Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Nov. 30th, 2020

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I call to order meeting number nine of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration.

Before we proceed, I have a health and safety reminder for everyone. I ask all members and other attendees who are participating in person to please make sure they physically distance themselves from others by at least two metres. Also, wear a mask unless you are seated and more than two metres from anyone else.

This is a hybrid meeting. Some members are appearing in person in the parliamentary precinct and others are appearing remotely. The meeting is being webcast and is available on ParlVu.

As a reminder to all speakers, please speak at a pace slow enough for interpretation to keep up. We will be keeping a list of raised hands if there is a need.

With regard to future business, the committee will meet with the minister and his officials on Wednesday, December 2, for a briefing session on the impact of COVID-19 on the department staffing level. The committee has invited senior officials from IRCC to appear on Monday, December 7, for the study of the impact of COVID-19 on the immigration system.

Today we will be hearing witnesses as we continue our study on the impact of COVID-19 on the immigration system.

I welcome Mr. Christian, assistant professor, Faculty of Law, University of Calgary; from Accueil Liaison Pour Arrivants, Yannick Boucher, director of services for immigrants, and Madam Marie-Laure Konan, director of occupational integration; and, from the Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic, Madam Avvy Yao-Yao Go, clinic director.

I welcome all the witnesses. Thank you for appearing before the committee today.

All witnesses will be provided five minutes for their opening remarks.

We will start with Mr. Christian.

[Gideon Christian, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Law, University of Calgary, As an Individual]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair and honourable members of this committee, for this invitation.

I am a law professor at the University of Calgary in the Faculty of Law. I'm also the president of African Scholars Initiative, ASI-Canada, a registered not-for-profit organization that seeks to attract bright future scholars of African descent to pursue graduate education in Canada.

Speaking as a law professor, intellectual debate in my classroom is exceedingly informed when there is a diversity of opinions among my students. However, achieving such diversity becomes problematic when you have an immigration system that almost always approves study permit applications for students from countries located predominantly in Europe and which at the same time almost always refuses study permit applications for students from countries located predominantly in Africa.

As president of ASI-Canada, I can say that the greatest challenge we have faced in attracting bright future scholars of African descent to pursue higher education in Canada has always been dealing with Canadian immigration officers, especially at the visa office in Nairobi, Kenya. Study permit applications are routinely denied by visa officers relying on subsection 216(1) of the IRPR, a provision similar to paragraph 179(b) of the IRPR. The study permit applications are routinely refused because the visa officers are not satisfied that the applicants will leave Canada at the end of their studies.

This has resulted in the denial of over 80% of study permit applications in the visa offices in Africa. The Nairobi visa office is especially infamous for this. In fact, among my immigration lawyer colleagues in Canada, there is a common joke that when you prepare a study permit application for the Nairobi visa office, you prepare the application in anticipation of litigation. This is because the application will most likely be refused, resulting in judicial review before Federal Court of Canada, with the minister's counsel making an offer to settle and have the application sent back to the visa office for determination. Then the application is refused again. Then you come to the Federal Court to relitigate. Prospective international students often spend a greater percentage of the money meant to fund their education to pay the litigation fees arising from refusal decisions by visa officers.

Madam Chair and honourable members, I wish to also make a submission relating to family reunification in the context of Canadian children in Canada who are the children of foreign nationals outside Canada. For Canadian children whose parents are in countries that require visas to enter Canada, family reunification can be nightmarish.

I would like to narrate the sad experience of a five-year-old Canadian child. For privacy reasons, I will refer to her as “Baby G”. Baby G is a Canadian citizen who returned to Canada in 2018 with her mom, an international student. Baby G was very close to her father. This separation resulted in an adverse psychological impact on Baby G. The mom invited the biological father to visit Baby G in Canada in the hope that his temporary presence in Canada would help address the psychological problem.

The visa application was filed in the Nairobi visa office in September 2019 and was refused after 130 days. The visa officer was not satisfied that the dad would leave Canada because of his personal assets and financial status, even though the dad had submitted bank statements with a total balance of the equivalent of about $66,000 Canadian. In reaching this decision, the visa officer gave zero consideration to the best interests of the Canadian child being adversely affected by the decision.

