Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to speak to the motion today. We have heard members from the official opposition and other parties present their case in several areas.
What I want to talk about today is the problem we have with crime and how it relates to problems in the immigration system. When we look at the warnings and the variety of people who have commented on the problem, we will see it is quite a wide problem.
Ward Elcock, director of the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service, CSIS, and the attorney general for British Columbia have made some very strong statements on the problems with criminals finding their way into our country through our immigration and refugee system. We also have statements from several previous officials from the Department of Citizenship and Immigration. I will use some quotes from some of these people.
We have statements by law enforcement officers about the problems they have in dealing with the crime that is caused by bogus refugee claimants who come into our country under less than honourable terms. We even have Liberal members of parliament who have made some very strong statements on the weaknesses in our immigration system and how that leads to crime. I will quote from one or two Liberal members later.
Who pays the price for the problems in our immigration system and for the crime that comes to our country as a result of a broken system? Canadians pay the price. It is Canadians who are having their lives destroyed due to drug abuse. They can find a ready supply of drugs from, for example, bogus Honduran refugee claimants on the streets of Vancouver.
Many times it is new Canadians who are intimidated and forced to pay protection from the criminal element that finds its way into their communities from their country of origin. These are the very people from whom new Canadians have escaped by leaving their homelands. These people are now here in our country and the same type of organized crime has followed them.
New immigrant communities pay a price in another way. We have all read story after story about problems with our immigration and refugee system which allow criminals to get into our country so easily. As we hear, read and see those stories on television, we know that it reflects negatively on the new immigrant population as a whole. I think that is sad. The new immigrant population is tarnished because of a small percentage of criminals who find their way into our country so easily through our immigration system. Canadians right across this country are victims of this problem and it must be dealt with.
I mentioned the problem with the drug trade in Vancouver, in particular the problem with Honduran people who come to Canada claiming refugee status which are bogus claims. That they are in our country is a problem in itself. How did they get to our country? We do not have proper resources up front to screen and so on, but I will talk a bit about some of the solutions at the end of my presentation. However, there is no doubt this is a problem.
I quote the member for Port Moody—Coquitlam who stated recently that refugee claimants convicted of dealing drugs should be deported immediately with no review or appeal allowed to drag things out. That is from a Liberal member who has recognized the problem.
We do not have the proper resources upfront. Therefore, people are finding their way into our country who should not be here. They should be screened by the process.
Our process is lenient and dragged out, and we allow so many appeals that we cannot get people who have been targeted and named as undesirables by the immigration department out of the country. That is what led the Liberal member to make the statement that they should be deported immediately, with no review or appeal allowed to drag things out.
The attorney general for British Columbia has stated “If you are abusing the hospitality of Canada by committing crimes, you should be deported forthwith”. He is very frustrated with this problem, in particular, but he is also frustrated with other problems, some of which I will touch on later.
A Vancouver staff sergeant stated recently that people who come in, flaunt our refugee system and sell poison to our children should be deported immediately. This again is frustration speaking. He goes on to say “I am disgusted that the system did not take action long ago”. Many of us have heard quotes like this. It is not really a quote that stands alone. This is a problem that we should not ignore.
When it is narrowed down, the most visible drug problem is that of the Honduran drug dealers in Vancouver. However, there are many others involved in organized crime which I will touch on a bit later.
Members have to be even more concerned when they find that the immigration minister and her department came down on a member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police who made statements that are completely honest on this issue.
What happened a couple of weeks ago was that RCMP Constable Mark Applejohn suggested that refugee claimants be fingerprinted and detained until their prints are run through police databases for criminal checks. He stated that immigration laws are lax and cumbersome, allowing claimants who have broken the law to stay in Canada while their claims continue.
How does the immigration department respond? Chris Taylor, who is head of western services for the immigration department, said “I consider these comments to reflect breaches of the code of conduct and the oath of allegiance of the RCMP”.
Instead of the department attacking the problem, it attacks RCMP officers who are frustrated. They do not have the tools they need to deal with the problem. The immigration department and the immigration minister are too weak to do something about it. In five years we have had no legislation whatsoever to deal with the problem.
The frustration is bound to show. This RCMP officer should not be criticized and attacked by the head of western services, backed up by the minister in the House and in committee. Instead of attacking the police for making statements that are completely correct, the government should attack the problem. I think it is sad that has not been done.
Another issue that has become huge is people smuggling. The former solicitor general spoke at a chiefs of police conference a couple of months ago. He said “This study estimates that between 8,000 and 16,000 people arrive in Canada each year with the assistance of people smugglers”. This estimate is probably very low. He said “The human costs are staggering when we consider that these people are vulnerable, often exploited, socially isolated and sometimes forced to engage in criminal activity just to survive”. This is a problem which not only causes severe harm to this country, but also to the people who are exploited.
Often people smuggling is done by organized crime groups such as the triads and most recently Russian organized crime that has found its way to this country.
There are some common solutions to the problem. Some of them have been set out by police. For example, when all refugee claimants are fingerprinted, why do we not simply cross-check these fingerprints with our internal police forces first and then with the police forces from other countries, including the country of origin.
Many other solutions have been proposed and I would be happy to talk about those at some future time. I appreciate the time I was given to make a few comments on this issue.