Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak in support of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration's motion recommending the government to place an immediate moratorium on the deportation of all undocumented workers and their families who pass security and criminality checks while a new immigration policy is put in place.
I want to begin by clarifying who, and not what, the motion addresses. The motion calls for an immediate moratorium on the deportations of all undocumented workers and their families who pass security and criminality checks.
First, let us remind ourselves that this motion concerns living, breathing humans. We are not talking about some kind of infestation of insects or stolen property. We are debating a matter that concerns living, breathing human beings with feelings, dreams and aspirations.
Second, let us also remind ourselves that the motion also concerns workers, so we are debating a matter that concerns living, breathing humans who are also productive contributors to Canada's economy and, precisely, they offer skills and services that are in demand.
Third, let us remind ourselves that the motion concerns not only living, breathing workers, but their families as well, so we are now debating a matter that concerns not only those persons who choose to be here, but those who were born and raised here as well.
Fourth, let us also remind ourselves that the motion concerns not only those workers and their families who pass security and criminality checks. We are debating a matter that concerns those living, breathing, productive members of our society and their families who have also honoured and respected the law in all other respects.
Fifth, because they are working underground, these people are being exploited and they are unable to reap the social benefits of the society to which they contribute.
Finally, in the interest of honesty, I must also be forthright and admit that yes, indeed we are talking about illegal workers, that is, persons who elected to take jobs in Canada without securing the appropriate visas.
In some instances, of course, some of these workers may have entered the country illegally but, in many cases, they may have simply overstayed a legal visa. None of this can or should be denied. However, I believe, like a great many others, that the fact that there are so many illegal workers in Canada is not itself the problem. Rather, it is instead a symptom of a severe problem in our immigration system.
After all, I find it difficult to regard any instance of a skilled worker productively contributing to the economy as a problem in itself. The problem is instead that there is something so wrong with our immigration system that it is unable to meet the very real demands of our economy.
These people are here because we need their skills and services and, in many instances, desperately so. If our immigration system were working as it should, there would be no demand for undocumented workers because the system would have provided all the legal labour necessary for our economy.
The problem is not the workers themselves but the fact that our immigration system is so inefficient at the task assigned to it. Therefore, the objection that normalizing these workers is somehow unfair to those who are working their way through the legal immigration process gets things backwards. Rather, it is unfair that we have an immigration system that is meant to identify the most needed and the most skilled immigrants and yet seems unable to do that in any fashion that meets the genuine demands of our economy.
Such an immigration system is not only unfair to immigrant workers, legal or otherwise, it is unfair to all Canadians. We need an immigration system that works to meet the demands of our economy and anything less is unacceptable.
Nevertheless, it is not for this reason alone that I support this motion. I also support it because it is in our country's own best interest to provide a moratorium and work to integrate these workers into the legal system.
There are presently at least 200,000 illegal workers in Canada and perhaps as many as 500,000. We are talking about skilled tradesmen in construction. We are talking about cooks, cleaners and truck drivers. We are talking about a huge number of people who are filling demands in the workforce. They are here and employed precisely because we need them.
What do we think will happen if we round these people up and deport them? The net result can only be economic chaos. The construction industry will collapse.
Consider also the costs. Identifying, rounding up, and deporting 200,000 to 500,000 workers will require an incredible expenditure of energy and resources. We must consider this matter practically and consider it from a perspective of how to best employ our resources to good effect for all Canadians. Rather than wasting resources deporting persons who have lived and contributed to our country, and are otherwise law-abiding citizens, it makes much more sense to use our resources to integrate these people into our economy.
By deporting them, we are only worse off than we were before. By calling a moratorium and integrating these persons, we will be better off. The answer should be obvious to all. In the same way that we provide amnesty to tax evaders because it is in the best interests of the country to reclaim the lost tax revenue and avoid the expense of pressing criminal charges, I am arguing that all Canadians will be better off if we expend our resources integrating these much needed workers.
In closing, I want to say that I support this motion and the reasons are straightforward. We are talking about living, breathing, productive, law-abiding persons who warrant our respect and contribute to our society, even if our immigration system has failed to identify and integrate them legally.
I believe it is in our own best interests to integrate these workers and their families into our society precisely as we work hard to prepare our immigration system, so it works to the advantage of all Canadians as it was intended to do.
The parliamentary secretary is badly misinformed. I was on the immigration committee and before the NDP pulled the plug on day care and other needed social programs, the Liberal government had in its estimates money to begin regularizing these workers. Members of the present government sat on this immigration committee and it was unanimous in support. We do not need more study. It has been studied to death. Please, let us pass it.