House of Commons Hansard #105 of the 36th Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was system.
Jay Hill Reform Prince George—Peace River, BC
Madam Speaker, I wonder if the hon. government House leader has any idea what legislation he will be bringing forward over the next week or so. I would also like to know if there is going to be a fall session of parliament or an early election.
Don Boudria LiberalLeader of the Government in the House of Commons
Madam Speaker, once I have finished answering the question perhaps I could ask my own supplementary.
This afternoon we will resume consideration of Bill C-31, the immigration bill.
The business for tomorrow will be report stage of Bill C-11, respecting Devco, and report stage and third reading of Bill S-3, respecting international tax treaties. If that business finishes early tomorrow I do not intend to call other business at that point.
On Monday we shall return to Bill C-32, the budget bill that was passed at report stage earlier this day. We will do that bill at third reading. That will be followed by resumed consideration of Bill C-31 if it has not been completed today. In the event that it has, which I understand is possible, then we will resume consideration of Bill C-33, the species at risk legislation.
Tuesday, June 6 shall be an allotted day during the normal sitting hours. There have been consultations with other House leaders and there is agreement that we would sit Tuesday evening, under special provisions to be agreed to in the form of a motion, to complete the third reading of Bill C-11.
On Wednesday I expect that the House shall consider Bill C-25, the income tax amendments, and Bill S-10, the DNA data bank legislation.
Thursday, June 8 shall be an allotted day. At the present time it would be my intention to call Bill C-19, the war crimes bill, at report stage and third reading.
That is the business of the House until the end of next week, at least to the extent that we can determine at the present time.
The House resumed consideration of the motion that Bill C-31, an act respecting immigration to Canada and the granting of refugee protection to persons who are displaced, persecuted or in danger, be read the second time and referred to a committee.
Rahim Jaffer Reform Edmonton Strathcona, AB
Madam Speaker, prior to question period, I was talking about the changes being proposed to Canada's immigration and refugee laws. For the benefit of those who are tuning in now, we are talking about Bill C-31. I was also talking about how proud I am as a refugee myself, coming here almost 28 years ago, to be a Canadian and about how disappointed I am to see our immigration system not being able to keep up with the demands that have been placed on it and the problems that has created.
We cannot keep up with the pressures on our immigration system and the unfortunate spin-off of problems. People are fed up waiting to go through the application process, either on the refugee process side or on the general immigration side.
We have seen many problems over the last number of years because of the lack of resources that have been placed in this particular area of the government. We hope this will be changed.
Even though the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration touts the new legislation as being tough and fixing many of the current problems facing the system, it will not accomplish its objectives and will likely to significantly slow down the entire immigration system. This is a big concern for us in the official opposition and for Canadians.
No matter what is contained in the new act, it will never be effective if the government does not ensure that there is improved management of the system, better training, tighter auditing and more emphasis placed on enforcement.
I want to touch on the idea of enforcement in light of the people smuggling and the number of refugees who have come from China in the recent past. This has raised a lot of questions about our immigration system and specifically the track record of the government on the management of the department. We do need to seriously address these questions.
The passage of Bill C-31 would be like signing a blank cheque to a government that has proven incapable of managing Canada's immigration system. The regulations will actually determine how the new immigration laws are applied and enforced. As I said, the immigration minister had the opportunity to make this bill work better but she has not done so.
The area I want to touch on specifically is where we saw some really tough talk from this minister, especially when it came to describing the new legislation. The bill will not deliver the necessary changes to re-establish the integrity of the immigration system and protect our borders from organized crime, terrorists, people smuggling and illegal immigration. These are things that are very important to Canadians in light of some the things that have happened recently. They want to see their immigration system work and their borders patrolled effectively. They want to see the resources needed to process immigrants and refugees put into the department to make the system work more effectively.
The bill provides for higher maximum penalties for the crime of human trafficking. On the surface this appears to be strengthening our laws, and it does, but it will have little or no effect on the flow of illegal immigration to Canada.
The stiffest penalties would apply only to those in charge of people trafficking operations. They are untouchable under Canadian laws as they operate primarily outside the country. The biggest problem is how to actually bring to justice the people who are profiting from the illegal trafficking of people. If the bill does not even begin to address this issue, then we have failed. The government has failed to strengthen this particular part of the bill and to stop the problem of illegal refugees and immigrants coming to this country.
The mid-level organizers who may live in Canada are protected by organized crime rings and are rarely caught and seldom convicted. Once this bill comes into force, it would be surprising to see even one person convicted and given a harsh penalty for the crime of human trafficking.
The current maximum penalties have never actually been applied to anyone convicted of people smuggling. In fact, as of 1999 the highest penalties ever handed out were 10 months in jail and a $3,000 fine. This is hardly the type of justice that should be put down on these sorts of people who are creating the crimes specifically pertaining to immigration.
With respect to enforcement, Bill C-31 mirrors the current Immigration Act. All that has really changed is how the act is laid out. The minister's strong message should not fool Canadians into believing this piece of legislation will fix the system. This bill lacks the necessary teeth to seriously address Canada's growing illegal immigration problems.
The bill is touted as the result of extensive consultation with the Canadian public, industry experts, law enforcement agencies and parliamentarians. The fact is that successive studies and reports were ignored by this minister. She would be hard-pressed to point out where even a handful of the recommendations can be found in the bill.
We have seen over and over again that when recommendations are made through the public process, through inquiries, through a number of different channels trying to involve the public to improve legislation, to be reflective of what Canadians want in this country, that the government seems to ignore grassroots Canadians. It seems to ignore the people that this type of legislation affects the most.
This is unacceptable to Canadians. It is unacceptable to the official opposition. We see legislation continuously pass through this place that could go a step further, that could be better, that could help Canadians. However, unfortunately, with the government's lacks of response to grassroots Canadians, we do not see legislation being improved the way we would like to see it improved and the way Canadians would like to see it improved.