Immediately, litigation was commenced at the Federal Court challenging the decision. The minister made an offer to settle on the condition that the litigation be discontinued and that the application be sent back to Nairobi for redetermination. The applicant trusted the minister and the Crown, and discontinued the litigation in April 2020. To date the minister has failed to fulfill his undertaking to review this application or to redetermine the application.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting, Mr. Christian. Your time is up. We have to move to our next witness.

Next up is Accueil Liaison pour Arrivants.

Mr. Boucher, I think you will be sharing the time with your colleague. You have five minutes for your opening remarks.

[Yannick Boucher, Director, Services for Immigrants, Accueil Liaison pour Arrivants]

First, allow me to introduce Accueil liaison pour arrivants, or ALPA. The mission of ALPA, which has been actively involved in immigration for 35 years, is to provide immigrants with integration, francization, employment assistance and regionalization services.

An average of 4,000 persons, in all immigration classes, make use of ALPA's services every year. As a front-line immigration and socio-professional integration organization, we are here to today to offer the committee our field observations of the immigration situation in Quebec as it pertains to the subject of your study on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the immigration system.

We should note from the outset that the current situation is exceptional, unprecedented in recent history. We are flying without instruments and doing all we can to minimize its impact on individuals, the human beings who are the focus of our presentation. We applaud this initiative, which is a special opportunity to inform Parliament about the situation of these people and to provide some perspective on the situation.

Today's application backlogs and processing delays stem from a structural problem that predates the COVID-19 pandemic. We had previously observed it, but the present situation has truly revealed and exacerbated the phenomenon. We have noted increased anxiety levels in applicants associated with administrative procedures and the uncertainty of not knowing whether they will receive an acknowledgement of receipt, for example, or whether their files are before the authorities who must review their applications. Applicants need an acknowledgement of receipt to gain continued access to Quebec's health insurance plan. Immigrants need reassurance in coping with these feelings of powerlessness.

Time is also a factor in the anxiety they experience. When documents expire, newcomers must refile applications, particularly for medical examinations. Depending on the size of family units, these costs may be increasingly costly for the individuals we assist. Consider the example of Ms. Belkacem—a pseudonym, of course—a social worker in Montreal whose Quebec acceptance certificate, a document valid for 24 months and required for permanent residency, has expired. As a result, if her permanent residency file is returned to her for additional information, for example, she may have to start immigration proceedings all over again and may even be forced to leave the country as she waits for a positive outcome.

We have also observed situations in which the documents of persons overseas were expiring, a situation that causes intense stress for those individuals. For example, it is hard for permanent residents whose permanent resident cards have expired to obtain permanent resident travel documents that allow them to return to Canada. A similar situation occurs for foreign students stuck in their home countries whose student permits have also expired. The same is true of those whose work permits have expired and may not be renewable or who have no way to find a new employer.

Anxiety as a result of administrative procedures may be exacerbated by situations of confinement, isolation or challenges associated with family reunification, which cause numerous family issues. Prolonged family separation—and we see this—often causes mental and physical health problems, a situation worsened where members awaiting family reunification are minor children whose only living parent is in Canada. We in fact see that many clients of ours who are protected persons have minor children who have remained in their countries. So we feel the situation has been complicated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

In short, extended processing delays worsen a situation that is already tough for many people. The danger is that they can cause major disappointment with the host country, discourage plans to migrate here and undermine Canada's international credibility, as Louise Arbour recently noted.

The processing of temporary resident visas of course has an impact on family reunification, but I would also say that delays raise language issues for international students, mainly those from francophone Africa. Delays affect and undermine the weight that French carries in Canada as a whole. We also know that the pandemic has affected student immersion in francization training. Isolation slows students' progress in learning about Quebec culture, the language barrier is thus eroded, and a language gap appears that will truly be hard to bridge.

There are issues regarding the next generation of workers trained by our educational institutions.

We also work in partnership with businesses. Those businesses say they find it difficult to anticipate the situation. Many recruit labour internationally and devote considerable time and energy to recruitment efforts, but they still don't know when…

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting, Mr. Boucher. Your time is up. You'll get an opportunity to talk about that during the rounds of questioning.

