Mr. Speaker, for 13 years the Liberals have promised to crack down on unscrupulous consultants.
During that time in 2004, the former minister of immigration had a unique opportunity to really set the legislation right, to make sure that there was a legislative body to regulate consultants. They chose not to do so.
Instead, the Liberals set up a body that was bound to fail because CSIC never had the power to sanction immigration consultants who were not members of the society. It cannot seek judicial enforcement of disciplinary consequences it imposes on those who are members. Further, because CSIC's jurisdiction is not governed by statute, there is no possibility for dissatisfied members and others to influence the society's internal functioning through a judicial review.
This is what the immigration committee's report said, that it was not done properly in 2004 and as a result matters got worse. More immigrants got ripped off because they thought there was an organization that could protect them, that if they registered there was some kind of legislation that would govern the consultants. Little did they know that there is really nothing because half of the people do not register and the other half register with a body that has no power.
How can we say that this is not a crisis? It is a crisis. How could the former immigration minister justify that this is not a problem and not a serious situation that we must deal with in the House of Commons?