Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Feb. 15th, 2018

[Marta Morgan]

I don't believe we have that number with us. If it is available, we will provide it to the committee.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Great. Thank you. I know it was about 5% in 2015. I'm wondering if you could express that number both in terms of an actual case number as well as a percentage of the total number of spousal sponsorship applications.

[Marta Morgan]

Yes, we will provide the numbers that we have on that. We just don't have them with us.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

My understanding is that the rules around spousal sponsorship have been relaxed. Are you no longer tracking the data on fraudulent spousal sponsorship?

[Marta Morgan]

We don't have that data with us.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

But you are tracking it.

[Marta Morgan]

I believe we are tracking it, and I'm saying we will get you the data we have, but we don't have it with us for this committee appearance.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

But to be clear, you are tracking...?

[Marta Morgan]

We track fraud across all our business lines. It's an important element of our program integrity.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Given the relaxation in rules on spousal sponsorship is there any set number or percentage of applications that would be found to be fraudulent that you have flagged within the department before remedial measures would be taken?

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

Ms. Rempel, just to be fair to the witnesses who prepared to come to speak on levels, to give them a little leeway, because I don't expect they are necessarily prepared to speak on those issues, I'm reminding committee members that when we invite witnesses on an agenda item that's what they prepare for.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

On a point of order, Mr. Chair, many lines of questions have been asked by my colleagues on spousal sponsorship. It directly relates to the immigration levels, and I don't understand why my colleagues from the Liberal Party weren't given a similar warning. I would ask that my questions to the minister stand.

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

Your question stands. I'm just saying that I doubt that our witnesses would have been able to prepare on issues that they were not invited to speak on. The issue with respect to the number of spousal sponsorships are absolutely in line with the levels discussion. The number of cases of fraud I don't believe are related directly to the levels. However, please continue.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Again, I would ask you to table that information with the committee.

[Marta Morgan]

We do have integrated risk management and fraud management frameworks for various business lines that include careful monitoring for fraud across all our business lines. That's part of our ongoing business. Sometimes these things can be across a whole program. We look at it or the issues might come up in particular regions, but we have a very active program to track fraud in the programs.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Does the department anticipate or has it done any analysis on the potential impacts on immigration levels should the government adopt the zero draft or the UN compact for safe, orderly and regular migration?

[Marta Morgan]

No.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Is any analysis being planned as part of that consultation process?

[Marta Morgan]

We are obviously looking at the issues around that compact, but at this point it's zero draft, and whether there would be an impact on levels would be very premature to assess.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

In terms of the government's involvement in the consultation on that draft, is there no work going on in the department on the potential impact on levels?

[Paul MacKinnon]

We're doing lots of work on it and we're analyzing the zero draft. Our sense at this point is that there will not be a significant effect on the levels because Canada already adheres to many of the principles you see in that zero draft: responsibility sharing, resettlement programs, a number of pathways for refugees and migrants writ large. We think we're on track with where it is now.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

How about the impact on the $440 million included in the minister's statement? Has that been analyzed?

[Paul MacKinnon]

As I said, at this point while we're very involved in the negotiations, we don't see a hit either on level space or on the fiscal framework associated with levels at this early stage.

[Michelle Rempel, Conservative, Calgary Nose Hill, AB]

Does the department plan on putting in place any sort of budgetary analysis in terms of the impact of adopting the global compact in terms of its budgetary allocation in this year's budget?

[Paul MacKinnon]

Certainly as the negotiations roll out over the next number of months and we have a better sense of where they will go, that is certainly something we will look at.