Citizenship and Immigration Committee on April 27th, 2026

[Sameer Zuberi, Liberal, Pierrefonds—Dollard, QC]

That integration depends on the work done by you, by newcomers and by the society that welcomes them. It's also important to ensure that people are well integrated into the labour market. It helps our economy.

Is that your experience?

[Léonie Tchatat]

Yes. Indeed, I think Canada pays a much higher price by failing to integrate its francophone immigrants. I think there are many opportunities to develop tailored programs, as we are doing at La Passerelle.

It is important to understand that, as long as francophone and racialized immigrants are not—

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dzerowicz]

Thank you, Ms. Tchatat and Mr. Zuberi.

Mr. Champoux, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Thank you.

I asked you a question earlier, Ms. Berry Méndez, and I didn't give you time to answer it. I didn't intend to force an answer.

I was asking whether you thought it would be an acceptable solution for the temporary foreign worker program to provide open work permits with the same time limits. As I mentioned earlier, that would allow for labour mobility in the event of business closures or job cuts, such as those experienced at Olymel last week in Drummondville.

In your view, is this an acceptable solution, or does it still fall short?

[Marisa Berry Méndez]

For us, there are really two parts. Regarding the elimination of the closed work permit, undoubtedly some workers would like to come to the country within the time limits.

The government should set the program criteria. However, the eligibility criteria for economic immigration programs, which exclude these people, must be eliminated. We believe that these criteria are discriminatory and that there should be a gateway to permanent immigration for these people as well.

[Martin Champoux, Bloc, Drummond, QC]

Ms. Tchatat, I'm also keen to hear what you have to say. I think that the organization that you represent, La Passerelle, is invaluable.

You saw the short debate earlier on a motion that we tabled to better distribute asylum seekers. We want to ensure that the people coming in aren't automatically pointed towards Quebec and Ontario, where the social safety nets are starting to become extremely strained. We're asking for more participation from the other provinces.

On the ground, have you seen this greater influx of asylum seekers and foreign workers who want to integrate in a perfectly honest manner and participate in society?

Are you also seeing an overflow on your end?

[Léonie Tchatat]

Yes, absolutely. We see it every day on the ground.

The serious issue lies in the fact that immigrants who come to this country settle in Toronto or Ottawa, in the major cities, given the greater diversity and openness in these places. In order to integrate immigrants in other regions, mechanisms must be implemented so that communities can take them in.

For example, we've seen the issue involving refugees in Toronto. Refugees were transferred to regions such as Niagara. However, they came back to Toronto because they faced a great deal of racism in these regions.

We need a two‑way approach. We need to both point communities towards these regions and also develop awareness and intake mechanisms to help integrate these refugees or immigrants into these communities.

[The Chair, Liberal, Julie Dzerowicz]

Thank you, Ms. Tchatat and Mr. Champoux.

Mr. Menegakis, you have the floor for five minutes.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you to our witnesses for appearing before us. I'm going to start with you, Ms. Kang.

Bill C-12 allows for thousands of applications to be suspended, cancelled or modified through an order in council if it is “in the public interest”. The committee never received an answer from the minister on what “public interest” means in the bill.

Have you been able to determine what it means in this bill?

[Joycna Kang]

No, we have not. It is a very broadly worded piece of the legislation that is causing a lot of alarm and panic.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

What do you see as some of the dangers of allowing the government to cancel thousands of immigration applications with no process or parliamentary oversight?

[Joycna Kang]

I think we're going to see a lot of litigation on that point. I think it is very alarming to the rule of law when there is no transparency or due process attached to the government's being able to have those powers without having to explain why they're invoking them.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

What types of applications do you see the minister cancelling?

[Joycna Kang]

I would imagine it would be a lot of temporary work permits, study permits and potentially TRPs, temporary resident permits. We fear that refugee claimant documents that have been issued and claims that have been determined could be cancelled without any due process as well.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Does your firm believe that this bill was passed as a lame attempt to clean up the asylum backlog?

[Joycna Kang]

It's very hard not to come to that conclusion, given the testimony that many stakeholders provided to the Senate. None of those suggestions were taken into account when the bill was passed.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

The firm where you work has published commentary on IRCC's new AI framework. Are you familiar with that?

[Joycna Kang]

Yes.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

What are some of the pitfalls in the government's use of AI to do security screening?

[Joycna Kang]

While we understand that there's a need for more efficient processes, given the volume that IRCC is dealing with, our concern with AI is that it doesn't leave enough room for human intervention.

AI, as many of us know, is made by humans, and human bias gets put into AI mechanisms. There are AI screening tools that are being used without any real human oversight. That's causing a lot of unreasonable refusals.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

I can certainly see how that is a problem.

Do you believe it will be easier for dangerous individuals to slip into Canada if AI becomes a primary security screening tool?

[Joycna Kang]

I do believe that this is a concern. I'm not entirely sure in terms of being able to speculate on a number or anything like that, but I do think that without human oversight over AI findings, an overreliance on AI will not have the intended effects.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

I can easily see how AI will not catch some things. For example, I represent a community that has one of the most diverse and biggest populations of Canadians of Iranian descent. These are people who came here from Iran. The government has reportedly identified at least 700 of them, if not more, as IRGC operatives.

IRGC, as you might know—I'm sure you do—is a known terrorist organization and has been identified by the Government of Canada and the Parliament of Canada as a terrorist organization. Without a personal conversation and discussion and assertion, how would AI catch somebody who was coming over here?

That is a major concern to a community of people living in Richmond Hill, where I reside. What would you have to say to those people?

[Joycna Kang]

Yes, I would agree with that concern. As I said, AI use without oversight from an actual decision-maker can result in overbreadth, capturing a lot of individuals who shouldn't actually be captured by security screenings and things like that.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Aurora—Oak Ridges—Richmond Hill, ON]

Would you say that the move towards AI is just a quick, simple way for the government to say that they're using AI to help them reduce their backlogs?