Even if the new immigration bill were good legislation, which it is not, it would not be effective until the government implements better management, training, auditing and enforcement within the system.
For 10 years the auditor general has stated that Canada's immigration and refugee system is in serious need of repair. The government has continually failed to listen to Canadians as well as potential immigrants and refugees.
The auditor general in his recent evaluation of Canada's immigration department states:
On the whole, we are very concerned about the Department's ability to ensure compliance with legislative requirements in this area. We noted serious deficiencies in the way it applies admissibility criteria related to health, criminality and security. It is somewhat disappointing to note the limited progress it has made since our 1990 Report....We believe that the Department needs to take corrective action without delay to ensure the integrity and effectiveness of the Canadian Immigration Program.
This is the auditor general speaking about Canada's immigration department and still the government refuses to acknowledge some of these criticisms, even from its own advisers.
This is something which Canadians need to take note of, especially when we are dealing with a bill that hits so close to home, the immigration and the refugee matter. It is a shame that this government will not even listen to its own auditor general.
Considering the abysmal track record of the government and its management of the department, this is a very dangerous piece of legislation. Much of the regulation in the bill is left to the regulation side and is not included in the legislative process in the House.
I also want to talk, generally, about what Canadians want to see when they look at their immigration system and the things that system should provide. Canadians want an immigration system which will accommodate independent immigrants who will quickly add to our economy, which will welcome genuine refugees and which will reunite these people with their families as soon as possible.
The government has failed to deliver what Canadians want in this new bill. There are a total of two clauses in Bill C-31 that refer to independent immigration. The rest is left to the regulations, as I said. Regulations will give the minister and her department the authority to determine, without guidance from the legislation, the definition of the terms child and common law partner; how to apply to amend the point system; how many of these applications would be approved every year; the number of immigration applications accepted each year; and the designation of classes of people such as spouses, foreign workers or foreign students who would be eligible for landing.
This raises a few concerns for Canadians to have this sort of discretion left to the regulations and not defined specifically in the legislation.
Through the committee process my colleague from Lakeland, who is our immigration critic, put forward a number of amendments to deal with this area, trying to strengthen this legislation to make it more responsive to some of the things I have mentioned, and especially trying to put some teeth into it.
In the committee process we would hope there would be an effort made by all members of this place to be non-partisan and to put forward amendments to improve legislation, no matter what side of the House they sit on. Committees are supposed to represent democracy and bring forth good ideas to make legislation better. They should not be involved in partisan politics.
However, we have seen committees continuously deteriorate to become havens of partisan politics, where we do not try to help one another improve legislation, especially when a member of the opposition puts forward amendments which could make government legislation better. Government members continuously vote down those amendments. It is not that opposition members want credit for those amendments, they just want to see Canadians well served. They want to see legislation improved and they want to see the committee process work.
Time and again we see the government continuously slap opposition members in the face. It slaps the committee process in the face and does not allow the committees to work the way they are supposed to. It is disheartening. It is disheartening to members of the opposition who are trying to serve their constituents and trying to improve legislation for Canadians. It is disheartening for Canadians who sometimes have the opportunity to tune in to committees. We do not even open up that process as much as we should. It is disheartening to Canadians to see their parliamentary system not working the way it should to improve legislation. We in the official opposition continue to fight to improve the transparency of this place, to improve the way the committee system works and hopefully to even have freer votes in the House to improve legislation. No matter what side of the House members sit on, if they have good ideas which can improve legislation, those ideas should be heard and endorsed in the House.
Canadians are concerned with how immigration will benefit Canada. This legislation provides no clear or firm laws to govern immigration. Once again, Canada's immigration system will be left to the hands of bureaucrats and the government, leaving very little room for accountability to the Canadian public.
I would like to summarize some of the points I have made in my speech today, especially in light of this bill and the changes that have been proposed to the immigration and refugee protection bill. The Minister of Citizenship and Immigration touts this legislation as being tough; that it will fix many of the problems Canada's immigration system faces today.
As I and many of my colleagues have demonstrated, this bill will not accomplish its objectives and is likely to significantly slow down the entire immigration system.
That is the result Canadians do not want. The result we were fighting for was to make our immigration system work better. We want to have a system which focuses its resources properly, which makes this process work more effectively and which processes legitimate refugees and immigrants more effectively, not a system which is bogged down by a government that fails to lead and fails to make its system more transparent.
As I mentioned at the beginning, as an immigrant to this country it disappoints me greatly that this government will not act to implement the changes which Canadians want.
Raymonde Folco Liberal Laval West, QC
Madam Speaker, I really wonder whether the hon. member for Edmonton—Strathcona and I read the same bill.
All in all, his understanding of the bill strikes me as rather minimal. Since he mentions the fact that he is an immigrant, I am proud to say that I am no longer one—I am now a Canadian. I will therefore speak as a Canadian, but one who knows what immigration is because I have been through it myself.
I would like to pick up on a few points. I should say that there are so many errors and misunderstandings about Bill C-31 on immigration and refugees that it is simply not possible to touch on all the points raised by the member.
But there are four I would like to examine, the first being the fact that this bill is intended to strengthen immigration, people's plans to immigrant to Canada.
We know, for instance, that the minister has already concluded co-operation agreements with international agencies throughout the world for the specific purpose of stopping illegal immigration to Canada, not when these people land illegally in Canada, but at the source.
We also know that the minister has already travelled, to the People's Republic of China for instance, precisely in order to try to negotiate agreements with the government of that country to dry up illegal immigration to Canada at the source. I believe that the hon. member for Edmonton—Strathcona has forgotten these points, which are to my mind very important ones.
I would also like to mention that there have been some very extensive consultations on this bill, and on Bill C-16 on citizenship. We know that the minister and her predecessor in the House of Commons both held consultations across Canada. From speaking to a good many of my constituents, since my riding contains a large number of Canadians who were born elsewhere, I know that they are extremely pleased with this bill the minister has introduced, and totally support it.
