Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Feb. 3rd, 2022

[Thibault Camara]

Okay.

In 2021, the Canadian government even created an exceptional program to allow tens of thousands of francophone graduates of Canadian institutions to apply for permanent residency with no proof of employment. Finally, just this past Monday, the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship himself stated that international students make excellent permanent residents. Canada is clearly committed to retaining the international students selected by these institutions.

However, when it comes to nationals [Technical difficulty]—

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting. I think there is an interpretation issue. Could you please stop for a second?

Okay, please continue.

[Thibault Camara]

The notion of dual intent clearly grants disproportionate discretion to Immigrations, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) officers, leaving room for discriminatory bias, as this regulation only applies to a portion of students, generally those who need a visa. By the way, this is also an issue in the processing of spousal sponsorship cases, and it always affects the same individuals.

Secondly, I want to alert the committee to the lack of transparency and the arbitrary nature of decisions made by IRCC officers. It's impossible to know precisely how study permit decisions are made, and some federal court rulings show that these decisions are sometimes not justified.

The Quebec Immigration Lawyers Association has shown that of 25 student visa refusals from the Accra, Ghana office that have been challenged in Federal Court, the court has upheld 23. That means that almost all the applications that were refused should actually have been accepted. That is just one example of the major issue we are facing today. Not every denied application should have to go to Federal Court for what should be a simple study permit application.

Concerns about transparency do not end there. The Chinook artificial intelligence system brought in to speed up application processing appears to be unobtrusively reinforcing discriminatory biases. It seems this tool was not subjected to consultation prior to usage and, while it does bring up the processing rate, it apparently leads to more refusals, with no need to justify them.

In an employee report on anti-racism report, IRCC employees were concerned that some manifestations of racism, even subtle ones, could affect the processing of immigration cases. The different refusal rates from country to country were even given as an example. This proves that racial bias has an impact on application processing and that there is discrimination based on country of residence at IRCC.

We come before you today with very significant concerns, but we can offer pragmatic and structural solutions.

Over the short term, we recommend that the Chinook software no longer be used effective immediately, that the guidelines given to IRCC officers be clearly and explicitly released, and that a mechanism be established to reimburse the tuition fees of individuals whose study permit applications have been refused.

Over the medium term, we recommend a substantial increase in IRCC's annual budget. IRCC needs more resources to meet its own processing targets, but it must also do it humanely and decently, for both officers and applicants.

In conclusion, we recommend that legislation be introduced to create an Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada ombudsperson position. Greater clarity and transparency can only serve both Canada [Technical difficulty] already contact the Hon. Minister of Immigration and parliamentary secretary—

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Sorry for interrupting, Mr. Camara—

[Thibault Camara]

We look forward to working together.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

—but your time is up.

We will now go to our rounds of questioning.

Mr. Hallan, you have six minutes for your round of questioning.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to all the witnesses.

My line of questioning will be for Mr. Camara. I was reading through the report. Thank you so much for what you all compiled.

My first question is with regard to the lack of resources that you stated in the report. My question is whether you think there is a link between a lack of resources and this alarming report of racism within IRCC. Might it not just be a lack of resources, but also the work environment there being toxic that could be causing some of these issues that are happening with the processing of files?

[Thibault Camara]

Thank you for your question.

We recognize that lack of resources may be leading officers to process cases as quickly as possible, and with as little sensitivity and humanity as possible.

So it's not that racist behaviour is happening, but unfortunately, officers are likely making decisions with discriminatory biases because they want to do things quickly and they are not taking the time to do them properly.

We have a clear recommendation: It will take a massive investment to allow for better, more humane processing of applications, but also to give IRCC officers the time to process cases expeditiously and humanely, because they need it.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Camara.

I'm going to give you some time, because this report was quite extensive, to talk a bit more about the Chinook tool, what your recommendation is about putting it on pause for now, and anything else related to your recommendations. I'll leave the floor open to you, because I know there was a lot you wanted to cover.

[Thibault Camara]

Thank you for your question about the Chinook tool.

The situation is somewhat complex at the moment because Parliament has just resumed, but we have submitted a brief to all members to read. I am always available to answer any other questions about this.

Some examples show that the Chinook tool, which has been used since 2018, lacks transparency. One article revealed that, from the outset, the Chinook tool, which was created with no legal oversight, has not kept notes about immigration officers' decisions and has not required officers to look at evidence submitted by applicants seeking temporary residency.

Our recommendation is clear. It is to immediately stop using the Chinook system to take the time to understand the algorithms they relied upon to create the artificial intelligence and make selections. Once it's proven that Chinook is bias-free, it can be used again.

We are tagging this recommendation onto a second one, and we immigrants have been asking IRCC to do this for years. We would like all rules and regulations on which officers base their decisions to be clearly released, because they are making arbitrary decisions and there's a huge lack of transparency.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Thank you for that answer. I think you hit the nail on the head that there's a lack of transparency. In most cases it seems like the officer has too much power and too much authority without any consequences for some of the decisions that are being made.

Do you have any recommendations for solving some of these issues? These are the issues we hear about in our MPs' offices as well.

[Thibault Camara]

Thank you for your question.

We do indeed have a recommendation and I am going to insist on this, because I know it has already been recommended to the committee. It is that an Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada ombudsperson position be created.