We will now move to our third witness, Madam Go, clinic director of the Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic. She is representing the clinic.

Madam Go, you can start. You have five minutes for your opening remarks.

[Avvy Yao-Yao Go, Clinic Director, Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic]

Thank you.

On behalf of the Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic, I would like to thank the committee for the opportunity to speak to you this afternoon.

The pandemic has dramatically changed the way governments carry out their businesses and has led to some positive outcomes in the context of immigration, including much faster processing times for certain types of applications, as well as fewer detentions and removals. However, COVID-19 has also exposed and exacerbated pre-existing inequities in the immigration system, which are felt most harshly by members of racialized communities and people with precarious immigration status. Despite numerous emergency measures being put in place by the federal government, many of these issues remain unaddressed. Here are a few examples.

Parent and grandparent sponsorship continues to be subject to an arbitrary quota. The MNI requirement continues to deny racialized Canadians, especially women, an opportunity for family reunification due to the racialization of poverty in Canada.

The vulnerability of migrant workers has been laid bare by this pandemic, yet governments have been slow to implement measures to protect them from further exploitation and harm.

Domestic violence incidents have skyrocketed, particularly among women who are trapped in abusive relationships due to their immigration status, many of whom are denied status under the pilot project specifically created for family violence victims.

The government continues to use immigration status as a gateway requirement to access federal benefits and refuses to extend Canada child benefits to children, including those born in Canada, based on their parents' immigration status.

There are delays in almost all immigration and refugee programs, with a concern that dependent children will age out and become ineligible to be sponsored later on.

Also, processing times around the world are still not equitable, especially for countries with a significant racialized population.

On the refugee side, the travel ban has meant a complete shutdown of our borders to asylum seekers. Also, disappointingly, the federal government has appealed the Federal Court decision declaring the Canada-U.S. safe third country agreement unconstitutional.

Finally, while the government has made a welcome announcement to address the political crisis in Hong Kong, the five-year open work permit is available only for those with a university degree, thereby excluding a vast majority of pro-democracy Hong Kong activists.

The government mantra of “build back better” must apply to everyone, regardless of their race, gender and immigration status.

As such, we recommend the following immediate measures, including: expedite the processing of all extension applications for temporary residents in Canada; develop a safe harbour program for more Hong Kong activists and others in countries embroiled in political turmoil right now; allow family class immigrants already granted visas to come to Canada without delay; lock in the age of dependent children as of March 1, 2020, in all applications; and, extend the deadline for restoration of temporary resident status from 90 days to at least June 30, 2021.

Then, in the medium and longer term, we ask you to: implement a regularization program for all people with precarious immigration status; rebalance the overall system by increasing family reunification with relaxing criteria that are fair and inclusive; eliminate the MNI requirement for parent and grandparent sponsorship and remove the quota; end immigration detention; repeal the Canada-U.S. safe third country agreement; eliminate immigration status as an eligibility criteria for current and future government benefits; mandate IRCC and CBSA to collect and publish disaggregated race-based data for all classes of immigration; and, finally, mandate IRCC and CBSA to take proactive actions to address structural racism within the system.

COVID-19 should serve as a wake-up call that the survival of humanity depends on all of us working together and caring for and supporting each other, especially those who are the most marginalized. We hope our government will do the right thing.

Thank you again for the opportunity to present today.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Madam Go.

Thanks to all three witnesses for their opening remarks.

We will now move to a round of questioning.

For the first round of questioning of six minutes, we will start with Ms. Dancho.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Madam Go, I have a number of questions for you regarding your expertise concerning Hong Kong.

My understanding of the announcement from the Liberal government and the Minister of Immigration a few weeks ago is that it primarily focused on economic immigration. In sum, from what they've said with the announcement, it will allow us to expedite study permits and work permits.

My concern is that it only services what seems to be a population that is young, educated and has some means. Are there other populations in Hong Kong that were left out of that announcement, from your perspective?

[Avvy Yao-Yao Go]

I do believe that a large number of people are left out. Not even all the young are included. There are a lot of young activists in Hong Kong who are still in high school. Many of them will not be able to afford the international tuition fee to come to Canada to study. They would not qualify for the open work permit program that is only for post-secondary graduates.

