Debates of May 11th, 2007

Citizenship and Immigration

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I obviously support the motion and the report. I have a great deal of experience with this issue, having spent a couple of years actually working on the solution. There is no doubt that there are several thousand undocumented workers in Canada and actually the number is much larger than that. We all know that.

I am going to give members a bit of a chronology to give citizens an understanding of the issue.

I am splitting my time with my colleague from Brampton West.

In 2003 I met with the labour and construction industry, with both business and labour representatives, who informed me that they were desperate to keep qualified workers in this country. Most of these workers come from Portugal or Eastern Europe and most are undocumented.

At that meeting, I learned a great deal about who these undocumented workers really are, what kind of lives they lead in this country, and where they come from. They are skilled labourers who in many cases came as visitors, with a visa, and overstayed. They are refugee claimants who failed the refugee status requirements and stayed.

Most, if not all, of these people are paying taxes in this country. Many of them own their own businesses by now and are creating jobs in addition to their own jobs. Most of them are actually owners of homes and are contributing to our Canadian society. Most of their children, if not all, are either born or raised here.

If were to look at these people, normally we would say that they are stable, settled Canadians. Again, most of the children have never been in their parents' country. Those who were raised and born here have never seen Portugal or Eastern Europe or wherever. Some of them do not even speak those languages. The only country they have ever known is Canada, their country of birth in many cases and certainly their country of adoption.

That is a very quick profile of undocumented workers. Most of them are working in the construction industry, although not all of them, but I am focusing on that industry because it is the one that I was working with for a while.

This does not mean that there are no bad apples in this group. I am not suggesting that all of the people working here as undocumented workers have no difficulties, but I would say that in the main they are hard-working and law-abiding people who are raising families, contributing to Canada's economy, and working very well, as I already have said. Many of them own houses and have created their own businesses, and their children are being educated here.

The labour representatives and the construction companies I met with told me that their industry desperately needed skilled labour. This is not something new. This has been going on for some time. In fact, I was a volunteer helping with the immigrant settlement program for about 20 years. I know that in the 1980s we were talking about the fact that the average age of a construction worker at that time was 50 years and the area was becoming de-skilled.

In fact, the industry has been trying for some time to try to get the government to fast track some of the applicants, which was mentioned by the government representative earlier. The industry is trying to do that because in addition to its undocumented workers here, it needs more skilled workers. One does not cancel out the other.

In fact, some contractors told me that they were no longer bidding on jobs and contracts because they were not able to find enough labour to fulfill the commitment they would be taking on. That is pretty serious in an industry that is very fundamental to our country's economy.

The average age of a construction worker today is about 60, probably more by now, and even if the undocumented workers were allowed to stay in Canada, the industry still would be facing a shortage of skilled labour, so this is not one or the other. It is an issue that is very major to that industry. The industry has been trying desperately to resolve this with the CREWS program, which was mentioned earlier, to try to fast track skilled workers to this country.

Both labour and industry went on to describe who undocumented workers are and what they do. They said that they work very long hours and that most of them pay taxes to this country. They said that they are raising Canadian-born children or children who came here as young children and are now Canadians. They also said that they keep the construction industry from collapsing because that is where they are needed.

Unless undocumented workers are regularized, they have no rights of any kind in this country. They cannot access any benefits and are not paying into pensions, therefore, as they grow older they will not be able to look after themselves. They will be living in poverty because they are not contributing to CPP and so forth. If they should become injured they cannot access workers compensation or anything else because they have no rights. If they become ill they have no access to health care. These are all major issues.

In a sense, they are making major contributions to our country but they are marginalized in many ways in terms of the benefits they can access from this country.

In essence, Canada is benefiting from the labour of these people without having to give them any rights or payments in the form of services, which is unfortunate. Some people have said that the way to resolve that is to deport everybody. I will talk a little about that because that is the wrong way to go and it does not resolve the issue in any case.

When I met with both the labour and the construction industries they asked that we try to find ways to regularize the situation for these people in a legal manner, respecting the immigration regulations, laws and security provisions.

In my work with them, we looked at a number of options for possible solutions. One option was to ask the undocumented workers to come forward and ID themselves and then ask them to go back to their native country with the understanding that they could apply for landed status in Canada. We would try to facilitate that provided they had no criminal record or problems.

