Evidence of meeting #59 for Citizenship and Immigration in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was letter.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Senator, Manitoba, not affiliated
Yes, as a result of being included in the email communications.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
Okay.
Do you consider that Ms. Radchenko gave you authorization to proceed this way?
Senator, Manitoba, not affiliated
I wasn't dealing with Olga Radchenko, who was the director of policy at the time and then became chief of staff to Minister Fraser.
Senator, Manitoba, not affiliated
Yes, we had communications with Mike Jones.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
Did any of them ever tell you to stop doing this?
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
On August 25, 2021, at 9:49 p.m., your office, on your behalf, sent the second template—an altered visa facilitation letter—to a family member of one of my constituents. The email that accompanied it stated there was “no guarantee” that the document would work. It also told my constituent's family, “Please do not discuss”.
Why were these instructions included in the email you sent?
Senator, Manitoba, not affiliated
I'm glad you raised that.
I understand that your constituent has found safety and will be going or has gone already.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
Just for the record, though, after coming to danger and thinking they had a passage to Canada, and after my office got the runaround for a year thinking this was an official government document, which put them out of contention for the government's official programs.... This put them in a crush of humanity going to the airport, thinking they had a plane ticket to Canada.
However, please continue. Why was that in there?
Senator, Manitoba, not affiliated
I can't speak to how they interpreted it. I can tell you, though, that there was no safe way out of Afghanistan in those days.
Conservative
Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB
Thank you.
I'll just close with this: If you had to do this all over again, would you do it the same way?
Senator, Manitoba, not affiliated
I would try. I did everything I could do that I thought was possible at the time. Under those circumstances, I stand by the choices I made.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Salma Zahid
I'm sorry for interrupting. The time is up.
We will now proceed to MP Ali.
MP Ali, you will have five minutes for your round of questioning. Please begin.
Liberal
Shafqat Ali Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
Thank you, Madam Chair.
Through you, Madam Chair, Senator, I'm grateful for your joining us here today.
I would assume you are aware that there are very formal instruments that ministers' offices and departments use when they wish to delegate executive authority, statues and regulations and the instruments.... It's never an email from staff with templates attached.
Have you, in any other Government of Canada operation or line of business, seen an authority delegated in the way that you suggest it was in this instance, that is to say, via an email exchange?
Senator, Manitoba, not affiliated
Thank you for the question, Mr. Ali.
I have never worked in a situation like the extreme humanitarian crisis that was happening as a result of the Taliban retaking Afghanistan. I considered it a unique situation, and a lot of the bureaucratic rules that one might apply just weren't realistic at that time. That's my estimation of it.
Liberal
Shafqat Ali Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
Senator, I can see that all of the work you do is motivated by a desire to help others. I can assure you that it is important to me and to this committee to understand precisely what transpired in this situation and not to blame anyone.
I want to focus a little bit on the differences between a visa and a facilitation letter and your understanding of these two documents.
I'm guessing that you are aware that a visa is to come to Canada. A temporary resident visa is a document that foreign nationals travelling to Canada from countries that are not visa exempt must obtain through an application prior to travelling here. In some cases, a visa counterfoil is put in the individual's passport prior to travel and sometimes upon arrival at the Canadian border.
You understand that a facilitation letter is an exceptional document that was created and issued in order to help visa holders travel to and through the Hamid Karzai Airport in Kabul. Is that correct?
Senator, Manitoba, not affiliated
No, sir.
I'm sorry, but my experience of what was actually happening, as opposed to the theory of maybe what should happen, was that many of the people being given the letters based on the template from Global Affairs, whether they were getting it from IRCC or Global Affairs or National Defence or through my office, were not holders of visas.
If you look at the letter, you see that the content of the letter has statements that, for the most part, were not true for most of the Afghans who were trying to escape. It wasn't the content of the letter so much that was the purpose of the letter. The letter was to assure the soldiers that they could let someone through to be processed, and those processes, in order to protect our country, had to happen after people made it safely into the airport compound.
Liberal
Shafqat Ali Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
Senator, I want to better understand whether you're aware of the differences between a visa and a facilitation letter. You issued inauthentic facilitation letters, but it seems that you explained to the people you were sending them to that they were actually visas, not just letters.
Can you speak a little bit about what exactly you told the people you were sending the letters to?
Senator, Manitoba, not affiliated
Sir, you can't hold me responsible for the contents of letters that were prepared by the Government of Canada.
The content was the content, and it came, in my case.... I was assured that it came from Global Affairs. It had Global Affairs' insignia. It has exactly the same wording on the template that I received from George Young as, I can table, was sent by IRCC to another Afghan who is now here in Ottawa.
Liberal
Shafqat Ali Liberal Brampton Centre, ON
My understanding is that the actual facilitation letters that were legitimately issued by Global Affairs and IRCC came with a context from the issuing department, which included an explanation that they were only for the transitioning through checkpoints. They were—
Liberal
Senator, Manitoba, not affiliated
May I just say that we have a different understanding, sir.