We're recommending this to foster greater clarity and transparency. It will be useful for Canada and individuals wishing to obtain temporary or permanent residency.

We have a bill, requests for meetings have been made and we look forward to working with the Minister and the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship.

Creating an ombudsperson position would allow for forecasting, reviewing of decisions and decision-making without adjudication of any kind. It would save time and money. It would reduce impact on the constituency offices of all members of Parliament across Canada. It would allow for analysis and reporting of systemic issues. It would allow for an analysis of what's going on.

This will provide transparency for all members of the public and, in addition, it will address a recommendation from the committee's May 2021 report, which called for the creation of an ombudsperson position.

[Jasraj Singh Hallan, Conservative, Calgary Forest Lawn, AB]

Thank you, Mr. Camara.

When we read your report, we realized that it's not always the francophone community from Africa that is being discrimination against. Are there other groups that you think are being discriminated against as well?

[Thibault Camara]

Thank you for your question.

I do not know how much time I have left, but I will try to answer quickly.

As we understand it, multiple factors are involved. Today we are addressing the issue of francophone international students from Africa, but perhaps a more in-depth analysis should be done on how developed each country is. That would look at French-speaking African countries that are not very developed. We have examples of refusal rates—

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting, Mr. Camara. Your time is up.

We will now proceed to MP Kayabaga. You will have six minutes for your round of questions. Please proceed.

[Arielle Kayabaga, Liberal, London West, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

I'd like to begin by thanking the witnesses for being here and presenting their research to us.

First, I have a question for Mr. Dupuis.

You talked about francophone immigration data. If no concrete action is taken, those numbers will continue to decline between now and 2036. Is that right?

Mr. Dupuis, in your opinion, how will the refusal rate for francophone student immigration applications affect the decline? What target do we need to set to turn the decline around?

[Alain Dupuis]

The francophone immigration target of 4.4% was established in 2003. That was equivalent or close to the demographic weight of the francophone community in the 2001 census.

It was a mistake to set the target at 4.4%. Last fall's report from the Commissioner of Official Languages demonstrates that to keep the demographic weight at 4.4%, we would have needed a much higher target simply to maintain the francophone population outside of Quebec.

In my opinion, this demonstrates how important it is that this target be raised. A catch-up target will need to be set. As the Commissioner said, not reaching the target in 2008, which was the primary objective, resulted in a shortage of 76,000 individuals in our communities. That's the entire francophone population of British Columbia right now. It's [Technical difficulty] French, which is very vibrant, that we have been unable to welcome over the past 20 years.

Clearly, these objectives must also be applied to international students. That's the situation we are denouncing today. It's as if francophone immigration targets are being ignored when we look at visa applications. The factor that often contributes to refusal is that the applicant must prove that they will return to their country. However, we would like these new graduates to stay in Canada, contribute to the vitality of our communities and find employment in fields experiencing a labour shortage.

We'd like to see policies related to visa processing aligned with our francophone immigration targets. Let's hope that comes to be. The recommendation in that respect is that IRCC conduct a formal review of the admission criteria and determine whether to change the requirement for applicants to return home. It's not at all consistent with Canada's official language objectives.

[Arielle Kayabaga, Liberal, London West, ON]

Thank you very much.

You also mentioned earlier that 60% of the francophones were in Africa. Do you see a link between the declining francophone community in Canada and the refusal to go get that percentage of francophones in Africa?

[Alain Dupuis]

Absolutely. Unfortunately, we have no promotion and recruitment strategy for French-speaking countries in general, but that's especially true for Africa. As I said in my opening remarks, we don't have the capacity. The Dakar office has to process visa applications from 15 or 16 countries, which means it serves up to 276 million people. They don't have the processing capacity and the strategy for Africa lacks consistency. It's obvious.

The Francophonie will grow around the world and reach 700 million people by 2050. Most of that growth will happened in sub-Saharan Africa, but also in Maghreb. We therefore need a strategy specifically targeting international students in French-speaking Africa, but we also need a much more global strategy. The Canadian government needs adequate resources to promote immigration in Francophonie countries and, most of all, it has to be able to process visa applications to address the major labour shortage across all sectors in Quebec and elsewhere in Canada.

[Arielle Kayabaga, Liberal, London West, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

I'm sorry for interrupting.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

I'm sorry, Madam Chair, there was no translation in that last part with Mr. Dupuis.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

For the last 15 seconds there was no interpretation.

If you could please repeat the last 15 seconds, we'll start the clock again.

[Alain Dupuis]

To sum up, I believe that the global growth of the Francophonie will be centred mainly in Africa. Therefore, we must establish a consistent strategy that takes into account the Canadian government's francophone immigration policy and objectives. That has to include student visas in French-speaking countries, but also a much more comprehensive strategy for francophone immigration, promotion, recruitment and processing in Francophonie countries around the world.

[Arielle Kayabaga, Liberal, London West, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Dupuis. I appreciate your comments. To sum up what I understood, we really need to address the lack of resources in Africa. Mr. Camara, or perhaps it was you, mentioned that a visa office in Senegal currently serves 16 countries. We really must look into that situation.

Mr. Camara, you talked about the Chinook tool, which you think should be put on pause because it is creating identification issues and it encourages racism. If this tool was created by IRCC, don't you think—