This was a difficult situation to work with because we did not think the undocumented workers would accept it because it was a bit of a risk. The best solution we came up with was to have the undocumented workers come forward and, after the normal checks for security and whatever, give them a three year work permit and then, like all other workers who come to Canada from abroad, they would be able to apply for landed status after three years. We felt this process would help the construction industry with its chronic manpower skills shortages. It would also help children, either born or raised here, to have stability, to know who they are and to help their parents live their lives without fear of detection. They would pay into pensions, receive health care and other services and become proud and productive Canadians. This also would help the industry tremendously and keep it from collapsing into the crisis that it is in today.

This was a solution that was being worked on by the previous minister just before the election. In fact, the solution had been arrived at and it was a matter of tabling and bringing it forward when we lost the election.

I would suggest to the current government that instead of trying to deport people, we should look at the compassionate reality and the fact that this country desperately needs their skills which they have been providing for all these years. The industry is desperately looking for this kind of solution. This would be the only humane and compassionate way, instead of turfing out families and forcing them to sell their businesses, which creates unemployment, and selling their homes and yanking their children, many of whom were here or who have been here for 14, 15 or 16 years, from school and moving them to, basically, a foreign country.

I think this is a very reasonable solution that the government should look at because it is the only one that makes sense and it is compassionate.

[Ed Komarnicki, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, there is no doubt that many of those who find themselves in this category are in an awkward and difficult position. Obviously, we need to find some means of dealing with that not only for the present but on a go-forward basis.

However, her government for 13 long years did not address the situation nor did it come up with any solutions. Maybe the member could indicate to me how it is that all of a sudden she feels that the solution should happen right now.

I agree with her that a solution is necessary. In fact, we have commissioned a committee study where this issue will be look at broadly with solutions in mind. The member and her party opposed the hearing of witnesses when the first report was filed and without hearing any witnesses had the report filed. However, during the 13 years of her government, deportations were happening, I would suggest if I were to look, at a higher rate than they are now.

The Liberals did nothing for 13 years and all of a sudden today are saying that we have a problem. There is a problem and we will find a solution to the problem but the member hardly has the place to say that it should be happening immediately.

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, my understanding of what the hon. member just said with respect to the committee not allowing witnesses, is not accurate. It is not true.

The hon. member says that the Liberal government did nothing for 13 years. First, we had a huge deficit that we actually got rid of. Second--

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Cambridge, ON]

Tell the truth.

[Ken Epp, Conservative, Edmonton—Sherwood Park, AB]

That was Trudeau's deficit.

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Oh, give me a break.

Second, I just presented some information and I said that we had been working on it. There had been consultation with the industry. The information and the studies were there. The Conservatives are saying that they will do more studies. At what point do we stop studying and start taking action?

The actual proposal, which the bureaucracy I am sure must have had at the time that the new government came in, was already there. The solution was there. The consultations and discussions with industry took place so I do not see why we need to delay this further.

The reason the study was done was because the proposals, the recommendations and the way forward were already there. Had the Liberals not lost the election at the time we did, the minister would have tabled those changes.

Two wrongs do not make a right and the fact that they happened under our watch does not mean that this is not the right thing to do. The hon. member is not even listening, which is quite nice. However, he should remember that two wrongs do not make a right and, therefore, I think it is time that the Conservatives get on with doing their job and take responsibility for some of these things.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am only rising to thank my colleague for an excellent speech. I concur with many of the fine remarks she made and I recognize and pay tribute to the work she has done in this field for many years.

I would like to point out that other groups within her area also agree. I have a statement from the executive board of the Toronto and York Region Labour Council's general meeting from April 6, 2006. It states:

Canada has been built by immigrants seeking a better life, but today the immigration system is broken.

A number of organizations in Toronto concur with that statement.

Would my colleague agree with the Toronto and York Region Labour Council that Toronto is not being well served by the current immigration system?

[Maria Minna, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I agree with the hon. member that the need for skilled workers in Toronto in the construction industry is not being met. Because employers are not able to bring in the skilled labour as fast as they need them, the industry has asked for a fast track to bring skilled labourers to this country.

