Evidence of meeting #98 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 board.
A video is available from Parliament.
12:10 p.m.
NDP
Jenny Kwan NDP Vancouver East, BC
Does the IRB keep stats, then, on the nature of the complaints in categories? If you do, can you provide that information to the committee?
12:10 p.m.
Acting Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board
We don't break them down. We would have to go through them individually to give you a sense of what they are.
12:10 p.m.
NDP
Jenny Kwan NDP Vancouver East, BC
Thank you.
Earlier there was a question about the consultation. Can you provide a full list of who was consulted for the review process?
12:10 p.m.
NDP
Jenny Kwan NDP Vancouver East, BC
Can you also provide the committee with a list of the recommendations that were not implemented? You highlighted one specifically, which is around the independence issue. I would argue, of course, on the independence issue, that while the office of integrity is somewhat independent, all of those decisions get put forward to the chair, who is not independent. Why not go all the way and make sure that every single decision sits with an independent authority with respect to complaints so that you have full transparency—
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Rob Oliphant
I'm afraid I need to end you there. You'll get another chance.
Mr. Anandasangaree for seven minutes. We're going to go back to our seven minutes. Each of the parties had seven and a half minutes on the first round.
12:10 p.m.
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
This is our first meeting back, and I'll share that Salma Zahid is taking a leave and that all of our thoughts and prayers are with her in this most difficult time for her and her family.
I do want to first thank both of you for being here. I know the IRB has been the subject of a number of developments recently, and I want to start specifically with the appointments process. I know that's being revamped.
How many appointees do you have that predate 2015, the current process you put in place?
12:15 p.m.
Acting Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board
I don't have the specific number. I can tell you that there have been, I believe, 89 appointments made under this government.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON
Are you confident that all of the appointees, including the current appointees right now, are competent to serve in the role of IRB adjudicator? Depending on the division, do you feel they're competent and meet the standards that you as chair would expect of your colleagues?
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON
You are.
I have heard from counsel, in a number of different cases, that if a particular applicant is from a particular country, then there's a track record of an IRB adjudicator consistently turning down those applications. Do you have any tracking or any sense of that type of trend? Do you track those trends?
Second, have any of those complaints come to you? I know that they've been the subject of some Federal Court interventions.
12:15 p.m.
Acting Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board
We don't track those trends because we don't want to interfere with the independence of the individual decision-makers. The recourse there is properly with the Federal Court. Members will adjudicate differently based on their appreciation of the facts and the law. That may lead to different results. By and large, however, I think what drives those outcomes is more the country conditions than the proclivities of individual members.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON
I can appreciate that, but certainly I do think that many of the lawyers have commented on perhaps biases of individual adjudicators. In that circumstance, would there not be a need for a basic standard of understanding on country conditions? IRB does packets of country conditions—
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON
—and I think they should be sure they're consistent across the board.
If there's a particular viewpoint there that's not reflected in the decision-making, then would that not be a cause for concern for you?
12:15 p.m.
Acting Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board
In an ideal world, we would have 100% consistency, but it's a process that is adjudicated by humans. Any adjudicative system—the boards or any other one—will have variances in decision-making.
The check on that, though, is not the complaints process, I would argue. I think the check on that is the process of judicial review and seeing whether or not the decision is sustainable.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON
If I may just clarify, in the process of judicial review, it is really up to the federal court to grant leave or not. It's not an automatic right to an appeal. It's more of a—
12:15 p.m.
Acting Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board
Absolutely, and it's absolutely a fair comment to say that there are a number of other variables that come into play, like can you afford to go to federal court? If you can afford to go to federal court, do you get leave?
The one thing that we have in place right now is the RAD, and the RAD doesn't cost anything. You get an appeal as a right to the RAD with certain exceptions, and that's an appeal within the board. The RAD is there, at least on the refugee side, to look at what the RPD did and decide whether or not they agree with it. That feature is baked into the process.
12:15 p.m.
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON
Coming back to two individual cases, I don't know if you're in a position to comment on them, but they're Sterlin and Cassano. I believe they're adjudicators, and they've been the subject of a number of reports.
Are you able to advise us as to why action wasn't taken earlier? Are you able to disclose that information here?
12:20 p.m.
Acting Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board
I feel a little bit uncomfortable talking about the appraisal process that took place in the past for a couple of reasons. Some of it involves personal information. The other one is I can't get into the mind of the people who made those decisions.
12:20 p.m.
Liberal
Gary Anandasangaree Liberal Scarborough—Rouge Park, ON
Maybe in general terms, do you believe that in the last two years, your process of complaints met the standard that you as a chair would want to have across the board in the IRB?