Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Nov. 7th, 2024

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

I think it's important to have that analysis.

Once that analysis is complete, will you share that information with the committee? When do you expect the first round of analysis to be completed?

[Bronwyn May]

I'll need to revert to the committee at a later point to confirm when it will be possible to share that information.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

All right.

Aside from looking at patterns of potential violators—the groups and organizations taking advantage of students with these fraudulent letters of acceptance—will you be including in the analysis what types of institutions are being utilized for these fraudulent letters? In other words, is it private institutions versus public institutions, colleges versus universities and so on? Will that be part of the analysis?

[Bronwyn May]

It's not always the case that a letter originates from an institution. We would need to look at various possible sources.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Maybe I can reframe that.

Obviously, as these are fraudulent letters of acceptance, they wouldn't be issued by the institutions. However, regarding the list of institutions being used for the purpose of these fraudulent letters, I would be interested in obtaining information to determine what percentage are private institutions and public institutions, how many of them are colleges, how many of them are universities and so on. That will tell us very specific information that I think is important when trying to tackle fraudulent activities.

[Bronwyn May]

I completely agree. That's a very important line of analysis.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

I will make the further request to make sure you share this information with the committee. I'll argue that this information should not be kept secret. It should be public and transparent—shared with all Canadians—so that we're aware of what the landscape is and of how international students are being taken advantage of.

With respect to that analysis, will there be information and data on what countries are being targeted?

[Bronwyn May]

We can look into that, for sure.

You're speaking about, I assume, the country of origin of the applicant to whom the letter was issued. That can be looked at as well.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Yes, that's correct. That will also tell us a lot about which student bodies are being taken advantage of or facing fraudulent activities.

All that said, I think this analysis is critical. Having collected this much information, you'll be able to do your preliminary analysis. That should be done as soon as possible, and that information should be shared with the committee. It will be critical, for the purpose of this study, for us to receive that information before we write the final report.

I will leave that there and hope we can get the information.

On the flip side of that, I'd be interested to know how many of the applications that have come through your screening process at this point indicate valid letters of acceptance.

[Bronwyn May]

I believe about 500,000 applications have been run through the system. About 93% of those were positive matches. When I say that, I mean that the application comes in with the letter of acceptance. IRCC pings the institution associated with that letter of acceptance, and then they confirm the authenticity of the letter.

In 93% of cases, there was a match confirmed by the institution. Two per cent were not matched, 1% were indicated as cancelled by the DLI and for about 2.7% we received no response from the DLI.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

I'm sorry. What was the percentage for no response?

[Bronwyn May]

For 2.7%, there was no response from the DLI.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Okay.

I assume that this analysis is being done with the data points that we mentioned earlier. If you can confirm that and also share that information with the committee when it's available, that would be great.

[Bronwyn May]

I'm happy to do that.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Thank you.

I want to move on to the conversations the ministry had with institutions. There was some indication that there was a discussion with institutions. I'm particularly interested in public education institutions, colleges and universities.

I wonder if you can share with the committee what the comments were on the government's plan for changes and in what areas they flagged deep concerns.

[Bronwyn May]

We've had intensive discussions with national education associations, learning institutions and provinces and territories over the course of the last 18 months. That's through the tables that we convene and through ongoing conversations on all of the measures that were highlighted in my opening remarks.

Over the summer in particular, we provided detailed forward plans for a number of additional changes that would be made and announced, and those were subsequently announced in the fall. All provinces, territories and education associations were able to provide comments to us. In addition, we're in the late stages of a regulatory amendment process, and those regulatory changes were posted for public comment as well, so there's been extensive consultation.

In terms of the specific comments provided in the case of the regulatory package, those are available publicly. I think the stakeholders are probably better able to convey their views on the reforms.

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

Thank you very much. We're long over time.

Now I'll give five minutes to the Conservatives, five minutes to the Liberals, two and a half minutes to the Bloc and two and a half minutes to the NDP. Then we will release the witnesses. We have 15 more minutes.

Are you okay with that, witnesses? Thank you.

With that in mind, we can now go to Mr. Kmiec for five minutes.

Please go ahead.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'll go very quickly to IRCC officials, specifically on housing.

You mentioned it in your opener. It's mentioned 36 times in the immigration levels plan. Is your branch the one that wrote the warning that was talked about in the Canadian press? Internal reports warned Minister Fraser, when he was immigration minister, that high immigration levels in Canada were going to cause a housing crunch.

[Bronwyn May]

As I mentioned earlier, the housing supply gap has many factors. It would be unfair to say that it is caused by international students.

In terms of your specific question—

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

I'm sorry; that's not what I'm saying. I'm asking about—

[The Chair, Liberal, Sukh Dhaliwal]

I'm sorry. One person speaks at a time.

Go ahead, please.

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

I asked specifically about an internal report that journalists have spoken about and written about in the Canadian press—the National Post and other media outlets—referring to material written in 2022, two years ago, saying there was going to be a housing crunch and making the connection directly to immigration levels in Canada. That's not me saying this. That's from an internal IRCC report.

What I'm asking is this: Is your branch—or either of you two—the one that wrote this report?

[Bronwyn May]

I joined the department about 18 months ago. I can't speak to anything prior to that.

What I can say is that over the last 18 months, we have been having continuous conversations. Information has been sought and received by the minister about challenges in the international student program, and that is what led to the reforms that I summarized—

[Tom Kmiec, Conservative, Calgary Shepard, AB]

I'm going to interrupt you there. I want that internal report, because journalists have access to it, and I would like it tabled with this committee in an unredacted format. It is directly what led to changes in the international student program. Everybody has made that connection. I think all members, especially on the opposition side, deserve to know what the former minister was warned about before he was shuffled out of his portfolio because he had failed and a new minister was put in.

Can you make a commitment to file that with this committee? Journalists already have it. This committee doesn't have it.

[Bronwyn May]

I don't believe I have that report, so I would need to revert to the department and return to the committee with a response to your question.