Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I move that Bill C-12, in clause 39, be amended by adding after line 23 on page 18 the following:
(4) Section 49 of the Act is amended by adding the following after subsection (2):
(3) The Minister must prepare a report in respect of each month of the year that sets out the number of removal orders that were enforced in that month, the number of removal orders that were not enforced in accordance with subsection (3) and the reasons for the delays.
(4) The report must also include countries of origin, age and gender breakdowns and criminal backgrounds of persons removed.
(5) The report must be tabled in each House of Parliament within 10 days after the last day of the month to which the report relates or, if a House is not then sitting, on any of the first 10 days on which that House is sitting after that day.
Colleagues, this reporting requirement will ensure that we are updated on the number of removals by the government and, more importantly, that we are updated on the removal orders that were not enforced, including the reasons.
There have been many stories of the fact that there are, I think, at least 600 non-citizens who have been convicted of serious crimes and are set to be removed from the country, and the government has lost track of them. Canadians want to know these results. This is very serious. It undermines trust, essentially, in the immigration system. They want to know if people who are here unlawfully or who have no legal reason to be here are being removed or not.
It's also a matter of simple transparency. I think all parliamentarians would want to know these numbers. It allows us to adjudicate whether or not the government and officials are actually doing their jobs. It also allows us to adjudicate whether or not Parliament needs further oversight, or other types of interventions, to ensure that these principles are upheld.
I'm not confident that they're being upheld right now, but I would like to have the data to argue otherwise. Members of the governing party would want to have that data public as well, on an ongoing basis and on a more timely basis.
I think that's the other point. We need to have this information on a timely basis given the state of the immigration system right now. This would allow Parliament to improve processes and to exercise our rights in that regard.
I hope that my colleagues will vote in favour of more transparency being established in this reporting mechanism.
Thank you.