When the hon. member for Edmonton—Strathcona speaks of there having been consultations which the minister did not heed, I have to object. I can see that my constituents are very pleased.
I would like to remind this hon. member, who benefited from generous legislation, who was able to come here to Canada with his family and who perhaps was able to bring in other relatives, that Canada is a generous country. We do not want illegal immigration, but we do want to continue our tradition of generosity toward people, be they refugees or immigrants, to welcome them and later welcome their relatives when they want to bring them over.
There is room here in Canada. We are all from somewhere else. Either we or our parents or great-grand parents came from another country and we want to continue that great tradition of which Canadians are proud and for which we are known throughout the world.
Rahim Jaffer Reform Edmonton Strathcona, AB
Madam Speaker, I do not know exactly where to begin to address some of the comments the hon. member raised. She raised some interesting points. I will, however, try to address at least the last of her comments before I attack some of the other things she said.
I do not think anyone would argue the fact that the immigration system should be generous. The immigration system should work in favour of potential immigrants and refugees coming to this country, as it did when my family came, as she so rightly pointed out. Unfortunately, things have deteriorated.
Also, under this government's leadership things have become worse, especially when it comes to processing refugees.
Rahim Jaffer Reform Edmonton Strathcona, AB
Madam Speaker, I am being heckled from across the way about proving this point.
We have seen more cases of people profiting from the trafficking of illegitimate refugees. They have become more numerous, as we have seen from the news. We have seen it more than ever.
As I mentioned in my speech, we do not have the proper resources and efforts are not being made to allow our immigration system to process refugees as well as immigrants expeditiously. That is why there is so much pressure for people to jump the queue, to look at illegal ways to enter this country. That would not be the case if our system worked effectively. The proof is in the pudding. This is common knowledge to many Canadians.
This is why we in the opposition have proposed many changes to the legislation which would focus resources more effectively to allow our system to process potential immigrants and refugees more effectively.
My hon. colleague opposite referred to the minister's trip to China to try to deal with this situation. Unfortunately, her travels ended up to be mostly a joke. She did not accomplish anything which she set out to do. If travelling would solve the problems, we would not have to be here.
We need to take a good look at this. I addressed the case of how this bill failed to meet the immigration minister's tough talk in describing the new legislation.
As I said, when it comes to the integrity of the immigration system to protect our borders, to fight organized crime, terrorists, people smuggling and illegal immigration, this bill falls short.
Dale Johnston Reform Wetaskiwin, AB
Madam Speaker, I listened to my colleague's very well reasoned and delivered speech and I could not help but wonder if he gets as much concern about immigration problems in his constituency office as I do.
Not to put words in my colleague's mouth, but just to give Madam Speaker and the rest of the House an idea of the kind of concerns I hear from constituents regarding immigration, the people who come to see me have gone through all of the legal requirements to immigrate into Canada. They have dotted all the i' s and crossed all the t' s and it seems that roadblock after roadblock is thrown in their way.
By the time they have come to see me they have been everywhere else. By the time anybody comes to their MP usually they have gone through all of the other bureaucratic channels and then they try the political route. By the time they come to our door they are extremely frustrated. Usually what I hear is that they are trying to do everything through the proper legal channels and within the parameters set out in the Immigration Act and they are having a terrible, tough time getting into Canada but people who arrive here by illegal means are brought ashore and embraced. Would my colleague remark on that?
Rahim Jaffer Reform Edmonton Strathcona, AB
Madam Speaker, there is no doubt that in my own experience, in my short time of being in this place, immigration is one of the biggest concerns that comes to my office.
Unfortunately it seems that the problems people are facing when it comes to bringing their own family members or various other people to this country, have grown ever so numerous. As I pointed out during the course of my speech, most of it seems to be that the immigration department cannot process immigrants properly. It takes forever. People are frustrated. It seems that the resources are not being allocated effectively. We are not doing our job and the government is not doing its job in trying to serve the public and Canadians who are trying to go through the legal process, who go through the proper application process to get their friends, family or other immigrants to this country.
I see the frustration every day in my office. Constituents are complaining about different parts of the immigration system. They complain that they have exhausted all the channels. Some of them are in tears because they do not know where to turn.
Why is the government not responding to the needs of immigrants, to families and trying to be charitable or generous as my hon. colleague mentioned? This is the last thing many constituents in my riding who are coming to me with immigration problems feel. They feel that the government is not being generous, that it is not dealing with immigration files expeditiously. That is one of the great failures of this bill. I wish we could have improved it.
Immigration And Refugee Protection ActGovernment Orders
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)
I must inform the House at this stage that we are entering into a new phase of the debate. From this point on speeches will be of 10 minutes. There will be no questions or comments.
Pat Martin NDP Winnipeg Centre, MB
Madam Speaker, I am very disappointed to learn that we are limited to 10 minutes because we are finally on a subject that we can really engage in some necessary debate, on the matter of policy relating to immigration and refugee issues. After struggling through Bill C-16 endlessly, it now seems we have very scant opportunities to really debate issues of substance regarding immigration policy.
Having said that, I think it is a mistake to enter into any serious policy debate on the subject of immigration until we first answer the question, how big a country do we want? How big should Canada be? Why should we be setting policy if we do not even know what the goals are? This debate has never really taken place in any meaningful way in the country. Should Canada be 100 million people? Is there room for 200 million people or 50 million people?
Sir Wilfrid Laurier at the turn of the last century said Canada should be 100 million people by the year 2000. Frankly, given the birth rate and the demographics of the time, his statisticians and demographers were correct. Had we maintained the same birth rate in 1900 throughout the whole century, we would be at 100 million people today. He was correct, but things have changed. The birth rate has dropped dramatically.
