Public Accounts Committee on Dec. 5th, 2023

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First of all, I'd like to thank the Auditor General, Ms. Hogan, for her very important report. As some of my colleagues have said, this is a subject of some concern for us in our riding offices and especially for our constituents.

I'd also like to acknowledge the work being done by the people in my riding, particularly those in the municipality of Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle, where Roxham Road is located. The people who live near that road, and the mayor and councillors, have worked for years to ensure that the welcome is always humanitarian and as efficient as possible.

We're obviously pleased that calm has been restored to Roxham Road and that we now have greater control over the arrival of asylum-seekers.

Ms. Fox, you mentioned that Roxham Road is a slightly different entry point from the official points of entry that refugees use.

Would you please tell us a little about the existing agreement respecting the arrival of asylum-seekers, especially those arriving in Quebec?

[Christiane Fox]

Thank you for your question.

For the moment, you're absolutely right, asylum-seekers now arrive at more official points of entry. Roxham Road was really an unofficial point of entry. Under the agreement reached with the Americans in March, we were able to apply the Additional Protocol to the Safe Third Country Agreement so that people now arrive in Canada at airports and the offices of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, or IRCC, in particular.

We've started using hotels. That's one of the measures that we introduced during the COVID‑19 pandemic and that have remained in effect as a result of the large number of arrivals. We do this mainly in Quebec and Ontario, where we provide temporary accommodation for people who are in very vulnerable situations. We work closely with Quebec to ensure that these people have accommodation upon arrival.

As regards Ontario, we work with the province, but especially with the municipalities of Cornwall, Niagara Falls, Mississauga and the Peel area. We very recently created a kind of welcome centre concept to ensure, in cooperation with the municipality, that people are able to go there, apply for asylum, receive their work permit and be able to undergo their medical examination. We're trying to ensure that we welcome people and offer them the services they need and then work with the province to match skills, in particular. We're trying various approaches because the number of arrivals to date is really the highest in the country. That's quite a significant factor in our support for the municipalities.

I'd say that the work permit is an important aspect of the process. We introduced a public policy in November 2022 to issue the work permit first. As a result, people don't have to wait 12 to 17 months to get one. Now they can get a permit in 5 to 30 days, depending on the results of their medical exam.

I think we have to work with the community. I've worked very closely with churches in the Toronto area, where there was considerable pressure to move these people, with the help of volunteers, from the churches and shelters to federal government hotels.

We establish an arrival management plan every weekend and evening, especially in the winter months. There are two ways for the department to go about this. First of all, we need to manage the crisis immediately by ensuring that people are housed and are being treated humanely. Second, we have to look at the long-term situation and examine the system so we can make it efficient when these people arrive in Canada.

[Brenda Shanahan, Liberal, Châteauguay—Lacolle, QC]

Excellent.

That brings me to another question. We regularly receive family reunification applications. Would you please tell us about the agreement that's in force with Quebec on that?

[Christiane Fox]

According to the Auditor General's reports, at the time of the audit, reunification with spouses and families outside Canada took approximately 20 months. Reunification now takes 13 months. So it's much easier to do. For people who are in Canada, it used to take 12 months, and now it's 10 months. So we've expedited processing in those cases.

The situation in Quebec is slightly more difficult because family reunification there takes more time than elsewhere in Canada. There's a family reunification threshold in Quebec, and once it's reached, people have to continue waiting to be reunited with their loved ones. That's a challenge, but we're working closely with Quebec on the problem and on its economic and humanitarian program. You can see on the website that processing times are shorter outside Quebec.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

Ms. Sinclair-Desgagné, you have the floor for two and a half minutes.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Fox, I'm going to ask you a question that you can answer with a yes or a no. I asked it earlier, but I don't think I got a conclusive answer.

Do you, as deputy minister, think the Department of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship has the necessary financial and human resources to proceed, from an administrative point of view, with the intake of half a million newcomers a year?

[Christiane Fox]

That's not really a question with a yes or no answer.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

You either have the necessary resources or you don't.

[Christiane Fox]

We've received significant funding to enable us to do the department's work. However, I have to say that different populations create different pressures. Economic immigrants and refugees involve different types of work. Our ability to meet the demand will depend on those different categories.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

I see.

[Christiane Fox]

It's hard for me to answer with a yes or no. If you're asking me whether we have the necessary resources to manage Canada's immigration levels plan, the answer is "yes". The plan has been introduced in the House, and I therefore have the resources to do the resulting work. However, if there's an enormous increase in temporary visa applications for visits to Canada next week, that will change my answer.

That's why it's hard for me to answer the question. As for permanent residence applications, the department is receiving the funding to do the necessary work.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

All right, but we know that the processing of permanent residence applications isn't one of the department's responsibilities.

[Christiane Fox]

It actually is one of its responsibilities.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

But it's possible to anticipate matters for its other responsibilities.

Isn't it?

[Christiane Fox]

For this year, considering the current number of studies and temporary work permit applications, we're able to meet the demand. However, a sudden increase of 300,000 or 400,000 study permit applications next year would be a challenge.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

All right, but we know that won't happen. There won't be 400,000 more applications next year. The number of applications is relatively constant.

