriminatory.
We're questioning the implementation of this law. We're urging the committee to repeal it. You'll hear from other witnesses, and we've heard from the panel before us, that this is a system that discriminates against persons with disabilities.
In 2015 we represented the mother of a 14-year-old teenager named Jazmine. She was found inadmissible because she was deaf. Her case was heavily publicized in the media. The procedural fairness letter that Jazmine's mother received essentially said that her daughter would be a burden on Canada. I think the sad part about this is that Jazmine's disability really is just one part of her identity, but IRCC saw this as the only relevant part of her identity.
I think it is discriminatory to see persons with disabilities as a burden. If you speak to any parent who has a child with a disability, you can see the positive change and impact they have on their families and their communities. Jazmine's mother worked for seven years in Canada. She paid taxes every single year. I met Jazmine last year in Vancouver, and she's thriving in her school. She has so many friends. It's one of those situations where she really isn't a burden on the social system; she's attending a public school in B.C. Jazmine and her mother should never have been subjected to this discriminatory process.