Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Toronto Centre for bringing this subject to the floor of the House of Commons today so we could all take part in a debate.
The member knows full well, and even the way he framed his question would indicate he is well aware that there are international norms and conventions on managing a refugee crisis situation. In fact, whether there are family members in Canada or not, if they were applying for Canadian citizenship and in the queue already, accelerated claims for a small number of those cases might be reasonable.
There are very sound reasons that the UN High Commission and other responsible partners have come to the conclusion that in a humanitarian crisis it is not the first objective to take people out of the conflict zone and depopulate Syria to other countries. It creates a whole different dynamic that is actually not helpful to the long-term solution in the area and the betterment of refugee situations around the world.