We did meet with the industry many times and we came up with a solution to address the needs of that industry with undocumented skilled workers who are in this country already. We should at least keep those workers in the country and then change the structure of immigration because, quite frankly, the points system, as the hon. member knows, does not allow for the easy entry of skilled labour. The points system actually, in my view, needs to be changed in order to ensure that skilled labourers can come in much more quickly. I think there needs to be some changes made--

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Brampton West.

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

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.

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Cambridge, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am going to partly agree with the member opposite. I have a large population of Portuguese people in my riding who are absolutely some of the most vibrant, hard-working, intelligent and proud people in this country.

However, I have to tell this hon. member that these are not only living, breathing, proud, wonderful and vibrant people; they have suffered from a decade of delay under the Liberals. Hundreds of thousands of people were thrown out under the Liberal regime. The immigration department is a mess because of the decade of delay and the decade of disgrace.

Here is my question. I would like to ask the member if she can point to one incident, one time that she spoke on this issue when she was in government? Not once.

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I contributed quite heartily in committee as--

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Cambridge, ON]

Never once in the House.

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

Not in the House. But anyway, that does not matter, Mr. Speaker.

I think that the issue right here is here and now. I participated in the debate in committee and it is on the record. But that is not the issue. The hon. member agrees with me that the immigration system is in a mess. Now he has the opportunity to put his money where his mouth is.

[Olivia Chow, NDP, Trinity—Spadina, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I have in front of me a news release that came out on December 20, 2004. At that time the government was holding cross Canada hearings with the House of Commons Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration. It gave an opportunity for a person's voice to be heard.

That committee travelled in March and April of 2005 to St. John's, Halifax, Charlottetown, Fredericton, Quebec, Montreal, Toronto, Kitchener-Waterloo, Winnipeg, Regina, Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver and Victoria. Hearings were held at each location on various topics of immigration.

I also have a submission from March 24, 2005, by the Portuguese Congress of Canada. It recommended precisely what is before the House today. It said that we need to deal with the undocumented workers. We need to have regularization. Action needs to be taken, then and now.

That was March 24, 2005. Yet, no action was taken by the former Liberal government and no action has been taken by the Conservative government. We are about to hold even more hearings. What good is it? Why do we waste taxpayers' time travelling to all these places and give people hope, asking agencies to come and tell us what they want, and then completely ignore them and take absolutely no action?

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I absolutely agree with the member, except for one thing. At those hearings we heard from the Polish groups, the construction industry, and from everyone who had a stake in this. Once the report was tabled, the minister put in place, in the supplementals, the money to begin the regularization of the program, and the NDP pulled the plug.

[Gary Goodyear, Conservative, Cambridge, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I will be very sincere on this because I have received emails from my Portuguese community. The emails are actually from members of the community who are asking me to please not support this because they waited in line. They did everything the right way. Despite the fact that after a decade of Liberals, we have something like 700,000 immigrants trying to get into this country the proper way. I would really like to know, what shall I tell the folks in my riding who have asked me--

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

The hon. member for Brampton West.

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, the hon. member can tell the members of his riding the same thing that my great grandmother probably told people when they said to her, “We did not get an old age security pension, why should you have one?” She replied, “Would it not have been nice if we had been in the position to be able to do that for you?” We would--

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

Resuming debate, the hon. member for Winnipeg Centre.

[Pat Martin, NDP, Winnipeg Centre, MB]

Mr. Speaker, I am honoured to enter into the concurrence debate on the fourth report of the citizenship and immigration committee. I am proud that the NDP moved this concurrence motion and proud of my colleague from Trinity—Spadina who has a long track record and history for speaking out on behalf of rights for undocumented workers.

I will begin my remarks by saying this issue has been the elephant in the room for decades that no one is willing to speak about. We have to start with the fundamental base information that economic migration has been a fact of life for thousands of years. People gravitate to where the opportunity is and in this case the economic activity was in Canada and people no matter what their reason for coming here, seek a better life.

That is how we built this great nation. Industrious and skilled people are able to travel and come to our country. It is a reflection of the inadequacies in our immigration system that we have hundreds of thousands of undocumented workers toiling away in certain key industries in our country where there are skill shortages.

