I can, one hundred per cent. We actually wrote a policy brief on this. It was part of this project that looked at immigrants in 12 countries. In some countries like the U.S.—and the U.S. is an example of the more open end of the spectrum—citizenship is not a requirement to join. In addition, joining often provides an expedited path to citizenship.
In my opinion, our labour force in Canada depends on immigrants. Not all of those immigrants are already going to have acquired citizenship. In particular on arrival, some people are going to be looking at different jobs and they will find out that they are not welcome in our forces until they have acquired citizenship, which can take up to five years or longer, so we have lost a very huge pool of possible candidates.
Where are these immigrants coming from? The majority of immigrants to Canada now come from Asia and Africa, so by definition these are visible minorities by and large. Not only are we missing out on potential recruits but these potential recruits are men and women from different visible minority communities.
If I were the queen—nobody appointed me the queen, but if I appointed myself the queen—that would be the number one thing I would do. I would change that requirement. It is entrenched in law, so the Canadian Armed Forces cannot change that on their own.