Citizenship and Immigration Committee on May 12th, 2022

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you.

I'll just go back to the first point. The issue is that we're excluding people who have been prominent pro-democracy protesters and activists, for instance, if they're high school students, if they're not yet graduates. Why would we exclude human rights defenders who clearly should be able to come to Canada based on the principles of these program, yet aren't formally graduates yet?

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting, but time is up, Minister.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Perhaps I can get a response in writing, at least. Thanks.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

We will have to move to Mr. El-Khoury.

You will have two and a half minutes for your round of questioning. You can please begin.

[Fayçal El-Khoury, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for coming to visit us so often and for explaining so many interesting things to us.

I would like to mention something at the beginning regarding the violence in our cities, Mr. Minister. Part of this happened in my riding. It must be known to everyone that a good part of the responsibility also goes to the provincial police of each area. Everything is not just on the federal side.

Here are my questions.

There are a number of programs and grants that are increasing significantly.

Are you able to tell us about the major steps taken compared to previous years in this regard?

Are there any new tools or pilot programs in the 2022-23 main estimates that you would like to bring to the committee's attention?

Can you tell us how the 2022-23 main estimates will address the links between economic growth and immigration?

Thank you, Minister.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

Thank you for the question.

The review of measures in the main estimates is a very important function of the committee.

These amounts have not increased by accident. They stem from the decision to increase the number of newcomers to Canada. This is essential, in my view, to promote the national interest. The economy is doing very well, but this will improve it.

It's not enough to be excellent. We have to increase the margin by which we are excellent compared to competitor economies. The increase in the numbers that you see in the estimates is a reflection of the decisions that we've taken to bring more people here to fill the gaps in the economy so that we can experience economic growth.

There was one piece I was a little unclear on, the second element to your question. You mentioned a pilot program. Was there a specific pilot, or just generally funding?

[Fayçal El-Khoury, Liberal, Laval—Les Îles, QC]

Is there a new pilot program in 2022-23 that you would like to express, or a new idea?

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting, Mr. El-Khoury.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

I have many I'd like to....

Are we out of time?

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Yes. If you could, please give a quick 10-second answer.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

I'm very excited about the new flexibilities we're going to be pursuing in the express-entry system, which is going to allow us to target, with more precision, workers to fill the gaps in key sectors than is possible under the current system.

I have much more to say, but maybe at my next committee appearance.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

With that, we end our rounds of questioning.

We have to vote on the main estimates 2022-23, and then we will start our second panel.

DEPARTMENT OF CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION

Vote 1—Operating expenditures..........$1,539,424,462

Vote 5—Capital expenditures..........$30,355,221

Vote 10—Grants and contributions..........$2,126,826,012

(Votes 1, 5 and 10 agreed to on division)

IMMIGRATION AND REFUGEE BOARD

Vote 1—Program expenditures..........$254,883,504

(Vote 1 agreed to on division)

As the chair, shall I report the votes on the main estimates to the House?

[An hon. member]

On division.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you.

We will now suspend the meeting for a few minutes and then go into the second panel, where we will have opening remarks.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I call the meeting to order.

I would like to thank the minister once again for appearing before the committee. This panel will be on the applications backlog and processing times.

Minister, I would like you to provide your opening remarks for five minutes. You can begin, please.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

Thank you so much, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'd like to now turn to address the issue of application inventories and processing times at IRCC.

My view, I think people will appreciate, is that immigration is critical to the well-being of our communities, and that newcomers play an essential role in addressing some of our most severe labour shortages throughout the pandemic and as we enter the economic recovery phase.

The past few years have posed real challenges that would have been beyond imagining just a couple of years ago. Immigration systems around the world have been affected by the pandemic as a result of lengthy border closures, travel restrictions and public health measures that have prevented people from going to work, particularly in jurisdictions where they may not have been able to adjust to work from home as easily as they have in Canada, depending on the line of work.

Yet at the same time we continued to receive applications, leading to frustrating delays and substantial file backlogs. My department is working hard to resolve these issues.

We have made great efforts to mitigate the effects of the pandemic, partly through digital solutions and program innovations.

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada has modernized its processes by increasing the digitization of files, offering online intake for many lines of business and allowing for greater remote processing of applications despite office closures that forced staff to work remotely where that was an option.

As a result, and in spite of the global pandemic, IRCC made over half a million decisions and welcomed over 405,000 new permanent residents in 2021, which is the greatest number of newcomers in a single year in Canada's history.

This was possible in part because we established a pathway to permanent residency for people who were here in Canada on a temporary status, including temporary foreign workers, students and others making a positive contribution to Canada’s economy.

Additionally, in the midst of the pandemic, we made a decision to step up with a significant contribution on the world stage to accept at least 40,000 Afghan refugees as well as tens of thousands of Ukrainians.

In spite of this increasingly large and complex workload, we are seeing that we are able to reach some pretty important goals. Already IRCC has surpassed its goal to make 147,000 permanent residence final decisions in the first quarter of 2022, which is double the number during the same period of time in 2021. In fact, from January to the end of March, we made over 156,000 final decisions on permanent residence applications, which puts us on a pace where our ambitious goal this year is well within reach.