There are also activists who don't have high school or university education. There are actually a couple of people who are now in Canada seeking refugee status. We know for sure that they will not meet any of these requirements. They were lucky enough that they left Hong Kong before the lockdown, so they are now able to apply for asylum here. There are many others who are still in Hong Kong, in other parts of Asia or in other countries who won't be able to get here.

We recently had a conversation with the director of policy for the ministry of immigration. They are not changing any of the policy with respect to asylum seekers. I'm not sure how many of them would end up coming to Canada. In the program we have in place, those people who qualify will have other options. They can go to the U.K. or they can go to Australia. They don't have to come to Canada. I'm not sure how many people will actually benefit.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

Thank you. I appreciate that.

I want to ask a little more and expand on the parents and grandparents program.

Our understanding is that right now, aside from that announcement, the Liberal government has mentioned that they will provide the parents and grandparents lottery, which is provided to anyone who wants to bring their parents and grandparents to Canada. That will, of course, also be an option for Hong Kong.

My understanding is that anyone who wishes to apply for this has to win the lottery. It comes about once a year in the fall. It just wrapped up in October. That may take two to three years if everything goes well and they're selected and they have all the proper travel documents. If the travel documents have been taken, we know it's going to be very difficult for them to be successful in the lottery.

Is my understanding correct or is there another, quicker way for grandparents and parents in Hong Kong who wish to join their families safely in Canada? Is there some other option that I'm not aware of that you may be aware of?

[Avvy Yao-Yao Go]

They do have the option of the super visa. They can come as a visitor, but that's not a permanent resident application.

With respect to permanent applications, the only option is through the lottery system. I would like to point out that parents and grandparents are the only ones who are subject to lottery. I don't understand why that is the case. They are also the only ones that have a quota.

The two factors combined mean that most people who want to sign up on January 1 or January 15 will not get in. They will not be selected. For the vast majority, they don't even have a queue for them to wait because they will not get in through the lottery.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

That's another question I had.

Are you familiar with how long study permits would take for someone who applied? The government has mentioned they are going to open this up, hopefully, in the first quarter. Let's say in the best case it's January. If someone goes to apply for these expedited study permits, how long would that normally take?

[Avvy Yao-Yao Go]

I'm not aware of how long the current process is. Of course, because of the COVID situation, it's kind of hard for me to comment on that right now.

I do think that they have been able to expedite some applications. If they do expedite student permits from Hong Kong, it probably wouldn't take too long. The question is who will actually qualify and how many will have the means to take advantage of that opportunity.

[Raquel Dancho, Conservative, Kildonan—St. Paul, MB]

My understanding is that the situation in Hong Kong is becoming increasingly dire. Democratically elected officials are being removed. The government is clamping down on civil liberties.

In your expert opinion, do you think that Canada should be ramping up our supports for those that are fighting for democracy and need to flee to safety? Do you feel that Canada is doing enough to show our support for the pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong?

[Avvy Yao-Yao Go]

So far, the announcement focuses on economic immigration, so it's not really a humanitarian application or program.

Canada should look at it more from the humanitarian perspective. We have made some suggestions to the minister. For those who are here in Canada right now, there are pro-democracy activists. Canada can easily open a program for them to apply, just like we did after what happened on June 4, 1989, in Tiananmen Square. We had a special program for Chinese nationals to stay in Canada permanently. We can have that for the people who are in Canada.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

We will now go to Ms. Martinez Ferrada for six minutes.

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Allow me to welcome the people from ALPA, an organization from the riding I represent. I'm really glad to have you with us today.

I want to congratulate you on the outstanding work you do with the clientele you serve in Hochelaga and East Montreal and on Montreal Island. Thank you for your hard work.

As you said earlier, we took quick action to put a family reunification process in place. We committed to processing 6,000 files a month and 49,000 more by December. We facilitated the transmission of biometric information, applications and digital interviews, but we especially migrated from paper to digital files.

I'd like to hear what you have to say about everything that's been done during the pandemic. This proved that our immigration system had to be modernized. What else could we do to make the immigration process more efficient?