Those are the two things we have to look at if we are serious about growing our population and moving our population forward. Birth rate and immigration are the two factors that demographers build into their models when they are trying to see what Canada will look like 10, 20 and 50 years from now.
At the current birth rate without any immigration, in 100 years time we would be a country of 18 million people. We are 32 million today and 100 years later we would be 18 million people. Cities like Minneapolis will be bigger than that 100 years from now. The computer models show that without immigration our population would shrink. It cannot afford to shrink if we are going to be competitive in the new global economy.
Having said that, obviously everyone in the House accepts that immigration is necessary for Canada for future economic growth, but how much? We have not had that debate. How can we set law and policy dealing with immigration if we do not know what our targets are, if we do not know what our goals should be?
I wanted to preface my remarks with an urgent call that we should be having an honest non-partisan debate about what we want Canada to look like in the coming years. It is very hard to say if Bill C-31 has any merits or if it meets our needs because we do not have any clear goal of what those needs are.
Some people have serious reservations about Bill C-31 and I share some of those feelings. I have heard it said that it really asks more questions than it gives answers because, as was pointed out by the previous speaker, it is just a framework document. All the meat and potatoes, all the guts, are going to be left to regulation.
Regulations are not things which are debated in the House. It is a dramatically undemocratic process to let us figure out what colour to paint the lunch room and let someone else do all the important decision making, like how fast the assembly line should go. I feel slighted that we are not going to be debating the issues of substance. That is all going to be within the regulations and within the purview of the minister and not within the purview of the House of Commons. We are very concerned about that.
The bill does contain a number of positive measures. The consolidation of all the protection related decisions in the Immigration and Refugee Board will be a positive move. Ultimately however, critics we are talking to are saying that by inconsistently applying human rights norms in some context and then violating them in others, the bill fails to demonstrate any underlying commitment to justice and to our international obligations in the various institutions like the United Nations.
On the negative side I want to point out that the bill demonstrates an unhealthy obsession with criminality without any safeguards to protect the wrongly accused. I believe this stems directly from the hysteria associated with six boatloads of illegal migrants who drifted up on the shores of British Columbia this summer.
I should point out that other countries are coping with this as well and coping with it in a more mature way. Australia had 88 boats of illegal migrants last year. We had six. It expects 150 this year, but we do not see the same hysteria or the same urge to crack down, get tough and change immigration laws and policies based on what is really an anomaly.
There is a saying that it is a poor sailor who sets his course by the lights of a passing ship. What happened last summer was lights of a passing ship, and here we are prepared to permanently change our whole immigration policy based on that. That worries me and it worries a lot of the people we have been talking to.
There are a number of issues I would like to go through. One of the things we have to deal with, and it is a necessary evil I suppose, is the penalties which have to be increased for the trafficking of humans. It is by international agreement more or less that all the countries of the world are starting to crack down on the illegal trafficking of human beings. It is one of the most reprehensible things going on in the world today. It is tantamount to slavery and bonded labour. These things cannot be tolerated in our country. Therefore we approve the increase in the penalties for illegally trafficking people and the exploitation that is often associated with it.
We draw a cautionary note however. I point out that in part of our history we were very proud of illegal trafficking and smuggling of human beings. We had the underground railroad which, breaking all the laws of the land, illegally smuggled slaves from the deep south and brought them to Canada. That is a part of our history we are very proud of.
All over the world there are modern day underground railways taking place where people are being delivered from persecution by people who are breaking the law to do it. I remind the architects of this legislation that we should not ignore the very real, courageous work that is going on in terms of smuggling people. Sometimes people are being smuggled out of danger to save their lives. There is a line we have to view there.
There is one thing I must mention. The bill makes reference to the best interests of the child. We believe that incorporating that language is a step in the right direction. It shows up at various points in the bill. But we do not believe it goes far enough. Canada has stipulated to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the language is far stronger within that convention. We believe that the language in the legislation should accurately reflect the language we are already bound to under the UN convention.
I must comment on the aspect of criminality. I have noted before that we are disappointed in how much the bill concentrates on this aspect. To bar anyone making a refugee claim who has ever been convicted of a “serious crime” is a terrible mistake. This is something we will call to be corrected.
Under this clause Nelson Mandela would not qualify for immigration into this country because he was convicted of what was thought to be a serious crime in his home country. He would not be allowed into this country. The government and the Liberals were fawning all over themselves to touch the hem of his garment when Nelson Mandela graced us with his presence and now they are passing legislation one year later which would effectively bar that same man from ever becoming a Canadian or even taking sanctuary in this country.
Let us think this through. There are some places with corrupt dictatorships where people are persecuted and put in prison for political ideology or any number of other reasons when they do not deserve to be. Those people should not be barred access to Canada if they seek refuge here because they may have committed crimes under a regime that we do not even agree with.
Along those same lines we should be very careful that when we do revoke citizenship or turn people away from this country we never ever send them back to places that are known for torture or where they run the risk of being tortured because again, we are stipulated to the United Nations convention on torture. We must make sure that our rules would never force such a thing to happen.
The last thing I will mention in my final minute is that this government is missing a valuable opportunity to do something about the racist head tax. The right of landing fee is absolutely racist. It is racist because it economically discriminates against those who come from third world developing nations and who are often people of colour. For those from West Germany it is not that hard to raise $975. For those from the Sudan it is three years income and is impossible. Therefore, whether by action or omission, we are inadvertently selecting people based on race. The head tax should be eliminated if we are to welcome people to this country.
I wish I had more time.
Lee Morrison Reform Cypress Hills—Grasslands, SK
Madam Speaker, I would like to begin by complimenting the member for Winnipeg Centre for his very reasoned comments about the over-reliance of this new legislation on regulation rather than having the rules clearly stated and built into the bill. This is just another of hundreds of examples that we have seen in the last seven years of the gradual erosion of the powers of parliament and the handing over to either the centre of the government or the bureaucrats, or both, the powers which should be exclusive to us in this Chamber.