I come from the building trades, a carpenter by trade, and certainly the construction industry is one of those sectors where there are tens of thousands of undocumented workers providing a necessary function and a necessary service.

This is not the first time that we have had this debate in the House of Commons. Somebody just accused one of the Liberal MPs of never having raised it in the House of Commons. I can say, we have. My colleague from Trinity—Spadina has most recently, but for the decade that I have been here, we have raised it over and over again.

We were critical that the government was allowing an increased number of foreign workers on special work permits and not taking advantage of the great pool of skilled labour that was resident in this country, notwithstanding the fact they jumped the queue. Let us put that to the side. This is not a punitive debate of punishing people for not following the rules to get here.

The government was meeting a demand. It is an inexorable migration. People gravitate toward opportunity and it is something that we want to encourage, not discourage. So, we find ourselves with this pool of undocumented workers, great skill shortages and a great need and demand.

I defy anyone here to show me the business case for spending millions of dollars to have a mass deportation and throw 200,000 people out of the country. It would be ludicrous. It would tie up the enforcement division of Immigration Canada for decades and that is not even if every one of them exercised their right to appeal because our system is fair and equitable. We can only really deport people who want to be kicked out because if one digs in his or her heels they are in for a five or seven year appeal. It is impossible.

Why do we not just face the facts, acknowledge that we have a human resource in this body of undocumented workers, recognize that the skill shortages demand these workers, and give them some status. Give them their right to apply their craft and their trade with dignity, safety and security and a safety net that our system offers, and let them help us grow this great land without having to sneak around.

It is only common sense. It happened in California. When they realized they had hundreds of thousands of undocumented workers in the California building industry, unions started going out and organizing. My own union signed up 15,000 dry wallers and tapers who were Mexican, who were undocumented, and they started representing them because they were providing a necessary service, paying taxes in that country, and they deserved representation and recognition. Maybe that would be the first step toward solving this problem as well.

With what short time I have I think it would be useful to look at this motion by the City of Toronto, moved by Councillor Giambrone, a former president of the New Democratic Party I might add, and seconded by Mayor David Miller. It states:

WHEREAS Toronto City Council recognizes there are thousands of hard-working, tax paying immigrants in the City of Toronto who have no government documentation; and

WHEREAS there is a shortage of labour in the construction sector;--

I will not read all of the other whereas items. It concludes:

AND BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED THAT Toronto City Council direct the City Clerk to write to the Federal Minister of Citizenship and Immigration expressing its desire to see the cases of undocumented workers be addressed in a timely, fair and equitable manner.

It argues in the whereases that there should be a moratorium on deportations until such time as we can find a fair and equitable way to deal with this issue.

It points out as well that two of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act key mandates are to support the settlement, adaptation and integration of newcomers to Canadians society and to manage access to Canada with a fair and effective enforcement strategy. If we can take the very mandate of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act's own language, we could find a much more compassionate way of dealing with the backlog of undocumented workers in this country.

I also recognize the work of my friend and colleague, John Cartwright, a fellow union carpenter and leader with the Carpenters' union. He is now the head of the Toronto and District Labour Council. It too is getting involved in trying to represent undocumented workers.

We have a choice in our hands. We either acknowledge we have a pool of skilled labour and a great labour shortage and we put those two together, or we order a witch hunt and mass deportation of 200,000 hard-working tax paying people.

I think it is an easy choice to make. There is no business case for carrying on with the status quo. There is a compelling business case for putting to use this human resources pool that we have and to help build the economy and fill skilled labour shortages.

[The Acting Speaker, Royal Galipeau]

It is with regret, but it is nonetheless my duty to interrupt the proceedings on the motion at this time.

Accordingly, debate on the motion will be rescheduled for another sitting.

When we return to this matter, there will be 13 minutes left for the hon. member for Winnipeg Centre.

It being 1:30 p.m., the House will now proceed to the consideration of private members' business as listed on today's order paper.

Old Age Security Act

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

moved that Bill C-362, An Act to amend the Old Age Security Act (residency requirement), be read the second time and referred to a committee.

Mr. Speaker, with me it is either feast or famine and today is a feast.

