Citizenship and Immigration Committee on Nov. 20th, 2025

[Aaron McCrorie]

He's entitled to his opinion. Certainly, one-touch is a change, and a lot of people don't like change. What I think is really great about it is that staff looked at it: How could we do things better? How could we do things differently? You know, there's always a tendency to want to throw money at a problem. Here, folks came up with a solution that made us more efficient and as effective, if not more effective. I think it was a really great innovation in terms of people from the ground up coming up with a solution.

Change is hard, but I think we've come up with a good approach.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

I understand that. What I don't understand, though, is that there's a major difference here. In discussions with him, he said that the person clicks, does the app and they're in the country. They have to report in 45 days. You're telling us they actually see a person. I'm not understanding which of you is correct here.

[Aaron McCrorie]

Well, there is no app. I think Bill C-12 contemplates a single online application portal, but in terms of—

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

The one-touch system is not an application.

[Aaron McCrorie]

No.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

What is it?

[A voice]

What does it do?

[Aaron McCrorie]

Pardon me? I'm sorry.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

What is one-touch?

[Aaron McCrorie]

For one-touch, the idea is that it has limited the number of touches we have on a person rather than pushing a button. The idea is that an individual shows up at a port of entry. They are assessed by a border services officer, who goes through a series of mandatory questions, collects biometric information and does a risk assessment. On the basis of that, they will make a decision on whether or not the person is eligible for the administrative portion of the assessment to move inland. That's when the individual will enter tombstone data in a website—

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

You're saying that this person actually talks to a person and there is no application. This is the exact opposite of what we were told by the union leader. He doesn't know what he's talking about: that's what you're telling me.

[Aaron McCrorie]

I can't comment on what he said. What I will tell you is—

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

Do you have problems with the union right now?

[Aaron McCrorie]

Actually, I'd say that on a file like immigration detention, for example, we have fantastic relations with the union. We have ongoing dialogue with them. We're really working together to address the challenges we have in immigration detention to ensure that our employees are safe.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

One of the other things he said, and you said this too, was that there's a 45-day process afterwards. You have to come and do some things. Mr. Weber told us that about 10% of those people never show up. Is that correct, in your opinion?

[Aaron McCrorie]

I'd have to confirm the data. There is a timeline in which people have to enter the data.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

Is it approximately correct? Does it sound about right?

[Aaron McCrorie]

It's hard for me to to say definitively. I wouldn't want to mislead you by guessing.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

It's not zero.

[Aaron McCrorie]

No, it's not zero.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

People do not show up sometimes.

[Aaron McCrorie]

It's no different from people who don't show up for their IRB hearing down the road.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

That means we have people who have gotten into Canada who are just here. We can't track them. You've lost track of them. That's—

[Aaron McCrorie]

I would suggest that this isn't an issue with one-touch. This is an issue we confront just generally. It's not a product of one-touch.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

You referred to these as low-risk claimants, yet we have people who aren't showing up. We have an unfortunate situation right now where we have criminals who have gotten into the country. I mean, I understand that most people who come into our country are not criminals, but we do yet have them in our country. They're getting through the system somehow. Is this a smart thing to do?