As the son and grandson of immigrants I have a very keen interest in what I see happening around me these days. We have become, for the third time in a century, an immigration dependent country, an immigration dependent economy. I do not think anyone would deny at this point that in order to keep the pump primed we do have to bring in more people, preferably people with skills, people with ambition, and people who can contribute physically and financially to the maintenance and growth of our economy. This should be the prime purpose of immigration. This is what Canadians want.
For the record I would like to quote the policy of the Canadian Alliance Party on that particular point:
We should have an immigration system that will accommodate independent immigrants who will quickly add to our economy; a system which will welcome genuine refugees and which will reunite people with their families as soon as possible.
The government has failed to deliver that, and I do not see any sign in the new act that it is on the line for the future.
I should like to address briefly the question of refugees, which seems to be the part of the Canadian immigration system that is attracting the most public attention and is causing the most concern to the general population. It really hurts me as a Canadian to see how our country has been made a laughing stock of the world because of the way we handle refugee claimants.
Migrants get their toes on Canadian soil, say the magic word refugee, and they are in. That is a wonderful setup for criminal traffickers in human beings or for plain scofflaws and queue jumpers. This is not the way to run a country. If we to do it that way, why have an immigration department at all? This issue is that it is becoming a rubber stamp. It makes no sense.
This goes back to a court decision in 1985. The Singh decision made very clear that once people gets their toes on the ground they have all the rights and privileges of a Canadian citizen, or at least that is the way the decision was interpreted by the immigration department.
The government extended the Singh decision to mean that all refugee claimants, in fact any foreign national who lands on Canadian soil, should be given the full protection of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. That interpretation is certainly a major contributing factor to Canada becoming the favoured target all over the world for people traffickers, for scofflaws, for people who cannot be bothered to go through the formalities of proper immigration procedures.
This new legislation will outsing Singh. According to the new act anyone who applies for entry into the country, no matter where in the world, automatically gains protection under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. There is no other country on the face of the earth that gives citizenship rights, or rights equal to those of citizens, to foreign nationals outside its borders. People trying to get into this country will think we have lost our minds.
I have talked to immigration officials who have read the bill and see what is coming. Obviously I cannot quote their names but they are appalled. They are asking what they are going to do now when what looks like a spurious applicant comes before them and they say no for a good reason. The person will then immediately invoke the rights our citizens would have under our constitution to challenge the decision made by these officers.
If the officers are confronted with this often enough, they will simply throw up their hands and say “It is no use. We cannot keep bailing. The hole in the boat is getting bigger all the time. Our jobs are without purpose. We will just have to open the floodgates and let people in”.
I sincerely hope that clause in the legislation will be amended out before we finally get to vote on it. It is an absurdity. I do not know who makes up these things, but it must be somebody with a fine imagination.
I have talked about the idiocy of the new legislation, but there are some good things in it. There is the stiffening of the penalties for trafficking, for example. However, if we look at that closely, those clauses are without much meaning.
If someone is a big time people smuggler, that person will not come to Vancouver, set up a booth on Hastings Street and say “Come now and we will arrange your illegal immigration”. He will reside either in his home country or in a third country where we cannot get at him. We have a law that says one could get a million dollar fine or a year in jail. So what? It has no effect.
I have heard today a couple of times about how our minister has presumably partially stopped the flow of illegal immigrants by going to source, making trips and talking to officials in the source countries of illegal immigrants. I am sure, oh so sure, that really deterred a lot of people. In the real world how many do we think it deterred when we have legislation coming up that will give people the right and the opportunity to say that if we do not want to let them into our country they will appeal again and again and eventually get in. What is our minister doing?
I deeply regret that I have only 10 minutes. I wanted to tell the House a whole bunch of horror stories on the other side of the coin about legitimate immigrants, people who have come here with the best will and intent. They have good jobs and are contributing to the country. However, after years and years of effort, they have been unable to get landed. I have a number of them in my constituency. Even though I am in a rural and so-called remote area, I get more of these kinds of cases than of almost anything else but income tax.
Roy H. Bailey Reform Souris—Moose Mountain, SK
Madam Speaker, following on my colleagues I think it would be best if I asked a question in relation to Bill C-31. We have had many different waves of immigration in our history. From the Irish to the Chinese, to The Last Best West , we have had waves and waves of immigration. Why is it that in the last 10 or 15 years we have had more problems than in the previous 150 years? That is the question Canadians want addressed.
To try to make the claim that this party is against immigration is absolutely false. We have to put this department in its proper place so that it can function properly. On a scale of one to ten Canadians might rate health care at five or police protection at two, but when it comes to immigration Canadians probably rate it at minus three.
Two doctors in my constituency, a husband and wife, were brought into the country. They laboured long and hard, day in and day out. They applied to go back to South Africa for a break and tried to get a permit to re-enter Canada. They were two very honourable and trained physicians.
I will find out this weekend when I return home if they were allowed re-entry into Canada. They have tried their very best. They came to their member of parliament. I tried everything I could, and finally on the day of the departure they said if they were denied they would never return to Canada. These people came here and slaved it out in our hospitals, and that is the kind of treatment they receive.
I will give one more example. Last week a girl in Ukraine had gone through everything legally. She travelled 12 hours on the train to Kiev. When she got there she thought all her papers would be in order. Instead of just walking up and taking a card for the line up to get in the queue, she had to buy a place in the line in front of the Canadian embassy, right before the immigration officials. What made it worse was that her application form was stamped rejected before she even completed the inquiry.
I could go on, but this is what Canadians are telling me. Like my colleague for Cypress Hills—Grasslands, I find these people come to their members of parliament when everything else breaks down.
Every case has been proven to be overly bureaucratic and prone to excessive legal delays. Why is it that we are so absolutely tough and ignore those people who not only would make good citizens but are well trained and ready for a job in Canada. One gentleman said:
Unless this department becomes more effective in implementing better management, better training, better auditing and more enforcement within the system, it will continue to fail Canadians.
