Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to rise as coalition immigration critic to take part in the debate on the supply day motion put forth by the Canadian Alliance.
Since September 11 the world certainly has changed and national security is on everyone's mind. We are all aware of the threats to our freedom by terrorist organizations of the world. At the same time Canada must be cognizant that Canada is a land of immigrants.
If we look at our history, Canada was built by immigrants. At this time we must not be pointing figures at legitimate refugees and immigrants, including myself who immigrated to this country before the events of September 11.
The coalition's position is that Canada needs to keep its door open to genuine immigrants and refugees. Our present and future standard of living depends on immigration. We attract the best in the world and we must continue to do so.
Despite the current fear of terrorism we must not repeat the dark side of Canada's history. Let us take a reality check. Over 99% of the annual movement of up to 40 million people between the United States and Canada is by legal people. The vast majority of those who come into Canada use the legal means. In fact terrorists can enter this country as visitors, students, refugees or legitimate immigrants. We need to tighten up our front end screening to detect those who would wish to do us harm.
As coalition critic my job is to point out the holes in the system. Let me take time to respond to the specifics of the supply day motion. This motion is much like an omnibus bill. It covers too much. In principle the coalition supports the motion, but we have concerns about the way it was put together.
Let me address some of our concerns. In the preamble the continental perimeter denotes a North American border, not a Canadian one. While the notion of a secure North American border is a good one, Canada cannot be expected to look after American borders. Nor can Americans be expected to look after Canadian borders. Agreements can and should be made on who looks after what and what jurisdiction we can share and co-operate on.
A continental perimeter does not by default ensure the safety of Canada's borders. Improved staffing levels, better training and better enforcement of existing laws will.
Under the Criminal Code of Canada a Canada customs officer has the authority to be a peace officer already by definition. In fact the criminal code states:
(d) an officer or a person having the powers of a customs or excise officer when performing any duty in the administration of the Customs Act or Excise Act.
According to the 1992 Immigration Act, section 113 states:
Duties of Peace Officers to execute orders--Every peace officer and every person in immediate charge or control of an immigration station shall, when so directed by the Deputy Minister, an adjudicator, a senior immigration officer or an immigration officer, receive and execute any written warrant or order issued or made under this Act or the regulations for the arrest, detention or removal from Canada of any persons.
We agree that immigration officers and customs officers should receive better training in identifying suspicious persons. There seems to be an attempt to arm immigration and customs officers with sidearms. While customs officers at borders should have sidearms, immigration officers at ports of entry should not.
If immigration officers simply use the enforcement tools at their disposal they have every ability to detain and even refuse entry to anyone who is thought to be a risk to the country.
I will comment on part (b) of the motion. This is a clear indication of seeking a sidearm for a border official. We do not disagree with this. However this would in fact make customs officers at the borders police officers. This would eliminate a number of positions across Canada in favour police enforcement.
We already have such a situation with park wardens who have effectively been replaced by RCMP because the wardens wanted sidearms.
We agree with part (c) of the motion. All asylum claimants should be held until their identities can be discovered and they are determined not to be a risk to Canadians. Proper security and health checks should be done to ensure the safety of citizens welcoming newcomers.
We agree with part (d). The safe third country concept has been used in immigration legislation since 1992. While the term and definition have been used to keep refugees and asylum claimants who have already been recognized as convention refugees from other countries from applying for refugee status here, there is no such thing as a list of safe third countries from which we might accept refugees or deport refugees to await identity discovery.
In 1999 a Sri Lankan national was refused refugee status as the claimant was found to already have refugee status in Germany. In 1998 a Liberian citizen was refused conventional refugee status since the person already had such status in Sierra Leone.
It is the broader sense of the legislation that is not being applied. A list of countries from which asylum seekers could come to claim such status or be detained while waiting for the outcome of such an application has never been compiled. It is believed that the reason for this is largely due to a lack of agreement on who decides which nations are considered to be safe. The safe third country concept does not guarantee the detection and apprehension of potential terrorists.
The auditor general made some very enlightening discoveries in his December 1997 report on the Immigration Refugee Board. Since 1993 over 99% of all claims were judged to be eligible by CIC officials. The claimants were then given the necessary documentation for filing a claim with the IRB and allowed to enter Canada.
Today there is still a 30,000 case backlog. With the passing of Bill C-11 all claims in the system that are not finalized will be nullified. All other claims will have to be started over again regardless of the stage of review. That will only create more backlog.
It was noted that over 90% of those denied refugee status remain in Canada, according to the auditor general. These problems have not gone away. They pose a real risk to Canada's security. The government has to account for how the IRB operates, recognizing and acknowledging that the IRB is a patronage vehicle.
I have tried over the last year to convince the immigration minister to set up front end screening of refugee claimants. I will close by making a few more comments on front end screening. I have indicated that the RCMP, CSIS and CIC need more staff.
No one can board a domestic or international flight without identification and in some cases travel documents. The fact that people arrive in Canada without such documentation should be grounds for immediate detention. The minister alluded to over 8,000 persons who were detained for an average of 16 days in the year 2000. What she forgot to say was that she personally okayed 3,989 otherwise inadmissible individuals, most hardened criminals, entering and remaining in Canada for a period of time.
The 3,989 people were obviously security risks to Canada since without a permit from the minister they could not have entered Canada. With no entry or exit data kept on persons coming and leaving Canada, it is impossible to tell whether those who are ordered out actually leave.