And how will you process the applications of francophone African students who would like to come and study at our francophone educational institutions in Quebec and are having problems for no particular reason?

[Christiane Fox]

I just want to inform the committee that there has been an enormous increase in the number of foreign students. In 2019, I believe, it was approximately 300,000, and the number is now closer to 900,000. That's a major swing. We've made some significant changes to the study permit system. We now verify letters of offer, since last Friday. We're trying to add more measures to the integrity program.

As for francophone African students, I entirely agree with you that we have to increase approval percentages. One of the obstacles is dual intent, which is addressed by the department's regulations and pushes up the refusal rate.

We also need to consider fraud rates, which are higher in certain regions of the country. However, I entirely agree with you that we need to welcome more francophone African students to Canada.

[Nathalie Sinclair-Desgagné, Bloc, Terrebonne, QC]

Thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much.

Mr. Desjarlais, you're up again. You have two and a half minutes, please.

[Blake Desjarlais, NDP, Edmonton Griesbach, AB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to turn to the deputy minister.

I know you're tasked with a very difficult job, a job that consistently demands that you provide independent evidence to this committee and independent recommendations to better assist our public service.

Oftentimes, in my short time in this place, you have made it very clear that these systems have harmed people and that you have reported those harms. Last month, I asked you about racism when you tabled the racism in the workplace audit directly related to IRCC, and we found that employees of IRCC have submitted to you that they themselves believe that racism exists in the processing of applications.

I'll quote your answer to me when I asked you that question last month. You said:

I'll tell you that the deputy minister has acknowledged that systemic discrimination exists in her organization. In fact, a recent internal audit that was published on their website highlights that employees are raising discriminatory practices in the processing of applications. We found that there really are differential outcomes, but the organization was not analyzing their outcomes in that way. They weren't looking at the results based on race or country.

We did that for them in the audit. We made recommendations for them to better understand that.

Ms. Hogan, do you think that these recommendations will find the earnest reception, change and transformation that are needed to make sure that systemic racism is truly combatted in this country?

I speak to my experiential evidence in this committee. We've seen many Indigenous Services Canada reports that go into decades of unchanging systemic racism.

Do you have confidence that your recommendations are enough to see that the IRCC truly takes seriously the issue of systemic racism when in fact the deputy minister just today didn't even acknowledge it in her statement?

[Karen Hogan]

It's a large question.

Do I think the federal public service will address this? I think there's a lot of goodwill toward this. I've worked on other audits with Deputy Minister Fox, and I believe she's committed to it. We saw the action plan that the department's put forward here. It's committing to starting to gather that data.

My concern is that this commitment came under its EDI plan, and there's been very little activity until now. The deadline is in 2025-26. It's a long time, but that's a place to start. You need to first acknowledge that there are biases and unintended consequences happening in the system. Gather the data to figure out how to break those down.

What I often don't see, and what I didn't see here, was an acknowledgement that this needed to happen. It's in the action plan that was submitted to this committee. It's just a long way out, in my mind. It's a long way for people to continue to wait to see some changes in the process that will hopefully have a concrete impact on discriminatory practices.

[The Chair, Conservative, John Williamson]

Thank you very much. That is the time.

Mr. Redekopp, it's good to see you. You have the floor for five minutes, please.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to the witnesses for being here.

Ms. Hogan, it's good to see you again. I think I saw you at the environment committee a few years ago.

You might be aware that at the immigration committee, we recently concluded a study on backlogs in the immigration department, so this audit's very timely. It also lines up well, I think, with what Conservatives have been saying and where we stand on this issue.

I'm concerned about exhibit 9.7, which shows some of the decreases in inventory from the beginning of the year to the end of the year. What it shows that's disturbing to me is the increase in the age of the inventory, particularly at the end of the year. It indicates to me that the department's not following a first-in, first-out type of system, because the ending inventory's age is quite a bit higher. You actually said, in paragraph 9.20, that this is “contrary to its operating principle.”

My question to you is this: Why is there no recommendation in the report dealing with this?

[Karen Hogan]

I acknowledge that the first-in, first-out principle is an operating principle. It's a great one, but at times it just can't function.

I'll give you an example. If an application comes in and what's missing is a key immigration document, you can request it and then move on to the next file, but if you have to wait for that document to come in, then all subsequent files are delayed needlessly waiting for that file. There needs to be a bit of a balance.

What we found was that operational pressures to meet the immigration level targets drove a behaviour whereby easy-to-process applications were sometimes treated more quickly. We saw that by analyzing the age of what was sitting in the backlog.

[Brad Redekopp, Conservative, Saskatoon West, SK]

Right, and I guess that's directly my point: I understand what you're saying, but this is a significant increase in age. I would have thought that you would have directed the department to investigate this to try to fix this problem or to manage it.

As a further question, your auditors would have had discussions with the department on this. Were there discussions about not putting a recommendation in there, or was there any political interference in that?