I do not know why the government keeps bragging about this department. It is atrocious. I have files in my constituency to prove that this is so.
Another person who recently came to this country said, “The integrity of Canada's immigration system to protect yourselves from crime, terrorists and people smuggling is disgraceful”. As my hon. colleague just mentioned, when we pick up the paper, it is unbelievable to see who is granted status immediately when they come into the country. Yet, there is file after file on people who have been denied access and on cases which are still being looked at.
What do Canadians want? We want the system we had in the last century that brought people into the country. We had no immigration problems with law. We had no immigration problems with unemployment. What do we have to have? We want an immigration system that will accommodate independent immigrants. We want the process of coming in to be improved. Not only that, we do not want them to suffer unnecessary delays. We need these people because they quickly add to our economy. We welcome genuine refugees. They know and have been told all around the world to get their feet on Canadian soil and they will be protected by the charter. Our legal immigrants do not even like what they see. Those who have come here are insulted by this. The government has failed to deliver what Canadians want and expect of this department.
In attempting to be all things to all people, we have disgraced immigration in Canada. We need to take the bill back, redraw it and go outside this Chamber to get information from people who are concerned about immigration. We are not doing it. Until we make big changes to this bill and to the approach taken by the department, we will continue to have an immigration scandal well into this century as well.
Gary Lunn Reform Saanich—Gulf Islands, BC
Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise on Bill C-31. My hon. colleagues from Souris—Moose Mountain and Cypress Hills—Grassland focused on how immigrants who are trying to come into the country are frustrated by the process. They spoke very eloquently. I am going to focus on a few other areas specifically within the refugee process which I am very familiar with. I was there last year when 600 Chinese boat people landed in Victoria and on Vancouver Island.
The name of the bill, the immigration and refugee protection act, suggests that the government wishes to protect refugee applicants. I suggest that it makes Canada the easiest target for abuse of the refugee system in the world. I will show the specific details in the bill. That is not what Canadians want.
Canadians want an immigration system that will allow immigrants to come into Canada efficiently and quickly. Immigration built Canada and our economy thrives on it. Canadians want a system that welcomes genuine refugees, like people from Kosovo, East Timor and other places that are in conflict or danger. What we do not want is a reputation for receiving economic refugees, or queue jumpers, or people who are abusing the system. Also once we get that reputation, people will want to come to our country through this process for illegitimate reasons and use it as a corridor to get into the United States. They could have other reasons that could be illegal.
I do not understand why our government has absolutely no interest in stopping what is going on. We heard the minister of immigration say to us in recent months that her focus was one that was going to make the process easier for refugees and to go after the snake heads, organized crime, the people who are smuggling people into Canada and making millions of dollars.
Ironically nine of those are going through our justice system now were practically thrown out the front door of the courtroom last week by a justice in Victoria who was prepared to drop all the charges. That has not happened, but it shows there is grave concern about the system and there is no leadership coming from the government.
I will focus on the specifics. There are two key flaws in the bill which neutralize any possible positive changes the government could make.
The first one relates to the Singh decision, the 1985 Supreme Court of Canada decision which states that genuine refugees, and I want to emphasize genuine refugees, would be afforded protection under the charter.
I would argue that when these people come to Canada they are not genuine. They are in fact economic refugees who are abusing the system and therefore should not be afforded the protection of the charter. The government's interpretation of the Singh decision is that if someone puts one toe on Canada's soil and says they are a refugee, they are going to get charter protection. That is not what the Singh decision says. It says that if a person is a genuine refugee under the definition of the Geneva convention then they would be afforded all the rights and protections of the charter.
What is worse is the government is putting its own interpretation of that court decision into legislation. Clause 3 of the bill states, “This act is to be construed and applied in a manner that ensures any person seeking admission to Canada is subject to the standards, policies and procedures consistent with the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms”. That is appalling. It is an utter disgrace and an abuse of power. Any person. They could be convicted criminals, terrorists, or queue jumpers.
We want to a process where we honour our commitment to the Geneva convention. To give any person who shows up in this country and says “I am a refugee”, regardless of their past and how they got here all the protections of Canadian citizens, we do not give that to people who are trying to come into this country legitimately. There are people applying to our embassies abroad saying, “I would like to immigrate to Canada”. We do not give them the protection of the charter for crying out loud, but a person who gets their toe on our soil does.
People get on planes and rip up their passports. I do not know how many hundreds of flight attendants have told me as I commute between Ottawa and Victoria on a weekly basis that when they do international flights it is a big problem. Passengers destroy their documents on the plane and they get off the plane and say, “I am a refugee,” and here they are. That is one flaw. It is absolutely unconscionable the government would even consider that.
The second is the bill expands the definition of who can become a refugee in Canada. Canada's definition goes well beyond what our commitment is to the Geneva convention. Again we are a signatory to that convention. We in the Canadian Alliance would like to honour that and we would do our fair share when we need to step up to the plate. However the government is putting into legislation that any terrorist, any criminal, anyone for any reason who puts a toe on this soil, has the protection of the charter, which is absolutely wrong. We are ensuring that Canada is going to be the world's number one target for human smuggling operations.
The nine Koreans who are on trial right now in Victoria and who came within a hair of being released and sent home to continue their business were laughing. They were waiting for us to fly them home in one of our jets so they could fill up more boats.
It is absolutely unbelievable that the government cannot see a problem. I want to emphasize that the problem is not the 600 refugees who came on boats last year; it is the 20,000 or 22,000, I do not have the exact number but it is in that neighbourhood, who each year cross our borders or come through our airports. It is wrong.
There are cases in my office where Americans have come across the border saying, “I am a refugee. I have my toe on your soil”. They are afforded all the rights. It takes anywhere from two to five years to process them. They come here for various reasons, whether it is health care or whatever. They get processed. We provide for them. In my opinion there is not a genuine refugee from the United States who is facing political persecution.
