Evidence of meeting #74 for Public Safety and National Security in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was seekers.

A video is available from Parliament.

On the agenda

MPs speaking

Also speaking

Patrick Tanguy  Assistant Deputy Minister, Government Operations Centre, Emergency Management and Programs Branch, Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness
Commissioner Joanne Crampton  Assistant Commissioner, Federal Policing Criminal Operations, Royal Canadian Mounted Police
Jacques Cloutier  Acting Vice-President, Operations, Canada Border Services Agency
Michael MacDonald  Director General, Operations Sector, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
Paul MacKinnon  Assistant Deputy Minister, Strategic and Program Policy, Department of Citizenship and Immigration
Louis Dumas  Director General, Domestic Network, Operations, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

10:10 a.m.

Acting Vice-President, Operations, Canada Border Services Agency

Jacques Cloutier

I do not have it with me in the detail that you're asking for, but we will provide that information to you.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

When will that be provided?

10:10 a.m.

Acting Vice-President, Operations, Canada Border Services Agency

Jacques Cloutier

It will be as soon as possible.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

Thank you.

As to the number of asylum claims that have been made in 2017, Mr. MacDonald, I believe you said in response to one of my colleagues that ebbs and flows are associated with visa regimes. In this year, how many asylum claims have been made by Mexican nationals?

10:10 a.m.

Director General, Operations Sector, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

Michael MacDonald

I don't have the Mexican number right at hand.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

What numbers do you have?

10:10 a.m.

Director General, Operations Sector, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

Michael MacDonald

No, I do not have the Mexican number at hand.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

Can you please provide it to the committee as soon as possible?

How many staff within IRCC have been reallocated from different streams of processing to the new processing centres in Montreal, and what streams are they from?

10:10 a.m.

Director General, Domestic Network, Operations, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

Louis Dumas

I would say approximately 80 staff have been deployed from across Canada to the centre at Guy-Favreau. In addition to that, we have created back offices in various locations across Canada and have an approximate total of 40 staff helping the processing at Guy-Favreau.

As Mr. MacDonald pointed out, we have capacity within our resources to divert individuals from one project to the other. We took, for example, some people from the citizenship line and have asked them to assist on the project. We've also taken people working on, for example, certain immigration lines and have asked them to participate in the process.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

Have the processing times for temporary foreign worker work permits increased in 2017 over 2016?

10:10 a.m.

Director General, Domestic Network, Operations, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

Louis Dumas

I don't have that information, but as Mr. MacDonald has indicated, over the past few weeks we have substantially reduced the processing times for refugee claimants to get work permits.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

Thank you.

In the 2017-18 immigration levels plan, there's a line item that says “humanitarian and other”. Is that the line item in which asylum claims would be projected?

10:10 a.m.

Assistant Deputy Minister, Strategic and Program Policy, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

Paul MacKinnon

No, the asylum claims would be projected under the “protected status” persons.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

How many were projected in that area this year?

10:10 a.m.

Assistant Deputy Minister, Strategic and Program Policy, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

Paul MacKinnon

In 2017 the target is about 15,000.

10:10 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

Is that specifically for asylum seekers, or does it also include other streams of refugees as well?

10:10 a.m.

Assistant Deputy Minister, Strategic and Program Policy, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

Paul MacKinnon

That's for the asylum seekers; then we have a column called “resettled refugees”.

10:15 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

Okay.

This year, just to be clear and for the record, the government projected 15,000 asylum claimants in the levels plan, and last week in New York the immigration minister was projecting more than 40,000.

Is that correct?

10:15 a.m.

Assistant Deputy Minister, Strategic and Program Policy, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

Paul MacKinnon

Well, just to provide a bit of precision, the protected persons number of 15,000 is the anticipated level of asylum claimants who would actually become protected persons in this year. It doesn't equate to the number of asylum claimants who might show up, because the process—

10:15 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

Do we have the figure for how many asylum claims have been made versus how many have been approved this year?

10:15 a.m.

Assistant Deputy Minister, Strategic and Program Policy, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

Paul MacKinnon

We certainly have the number of asylum claimants who have come in thus far, which I think is 32,000. As to when you actually become a protected person, it's a staggered pace: you don't become a protected person until the IRB actually makes the determination that you are a protected person.

10:15 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

Sure.

There is one other area that came to my attention about which I was curious. You were talking about expediting health care coverage for asylum claims that had been made at a legal port of entry.

Is that being undertaken for other streams of refugees as well?

10:15 a.m.

Director General, Operations Sector, Department of Citizenship and Immigration

Michael MacDonald

No, the discretion of the minister to do that is exclusively for those who cross through the Lacolle situation. We are processing most other asylum claims across Canada either completely at the port of entry, and they're issued their IFH certificate, or we are processing them inland within the three-day window.

10:15 a.m.

Liberal

The Co-Chair (Mr. Robert Oliphant) Liberal Rob Oliphant

You have about 30 seconds left.

10:15 a.m.

Conservative

Michelle Rempel Conservative Calgary Nose Hill, AB

Great. I'll just finish the thought of my colleague Mr. Maguire. He was asking the RCMP about the number of outstanding deportation cases from asylum claims that had been rejected.

Could you speak to those numbers?