You talk about the situation in Quebec. I'd like to hear what you have to say about the immigration agreement between Quebec and Canada. What more could we do with respect to that agreement?

[Yannick Boucher]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I'll answer Ms. Martinez Ferrada. I also thank you for the invitation.

We've experienced the changes along with you. I welcome the modernization effort, that is, the digital shift, that's been made by both parties. It has helped us facilitate procedures and processes, which are very complex in many cases. In some instances, Quebec has made it a twofold effort because the Quebec government exercises some immigration powers. I'll come back to that in a moment in response to the second part of your question.

Institutional modernization is a good thing. We at ALPA have also experienced a digital shift. We've been working with immigrants remotely since March, and that has revealed inequalities and a digital divide, which I think has occurred in two areas.

The first area is access to bandwidth. That's extremely important, but not everyone can afford a home connection that's fast enough. These services cost money. Everything's being done remotely and by video. That's the first point.

The second area is digital literacy. You can acquire the tools, but you still have to know how to use them. When you modernize and go digital, you use PDF documents, for example. However, if you don't have access to a computer, it's extremely difficult to use those documents. Most people we help have an Internet connection, but with their smart phones, which have small screens. In many instances, forms aren't adapted to those screens. We have to assist people with the procedures, and our work, in a way, is done in twofold manner. We take the PDFs and complete them remotely.

We can't criticize all this modernization—you can't be opposed to virtue—but it does have the effect of doubling or tripling the time we spend working with every person we assist.

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

Mr. Boucher, since we don't have a lot of time, would you briefly address the case of Quebec, please?

[Yannick Boucher]

Yes, absolutely.

The Quebec case is relevant because I think it currently takes an average of 26 months to get permanent residence in Quebec. So that's about two years. Earlier I talked about how all documents expire. So you can imagine the situation.

I think there are promising solutions in Quebec, given that it's quite easy to find a temporary springboard to permanent residence. I'm thinking here of the Quebec experience program, the PEQ, which is intended for students and temporary workers who can file their applications. I think it's important to capitalize on that.

The borders are closed right now. To renew our population in Quebec, we'll absolutely have to facilitate, and continue to facilitate, access to this springboard that temporary residents can use to become permanent residents. The fact that the borders are closed really complicates the situation. Quebec and the federal government will necessarily have to combine their efforts to facilitate matters. There's also the entire question of asylum seekers. It's mainly Quebec and Ontario that receive them. Unfortunately, we have very few services for them in Montreal.

[Soraya Martinez Ferrada, Liberal, Hochelaga, QC]

You don't have any funding for processing refugee cases.

Is that correct?

[Yannick Boucher]

There's no funding for processing asylum claims. A small portion of the funding we receive is earmarked for housing assistance, but services for asylum claimants are currently nonexistent. They need those services. These people have work permits and therefore can work. They're already trying to contribute. We've seen that during the pandemic. Most of the people who were on the front lines in the health system and who were working as patient care attendants or concierges were asylum claimants. We're indebted to them for that and we must also be able to offer them services. Right now, though, the doors are closed to asylum claimants.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Mr. Boucher, I'm sorry for interrupting, but your time is up.

We will now move to Madam Normandin.

Madam Normandin, you have six minutes.

[Christine Normandin, Bloc, Saint-Jean, QC]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair.

Once again, thanks to the witnesses for their testimony. It will be a great help to us in drafting the recommendations that we include in our report.

My questions are mainly for Mr. Boucher.

We've heard about very long waits and people who've had to undergo medical examinations several times, which is very costly, even more so for an entire family. Do you know of any situations in which that just compromised the permanent residence applications of certain persons?

[Yannick Boucher]

ALPA handles a lot of those kinds of cases. Earlier I mentioned a situation we know of involving delays and expiring documents. Many problems are related to medical exams. Very few of the families we're currently assisting can afford the exams, and I should acknowledge all the efforts the community network is making. Through modest savings and fundraising, the network offers much needed support to these families. The community network abandons no one. It's not because it isn't funded to do it that it isn't doing it. They're still helping them. If there's any one thing that's really causing problems, it's these medical exams. We could cite a lot of examples.