What is worse is that they leave and then they come back into Canada. They only have to be out of the country for three months before they can come back in and start a new claim. I have files in my office of people coming from the United States on their third refugee claim. The only thing they have to do is leave the country for 90 days. It is wrong.
I speak to immigration officials in Victoria all the time. They are equally frustrated that the government has taken no leadership. They do not have a clue what is going to happen this year. They have no money in the budget to deal with it. More refugees are expected to arrive on a regular basis.
How has the government shown leadership? By expanding the definition of refugees and bringing in legislation to guarantee charter protection when the Singh decision actually states that it is only for genuine refugees.
I argue that when these people arrive here, we should have concerns of whether they are genuine refugees and detain them until we can determine very quickly, whether it is weeks or months, if they are genuine refugees. If they are not, then they are not going to be afforded those charter protections. We can interpret the Singh decision in that manner.
It is time for action. The bill is full of empty threats of maximum penalties for snake heads and organized crime. Does the minister of immigration believe that she is going to go over to China and apply our laws to people over there? I do not know if she thinks she is a keystone cop. It is ridiculous.
There is only one way to send a message to stop human smuggling and stop the pain and misery of the people coming over in those rusty old ships, to stop them from dying en route. There is only one way and that is when they arrive here, bring them ashore, help them out for a few days if they need medical attention, then put them on a plane and send them home. We would be doing them a service.
I urge the government to consider that and to quit trying to play politics and trying to score political points. Canada's reputation is becoming an absolute disgrace in the international community as we are opening our borders up to who knows who.
Immigration And Refugee Protection ActGovernment Orders
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)
It is my duty, pursuant to Standing Order 38, to inform the House that the question to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for Bras d'Or—Cape Breton, Scotia Rainbow.
Ken Epp Reform Elk Island, AB
Madam Speaker, it is an honour to enter the debate on the immigration and refugee protection act.
Unfortunately I had to leave for a while to attend a committee meeting, but I listened to as much of today's debate as I could. I was taken back in my memory to the early days of my life, when the fact that we were immigrants to Canada was burned into my brain and into my heart.
I am one of those very fortunate people who is here because my grandparents made the decision to immigrate into Canada. I am a first generation Canadian. My parents, though they did not know each other when they came to Canada, were each in their very early teens when they came here. I believe my dad was 12 years old.
I remember listening to the conversations of the adults in our family. We were supposed to be sleeping, but we would listen to them talking about life in the old country, the hardships they endured and the way in which they escaped. They were very grateful to be in Canada.
I am one who fundamentally is supportive of the idea of immigration. I like the idea that in Canada we can move from province to province freely, especially because my family came from a country where to go to a neighbouring city to visit relatives they had to get a permit from the government.
Immigration And Refugee Protection ActGovernment Orders
An hon. member
It sounds like Saskatchewan.
Ken Epp Reform Elk Island, AB
I grew up in Saskatchewan and we do not have those rules in Canada.
One of the great freedoms that should accrue to human beings is the freedom of movement within the land they are going to and the land they are coming from.
My grandmother often expressed gratitude because her family grew up in Canada instead of Russia, from which they had escaped. Even though I did not experience it firsthand, the stories were repeated frequently in my youth and I learned them.
It was very important that in the early 1920s Canada extended an open hand of welcome to my family. I am one who believes that if I have received a benefit, I should pay it back. It is the old maxim of do unto others as you would have them do unto you. I do this even at home. When I picked up a hitchhiker the other day I told him that I was not giving him a ride because I was looking for points. Long before I ever ran for elected office I picked up hitchhikers because I was a hitchhiker myself when I was a young student.
Having had my family come to Canada as immigrants, I believe we should do everything possible to admit people who have the potential to be good citizens, who will contribute to our society by working hard, providing for themselves and others.
Bill C-31 is supposed to address some of the problems that we have within our immigration system, but as some of my colleagues have pointed out in earlier debate today it falls far short of the goals that most Canadians want for our immigration system.
When I think of the people who come to Canada as bona fide good people, it really is an affront to them that we would do anything less than protect their integrity entirely by making sure that those who are not qualified to be here, who are here on illegal or dishonest pretences, should not be permitted to stay, and thereby to tarnish the reputation of others.
Sometimes we in my party are charged with not being immigrant friendly. That is a totally false accusation. Whenever people say that they are distorting the truth about what we believe in. We in the Canadian Alliance believe that there should be a very orderly immigration system and that people who meet the qualifications should be able to enter our society in Canada, enjoy it and contribute to it.
I am very concerned about the fact that some people who come to Canada are given exceedingly excessive opportunities to rip off the system when it has become very clear that they are not honest immigrants. They do not come under the classification of being people who would satisfy the needs of Canadian society.
How does one handle this? I believe the intent of the bill should have been that in the event people are shown to be, for example, trafficking in people, we should have taken very strong measures against the traffickers. It was not done. I am concerned that, with our very weak policies, Canada will become the worldwide haven for international criminals. It is totally unconscionable that these immigrant smugglers take large amounts of money from people who need to escape from their own country, for whatever reason. These illegal people runners take large amounts of money from them and then, to add insult to injury, put their lives at risk by putting them into vessels which are not seaworthy.
Canada, being a very compassionate nation, rightfully opens up its doors to them when they come to our shores. I do not think anybody would suggest that we should not look after their immediate physical needs, but as long as we have a very soft policy on this kind of immigration it will continue and it will grow. The only way to stop it is to make sure that those who are doing it do not have the reinforcement of having success in their illegal enterprise.
I believe that the government should take very strong measures in this area. This is not our party policy, but one of the things which I personally think we should do is use radio transmissions to communicate directly with people in the countries from which these people come. We should put out a message which says that for those who are not genuine refugees, just simply coming to our shores will not mean automatic access to our country. That would dry up the source of business for mercenaries who trade in human beings.