Today, I rise to speak in support of Bill C-362, An Act to amend the Old Age Security Act (residency requirement). Introduced in the House on October 25, 2006, the intent of Bill C-362 is straightforward. It amends the Old Age Security Act to reduce from 10 years to 3 years the residency requirement for entitlement to old age security.

Nevertheless how straightforward the bill may be, it addresses and remedies a great injustice in Canada's social security system, an injustice which is presently causing great harm to seniors across Canada and to the families and communities to which they belong.

The bill deserves the support of each and every member of the House. It is my sincere hope we will set aside all partisan concerns and work together to improve the well-being of a great many seniors, their families and communities across all of Canada.

I want to begin today by identifying and clarifying the great injustice Bill C-362 is meant to address. Following that I will identify and discuss why I believe the bill warrants the support of every member of the House.

Presently the Old Age Security Act requires a person to reside in Canada for 10 years before she or he is entitled to receive old age security. Although the old age security program is intended to be universal and to act as the cornerstone of Canada's retirement income system for all Canadians, this residency requirement effectively excludes many seniors from its benefits.

Indeed, because of the 10 year residency requirement, it is not at all uncommon for a Canadian senior citizen to go entirely without the benefits of old age security for many years. Practically speaking, the residency requirement creates two different classes of senior citizens, those who qualify for old age security at 65 and those who do not simply because they have not yet lived in Canada for 10 years.

As a result, the residency requirement also creates two different classes of families and communities within Canada. There are those families and communities whose seniors receive the benefits and peace of mind of old age security at age 65 and those families and communities that do not because of the residency requirement.

In other words, the residency requirement also creates a distinct class of families and communities, those who are required to take on a burden of responsibility that other families in Canada are not expected to bear. The net result is the 10 year residency requirement for old age security treats a whole group of Canadians as second class citizens. This, I am sure we can all agree, is unacceptable.

It should also be noted that the 10 year residency requirement also adds insult to injury by targeting, inadvertently I think, some of the most economically vulnerable seniors in Canada.

As some member of the House well know, in some cases seniors can circumvent the 10 year residency requirement and qualify for old age security if they emigrated from countries that have signed reciprocal social security agreements with the Government of Canada. These agreements allow for the coordination of the two countries' social security programs, make the benefits portable between the two countries and normally exist because both countries provide social security plans with similar benefits.

As a result, in many cases, the very reason no reciprocal agreement exists between Canada and a particular country is simply because the other country is unwilling or unable to provide comparable social security for its citizens, including its seniors. This means those persons who may need old age security the most, because they emigrated from countries with little or no social security, must go without here in Canada even after they have become Canadian citizens. This I am also sure we can all agree is unacceptable.

To summarize, the injustice that Bill C-362 is intended to address is the brute fact that the 10 year residency requirement for old age security not only treats a great many Canadians as second class citizens, but it also denies benefits to some of those seniors most in need of assistance.

If we also recall that poverty is epidemic among our seniors, especially among women and new Canadians, there is only one sensible and decent conclusion to be drawn. The 10 year residency requirement is unjust, unacceptable and must be changed. That is exactly what Bill C-362 aims to do.

While I am friendly to the view that the residency requirement could be eliminated entirely, it is my feeling that a three year residency requirement is appropriate, meaningful and not at all arbitrary. Although none of us in the House can ever be sure of the original intentions of those legislators who proposed and accepted a 10 year residency requirement, it is easy to speculate that this requirement was intended to ensure old age security would only benefit those immigrants who were truly committed to remaining in Canada.

While I certainly agree that the decision to leave one's country of birth in itself is a good sign of one's desire and commitment to reside in Canada permanently, the three year residency requirement provides a sufficient safeguard against any potential abuse.

Moreover, to demand a residency requirement any longer than three years is unreasonable. After three years of residence, an immigrant is entitled to become a full citizen of Canada. If three years' residency is sufficient for citizenship, it is certainly sufficient to entitle that person to old age security.

Having identified the injustice that Bill C-362 is intended to address, and having justified why I think a three year residency requirement is appropriate, I want to conclude my remarks today by explaining why I think the bill deserves the support of each and every member of the House.

