Madam Speaker, I am delighted to rise and take part in this debate today. Although this effectively is basically a piece of housekeeping legislation, it nonetheless has quite significant meaning.
The previous government had moved the Department of Immigration into the realm of public security as if perhaps there was some danger to the security of Canada to be feared from those who choose to come here or who come here to find refuge from countries where law and order and justice and those values that we treasure so dearly in Canada are not treasured quite as dearly.
We on this side of the House do not feel we have anything to fear from people who seek to come to this country for a variety of reasons. We on this side of the House are proud that Canada is one of only four countries in the world which receives people.
There is a certain amount of babbling going on across the way, but I shall endeavour to rise above it. The hon. member from Calgary tells me he is returning the favour. He should return it slightly more sharply. I might appreciate it more.
In any case, there are a number of points that were raised by the other hon. member from Calgary who is the third party critic for immigration and citizenship. A couple of those I would like to address because I was offended. I want to say that I was offended.
I am offended that the hon. member does not think that citizenship is important in this country. I am offended that here in this wonderful and historic Chamber, the Chamber of Laurier and Macdonald and Trudeau, that someone who represents the people of Canada could think that citizenship is not important, that someone could suggest that the people who have been requested to give their opinions on the review of the Citizenship Act are somehow not of importance.
I am surprised this would be the response. I am surprised given the very hard work that has been put in over the last number of weeks and the hard work that will be continued into this review on citizenship. I am surprised and a little bit disappointed. To be quite frank, I am a lot disappointed. However, in the words of a former great cabinet minister in this House, the late Angus L. Macdonald, when he was premier of Nova Scotia, perhaps one should just consider the source.
I have a few other things that I would like to say. First of all, I am absolutely astounded at the numbers that the hon. member suggests are legitimate refugees. We know that the displacements in the world, the horrors in the former Yugoslavia, the problems in numerous African countries, and the problems with totalitarian governments in other areas of this world have created an unprecedented number of refugees.
To hear the hon. member speak, you would think this was not even a ripple on the horizon. That is just not so. There are more refugees than that in one refugee camp. The hon. member should retract that statement. However, I leave that to his notable good judgement.
I am also absolutely astounded at his percentages. There are words that can be quoted, for example his very famous quotation that even the devil can quote Scripture. With regard to his statement that the percentages that we are allowing in are somehow at an unprecedented high, if the hon. member would like to look back just to two or three years ago, he would see that the number of refugees accepted in this country was higher by, I believe, 12 per cent than it is today. Where we are is definitely within the normal realm of acceptance of refugees.
He talked about the 14 per cent that is the world average. Of course that would be the world average if we add in all those myriad countries that do not accept any at all. Either the hon. member's logic or his mathematics tends to suffer. Of course it would be unkind of me to say that, so I will not.
I also want to talk about something the hon. member raised with regard to the fact that people coming into Canada are not tested for HIV and that the minister promised to do something about it four weeks ago. The hon. member should know-I thought he knew; maybe he does not know-that the enabling legislation and regulation on medical matters under this department's aegis has remained unchanged for 40 years.
Perhaps the hon. member advocates a screaming leap into the void by the government without a proper review before bringing in legislation and amendments, but I want to make perfectly clear that neither this minister nor the department has any intention of bringing legislation before this House until it is adequately prepared and until the situation is adequately covered. That is the way good government works, to make sure that when we bring in legislation to change things that definitely need to be changed in this country, that we have covered all the bases. In other words, going from A to B to C to D will probably
prevent grief as opposed to jumping from A to D and probably falling in a ditch, if I may mix my metaphors, on the way there.