Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thanks to the witnesses for joining us. Thanks to the Office of the Auditor General and to the Auditor General for her very good work, as usual, and for this very interesting report.
To sum up the situation, Madam Auditor General, you have found that there are many deficiencies at the Department of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, specifically with regard to processing times and follow‑up. There appears to be a lack of governance to ensure that processing times are reduced and that people who have chosen Canada or Quebec as their new home are appropriately welcomed.
Everyone who appears before this committee tells us that progress is being made and everything's improving. Well, if that's the case, so much the better. However, I see a major problem in the fact that the department is incapable of processing applications within an acceptable period of time, whereas Canada is currently taking in many immigrants, nearly half a million this year, and immigration targets will be the same for the next few years.
Ms. Fox, how do you think you'll be able to reconcile those two observations? We have an energetic immigration policy on the one hand and a department that can't process all applications on the other.
First of all, do you have the tools you need to get the job done, or are you going to get them? Will they be implemented, given that we just learned from the Auditor General's opening remarks that automated tools haven't been properly used?
How will you be able to manage that, Ms. Fox?