Ultimately, I believe Bill C-362 deserves the support of every member of the House as a simple matter of decency. However people may choose to make sense of the notion of decency, whether they prefer to talk of a principle of fairness, or equality of opportunity, or the equal dignity of all persons, the underlying sentiment remains the same. A person should not be made worse off than others arbitrarily and without just cause.

Unquestionably, the 10 year residency requirement arbitrarily prevents a great many seniors from receiving old age security benefits and this creates undue and unjust hardship for a great many seniors, their families and their communities. As far as I can tell, there is no good reason which justifies the imposition of this harm on so many Canadians.

The only truly decent thing to do is to reduce this residency requirement to three years, as my bill proposes.

Bill C-362 also deserves the support of every member of the House because, in supporting it, we can each acknowledge an honour the immeasurable contribution made each and every day by seniors across Canada, to our families, our communities and our country.

Seniors, thanks to their lifetime of experience, are able to provide support and guidance to all of us. Not only do seniors help us to remember and to understand our history, our values and our identity, they very often help alleviate the real pressures of raising a family in today's fast paced society.

There is, for example, no better child care than that provided by a loving grandparent. However, seniors will not be in any position to offer us guidance, wisdom and support if they are themselves trapped in abject poverty. By securing the economic security of all seniors, ultimately we do a service to all Canadians.

Bill C-362 also deserves the support of every member of the House because, in supporting it, we formally recognize that all Canadian seniors deserve to live their entire lives with a sense of dignity and self-respect. No person and certainly no member of the House would ever want to face a choice between abject poverty and a life of absolute dependence on family and friends.

By guaranteeing a certain basic level of support for all Canadian seniors, we guarantee a lifetime of dignity and self-respect for all Canadians. After all, all of us will one day ourselves be seniors, some sooner than others.

Finally, Bill C-362 deserves the support of every member of this House because I believe that Canadians all across the country want us to address the very real injustice faced by so many seniors, their families and their communities.

On the whole, Canadians are decent people without exception. Whenever possible we strive to do the right thing and to right wrongs whenever we encounter them. I think to even the most casual observer the injustice of an arbitrary 10-year residency requirement is a wrong that needs to be corrected. Indeed, since tabling this bill I have received a great many letters of support from persons and organizations all across Canada.

In closing, I want to remind the members of this House that Canada has been, remains and always will be a country of immigrants. Even today, Canada has one of the highest per capita rates of immigration in the world, with roughly 17% of our population foreign born and another 30% descended from earlier generations of non-British or non-French immigrants.

It also should not be forgotten that the British and the French at one time were themselves immigrants. Moreover, research indicates that within the next 20 years, immigration will account for all our net population and labour force growth in Canada. In my view and the view of a great many Canadians, every single one of our recent immigrants and future citizens deserves a social security net which is truly universal and which encompasses a person's entire life.

While it is certainly tempting to say that we need to provide this kind of social security as a necessary exercise in marketing, that is, we need to do it if Canada wants to attract and retain the best and the brightest immigrants, I think there is a deeper and much more meaningful motivation. We owe it to all Canadians as a matter of decency, the kind of heart-felt decency which motivates and unites every person in this great and caring country of ours.

[Raymond Gravel, Bloc, Repentigny, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to the speech by the member who introduced Bill C-362. I think it is a good bill, but it seems to me that there is something contradictory about what the member said.

She said that she does not want to see two classes of Canadian citizens: first-class Canadians and second-class Canadians. However, because I have not been a member for long, I remember being there when the social affairs committee considered Bill C-36, which was also about seniors. At the time, the Bloc Québécois proposed an amendment because the clauses excluded new Canadians who were being sponsored.

The Bloc Québécois asked the committee to amend the bill so as not to restrict new citizens' access to old age security because of the sponsor's obligations under the Immigration Act.

I know that the Liberals voted against that amendment. Now that the member is introducing a bill that looks a lot like what the Bloc Québécois proposed for Bill C-36, can she tell me why they voted against the amendment?

[Colleen Beaumier, Liberal, Brampton West, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I am not really sure of the particulars of which the member speaks. If the Liberals did vote against that, they now have the opportunity to do the right thing and vote for my private member's bill.