Madam Speaker, like many of us here on all sides of the House I was not born in Canada, I am an immigrant myself. Many of us here are immigrants. I think it would be fair to say that immigration has provided Canada with many blessings.
The collective contribution of immigrants to Canada has been immense. We have built our farms, we have built our cities, we have built our quality of life, we have built our railways on the work, on the toil and on the immense sacrifices of the immigrant community.
We have to recognize that immigration has been to us a great benefit, a blessing. At the same time, we must live in the reality of our world today. I was interested in listening to my colleague from Bourassa. I must commend him for the way in which he approached the debate in measured tones and a constructive spirit. I appreciate this.
The hon. member says that we are going far too far, that the government's legislation is very regressive. On the other side of the House colleagues from the Reform Party are saying that the government has not gone far enough, that this legislation will not serve its purpose.
We stand in the middle of what may be two positions at either end of the spectrum. We say that today the reality in Canada is that a tiny minority-I think we all agree it is a tiny minority-abuses the system.
What we want to do is to say that if you are a legitimate immigrant, if you live by the rule book, by the law of Canada, then you are most welcome. The hospitality we give will be the hospitality that you have always received here. At the same time, if you breach our laws, if you use unfair or criminal methods to jump the queue, if you use fraudulent means to come into Canada or if when you are here you abuse the system in such a way that you prejudice the rest of us new and older immigrants and natural born Canadians, then there is a price to pay.
What this bill says in effect is that we will reward and will recognize the legitimate, the fair immigrant. At the same time we will say to the immigrants who take advantage of our system that enough is enough and they cannot do it.