What most Canadians want, certainly the ones I have talked to, is an immigration system that accepts refugees who are genuine refugees, and accepts with open arms immigrants who are capable. One of the shortcomings in our country is that when we are not able to train our own citizens in certain skills, Canadian immigration laws become a huge barrier to our business people and manufacturers who want people to come from other parts of the world where they have received the training. They are not permitted to come here. Yet other people, with all sorts of nefarious motivations, are allowed to come and we do not have the mechanisms to get rid of them.
I stand as a proud Canadian, as one who believes that we should show compassion and care for those people who genuinely need it. I stand simply to encourage the government to improve the refugee and immigration policies, bills, motions and laws. This bill will not do that.
Peter Mancini NDP Sydney—Victoria, NS
Madam Speaker, I had not intended to speak to this bill today, but having listened to some of the debate and seeing the importance of the issue, I felt compelled on behalf of the people I represent to stand and speak about some of the issues which have been raised.
First, let me start by picking up on what was said by my colleague from Winnipeg Centre who was in the midst of delivering what I thought were some interesting remarks when his time ran out.
He started with the question: How big should Canada be? What should the immigration number be? What should the population be before we add—
Immigration And Refugee Protection ActGovernment Orders
The Acting Speaker (Ms. Thibeault)
I am sorry to interrupt, but I have just been advised that the hon. member for Sydney—Victoria has already spoken in this debate.
Peter Mancini NDP Sydney—Victoria, NS
I apologize, Madam Speaker. I had much more to say.
John Duncan Reform Vancouver Island North, BC
No, it is Vancouver Island North, Madam Speaker. I want to get it right, just to ensure that I am not put in the position of being told I have already spoken.
John Duncan Reform Vancouver Island North, BC
Yes, such an important riding. As a matter of fact, from a citizenship or immigration perspective, perhaps my riding was rather pivotal in bringing this issue to parliament because that is where the boats carrying the Chinese migrants landed last year.
What are Canadians looking for in our immigration act? That is the key question we should be asking. The official opposition has a very clear picture of what that is.
Canadians want an immigration system which will accommodate independent immigrants who will quickly add to our economy, which will welcome genuine refugees and which will reunite these people with their families as soon as possible. This government has failed to deliver what Canadians want in this new bill. That is a pretty simple equation, but it is a very important question.
The fabric of our country and the future of our country is dependent on people. We all know that. People are what make this place. We all came from somewhere. We are all basically immigrants from somewhere, or progeny of immigrants.
The minister is saying that the changes to the act we are debating today are the result of consultation. All I can say is that it is pretty selective choosing from that consultation. I cannot find in my heart or in my head where the changes being brought forward reflect the concerns of Canadians when it comes to our immigration system. Those concerns are many.
People are not concerned about the level of immigration; people are concerned about the components of immigration. People want assurances that we are bringing to Canada people who will benefit Canada in the long run and people who need the safe haven of Canada. We want to do good for the world, but we also want to look after the best interests of the future of our society and of Canada. That means we have to put some safeguards in place, and those safeguards are very important indeed.
As members of parliament we all work with immigration cases every day of the week. Our administrative staff work on immigration cases every day of the week. We also work with immigration officials. We know what the problems are in the system. We probably know the problems in the system better than almost any other group of Canadians as a collective.
A major question right now is how to take whole issue of people smuggling and turn it on its head. Canada, as we know, has become a target. There are two ways to do it. We can use the hammer and try to penalize the people smugglers or we can remove the incentive to smuggle people.
Canada is not particularly good at using the hammer. As a matter of fact, we are terrible. We have an international reputation for it. One way to describe the posture of successive governments in Canada when it comes to this kind of issue is to say that we are not warriors, but boy scouts
All things being equal, an incentive is always better than a penalty if the same results are achieved. It usually costs less and is much more effective. People do it because that is the natural course of events given the set of rules and the circumstances.
We are operating under a perverse system when it comes to immigration in Canada. The way our immigration act is construed and the way these changes have been made still lead us to the very same place where the likelihood of penalty that is meaningful to a people smuggler is almost nil and the likelihood of a major reward is infinitely large. The consequence of that is like a government subsidy. If something is subsidized, we get more of it. There is nothing here to tell me that we will reduce people smuggling as a consequence of this bill.
This is a status quo document that the minister is using as a public relations message in order to defend the Liberal love of the status quo while at the same time trying to sell to the public the fact that she is actually doing something when we know that this is not going to work.
We have a larger problem here. The United Nations has defined a refugee and we signed that convention. Canada, in its wisdom—and I am being facetious when I say Canada in its wisdom—has chosen not to follow the UN convention on refugees. If we had followed that convention, most of the people who have arrived and declared refugee status would not be refugees because they arrived through a safe country.
Part of the UN convention says that refugee status is declared at the first safe country of arrival. If Canada has refugees arriving in large numbers there can be only one reason: we are being targeted and it is symptomatic of a bigger problem.
The bigger problem we have is that we have the easiest, most vulnerable, most generous and easiest acceptance ratio of any western nation community. That is not doing us a favour.
What it is leading to is that we are not getting the average or better than average client refugee profile. There is a tendency, when creating a system such as ours with all those vulnerabilities, that we will end up with a lesser group. We will particularly end up with that element, a small element admittedly, but an element with criminal intent to a larger degree than countries with tougher standards. I think the Canadian public has again been sold a bill of goods. The changes in this bill will ensure that Canada remains the number one target for human traffickers and queue jumpers.
The 1985 Singh decision has led to all sorts of problems in the way we apply our immigration and refugee system. It is a prime example of how parliament has been usurped by the courts. Parliament has been complicit in allowing that to happen. It is time for the government to reverse that trend, that tendency and, in this case, that decision. That will allow us to fix our system and retain the sovereignty on immigration and refugee determination that Canadians deserve.