Citizenship and Immigration Committee on March 3rd, 2022

[Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe, Bloc, Lac-Saint-Jean, QC]

Excuse me, Madam Chair, but if—

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you. Sorry for interrupting, Mr. Brunelle-Duceppe. Your time is up.

Sorry, Madam Tapley. We will now proceed to Ms. Kwan.

Ms. Kwan, you will have two and a half minutes.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

I'd like to give 30 seconds to Ms. Jarvis to answer my last question.

[Marian Campbell Jarvis]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

In order to respond, there are a couple of points I wanted to clarify. Madam Chair, I would be very interested in receiving information from Ms. Kwan about the issue of children aging out. My understanding is exactly that of Ms. Kwan, the member, that the families are assessed at the time of application and moved forward in that pace. That aging out issue is an unfamiliar one to me. I would be very interested to learn a bit more about that.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

I'll be happy to send information to your officials and to the minister.

Moving on to the next issue, from previous immigration committee studies, witnesses have suggested that the government look at changing the education and language testing requirements for caregivers. Has the minister done any work on this?

[Catrina Tapley]

Thank you. Yes. The quick answer is that we are always looking at ways we can improve the program and, frankly, at ways the pilot has told us the program doesn't work. We'll continue to examine that, and we'll continue to push on that. I'd just encourage the honourable member to reach out to us as well with the information that she has in this particular area. It's helpful to us in terms of how we assess this finding.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

Absolutely, I will be happy to bring forth that information. We've studied this issue. Witnesses have raised it continually. If the ministry is looking at this, we actually need the change to be done, because people are not meeting it and there are those who are in the system for years. Because of the language testing requirements, they are not able to fulfill the PR application requirements. I'll be happy to follow up with the ministry and with Ms. Tapley directly on this.

Due to the strain of separation, many migrant caregivers, mostly women, end up separating from their spouses. In the past, Immigration accepted separation agreements to exclude a spouse in their PR application. However, this policy has now changed. They are now required to provide divorce papers or legal separation documents, which are lengthy and expensive. Will the ministry consider going back to the previous system and accepting separation agreements? This is particularly important in the Philippines, because the process is very long and very expensive.

Can I just get a quick answer—yes or no?

[Catrina Tapley]

We'll have to come back on that one.

[Jenny Kwan, NDP, Vancouver East, BC]

I'll follow up with you on that as well, then. Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you. Based on the time left, we will have two minutes for Mr. Benzen and then two minutes for Mr. Dhaliwal. Then we will go into a vote on the supplementary estimates.

Mr. Benzen, you have two minutes. Please proceed.

[Bob Benzen, Conservative, Calgary Heritage, AB]

Thank you, Madam Chair, and thank you witnesses.

I guess I'll just ask one quick question on the estimates here.

You requested $8 million for the initiative on the issuance of proof of vaccination credentials for international travel. I still have constituents calling me saying that they're sometimes having issues getting other countries to accept their vaccination credentials. Could you talk a little about where you are in that initiative, the status of it right now and some of the challenges you face having Canadian vaccination credentials accepted in other countries?

[Catrina Tapley]

On this one, the monies that are there, we worked heavily with the provinces and territories, and I think the system we have is very user friendly at the end.

I live in Ontario, so if I look at my Ontario proof of vaccination credential that was issued by the provincial government and shows my vaccine record, there's a little Government of Canada wordmark at the top. It's that little Government of Canada wordmark that helps us have that consistent standard, so that other countries should be recognizing what we're providing and what we're doing there.

If there are specific countries where there are particular problems, I am happy to take that back and talk to my colleagues, both at the Public Health Agency and at Health Canada to make sure that those roadblocks aren't there, because the system that was put in place with the PTs should absolutely work.

[Bob Benzen, Conservative, Calgary Heritage, AB]

That's good, and the $8 million that you requested is a limit. You don't need more than that. Has everything been accomplished at that point?

[Catrina Tapley]

I think there will probably be more that comes through in mains and supplementary estimates around this in future years, but I believe that's covered.

[Bob Benzen, Conservative, Calgary Heritage, AB]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Thank you, Mr. Benzen, your time is up.

We will now end our panel with Mr. Dhaliwal.

Mr. Dhaliwal, you will have two minutes. You can please begin.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Surrey—Newton, BC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Madam Chair, I want to thank the IRCC call centre as well as the MED for the number of calls they get from our office and the service that they provide to our constituents with their help.

My question is on the super visa. Madam Chair, every month I get tons of calls on the super visa. Parents are waiting for over a year. There's a need for those parents to be united with their kids here. I'm just wondering what the department is doing to deal with that situation of waiting for a visa for over a year.

[Catrina Tapley]

That's part of our backlog reduction strategy, to be able to bring the timelines for that super visa way back down into our service standards. Now that the border has reopened for discretionary travel and parents and grandparents are able to come on that super visa, we need to get that number down. That's the backlog reduction strategy that's focused both on new applications that are coming in and existing applications that are already there.

Mr. Mills, would you like to comment?

[Daniel Mills]

Thank you very much for the question.

The information that the honourable member is referring to is correct, that the processing time was indeed over 10 or 11 months, but it is now about six months. We have worked hard to significantly reduce processing times, and we'll continue our efforts in the coming weeks and months to reduce the super visa backlog.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Mr. Dhaliwal, your time is up. Thank you.

[Sukh Dhaliwal, Liberal, Surrey—Newton, BC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

With this, our round of questioning comes to an end.

We need to vote on the supplementary estimates (C) 2021-22.

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

Madam Chair, can we adopt on division?

[The Chair, Liberal, Salma Zahid]

Yes. We will go one by one.

DEPARTMENT OF CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION Vote 1c—Operating expenditures..........$118,830,700

Vote 10c—Grants and contributions..........$52,410,000

Vote 15c—Forgiveness of an immigration loan..........$1

Vote 20c—Debt write-off—immigration loans ..........$172,941

(Votes 1c, 10c, 15c and 20c agreed to on division)

IMMIGRATION AND REFUGEE BOARD Vote 1c—Program expenditures..........$1,608,006

(Vote 1c agreed to on division)

Shall I report the votes on the supplementary estimates (C) 2021-22 to the House?

[Some hon. members]

Agreed.