To respond to the pressures resulting from the pandemic, to support Canada's economic recovery and to help us address our labour shortage, we're investing an additional $85 million to help reduce application inventories that were accumulated during the pandemic and to increase staff across the department.

This includes applications from international students, workers and visitors, as well as applications for permanent resident card renewals and citizenship ceremonies.

On April 22, I announced that, at the beginning of mid-June, Canada will extend post-graduate work permits for recent international graduates. Those whose permits have already expired or will expire this year will be eligible for an additional open work permit of 18 months. As well, in July of this year, we'll be ending the temporary pause on express-entry draws, and we will resume inviting qualified candidates to apply for permanent residence.

Across Canada, processing is going to continue for all of our programs with 100% of IRCC offices and service providers open. Capacity limits continue to require the majority of staff to work remotely, but it's not stopping processing or our ability to address the inventory of cases that have built up.

Of our missions overseas, 98% are open. As well, 97% of our visa application centres are open and offering biometrics collection, and 98% of our panel physicians' clinics are open and offering immigration medical exams.

But clearly, there is a lot more work to do. Addressing a backlog of applications is not simply a numbers or a resources challenge—it is a human challenge.

Every application represents a person whose life is in some way on hold or has been impacted. I know that. Our department is also very aware of the real-life impact that the challenges that our immigration system faces can have on individuals and families.

My view is that we have a duty to resolve these challenges, to do right by those who have hopes of making a new life in Canada and to help to continue to recover from the pandemic. We're committed to helping to resolve these challenges by making the necessary investments to address these challenges that are serious, but are the result of a temporary and exogenous shock to the immigration system.

Thank you for your time.

With that, I'll be pleased to answer the committee's questions with the final comment that we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that the output of our immigration system remains extraordinary.

The user experience can be very challenging. By making the kinds of investments that I've described and some that I'm sure we'll get into in the question and answer period, I do believe we can return to prepandemic standards and have our immigration system on track to support the people who'd like to come to Canada, and as importantly, support the communities that they will call home after they arrive.

Thank you, Madam Chair.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Minister.

We will now proceed to our rounds of questioning. We will begin the first round with Mr. Genuis for six minutes.

Mr. Genuis, the floor is yours.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you, Minister.

It's important to acknowledge that we do have a very serious problem with backlogs right now. I infer from your remarks that acknowledgement of the problem, which is an important first step.

Part of solving the problem is not just to say that you're working on it, but to establish specific goals in terms of what is an acceptable wait time for people for specific categories and to establish timelines in which you intend to realize those goals. For instance, you would say that the current wait times in many categories are clearly unacceptable and create significant hardship for people, and then say what acceptable wait times are and that you will seek to have our system working within those wait times within a certain period of time.

Is it your intention to identify those goals and timelines and work toward them?

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

Yes. In fact, it is to go one step further. The service standards for the different lines of business are what we identify as acceptable wait times. That will range based on what stream you're talking about. My goal is to get back to service standards. I think we'll be able to do it on a majority of lines of business potentially this calendar year. Where we can't do it, we should be broadcasting those timelines.

On the announcement I made on January 31 about some of the investments we're making, we did broadcast some of those timelines. The step further that I wanted to share with you is that we also made the decision to broadcast where we're actually at and not just where the service standards are. Some people may say it's weird for the government to be publishing that they are beyond service standards, but I don't think there's a problem with acknowledging that.

We have posted publicly the actual processing times, so that people can see where we are at and where we should be. I expect you want to get to your questions, but if you'd like more details, Dan Mills from our department would probably be able to tell you the anticipated timelines to get back to service standard for each line of business.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

Thank you. I would appreciate that information in writing, if we can receive it at the committee, to know what the goals are in terms of timelines for coming back to those service standards.

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

Are there specific lines of business you're most interested in?

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I would like to see all of them. Personally, I'm particularly interested in the processing times around refugee sponsorship, but I think we would be interested in seeing all of them.

I have another question for you, Minister. In a context where, as you've identified, a majority of staff involved in processing are working remotely, how many people involved in immigration processing are on unpaid leave as a result of their personal vaccination status?

[Sean Fraser, Liberal, Central Nova, NS]

I don't have that number. I'm not sure if any of our officials have that number in front of them.

[Caroline Xavier]

I don't have the exact number, but from my recollection, I don't believe it's more than about 200 people out of close to 11,000 employees who are not currently working with us due to the choice they've made on vaccination status, but I can get that number more accurately. I'm just guessing.

[Garnett Genuis, Conservative, Sherwood Park—Fort Saskatchewan, AB]

I think we would appreciate it. Our view, as a party, is, again, especially in a context where most of those folks are working from home, that it would be an easy win, Minister—and obviously you have to consult with some of your cabinet colleagues— for the government to say, “Let's let these folks get back to work so that we can get people who are experienced working in processing back on the issue of processing.”

Respond to that point if you want to, but could you maybe also address another issue?

Your department now limits the number of inquiries you will respond to from MPs' offices, and our offices, our staff, are working very hard, in many cases well over time, to respond to the concerns people have. It is a major source of frustration that we're limited in the kinds of responses and level of responses we get from the department. We're on the front lines of serving people often, so what's the rationale behind that limitation? Is there any willingness to revisit it?