Mr. Speaker, I wish my colleagues would learn to listen. I am a Canadian. I am a proud Canadian, and in this country it is the law of this land that allows one to hold dual citizenship.
However, what the government is trying to do with the bill would actually change what citizenship is, because even for someone born in Canada, the government would give the minister the ability to take that citizenship away. I think it behooves each and every one of us to pay very special attention to this provision, because we are talking about potentially taking away citizenship from people who may never have been to another country, who were born here, and who have lived here all their lives.
By the way, I am not blaming just the Conservatives. The party at the far end started this trend because it was too chicken to publicly debate the changes it was making to immigration. It vested more power into the hands of the ministers so they could make changes behind closed doors and not have to go out and explain them to Canadians. The scary part is that we have seen the current government, a government on steroids, increase that power in the hands of the ministers, whether it comes to refugee situations or otherwise. In this case the bill asks Parliament to give the minister the power to take away somebody's citizenship, and it would not have to be based upon any sound evidence. It could be based upon suspicion.
There is no judicial hearing or anywhere that a person can go to tackle that. Someone's citizenship can be taken away based on suspicion. It is that scary. What is more scary is that kind of power will be given to some of the ministers I see sitting across the aisle from me. That, I will tell the minister, should scare Canadians from coast to coast to coast.
In Canada we are proud that whether people are naturalized or whether they are born here, once they are Canadian citizens, they have the same rights and the same responsibilities. However, under this legislation we are going to take one group of Canadians and hold them to a totally different bar. They could not only have their citizenship stripped away but would then have to leave the country, based on the whims of whom? It would not be based on any trial or anything like that, but in any case we should not be using citizenship as a tool, as part of a judicial system.
Let me be clear: if anybody gets his or her citizenship in a fraudulent manner, there is already a mechanism to have that person's citizenship taken away. If anybody has lied or deliberately used fraud in order to get citizenship, of course he or she should have his or her citizenship taken away.
We are not talking about that here. We are talking about somebody born in Canada, maybe someone born just down Wellington Street or in my riding at the local hospital in Surrey. I would say that Canadians would suddenly be feeling a bit worried, because what does citizenship mean if the minister can take it away based on suspicion, et cetera?
I read a quote by the new minister of immigration and I kept thinking that a minister would not say that. Here is the quote: “Citizenship is not an inalienable birthright.” If one is born a Canadian citizen, surely that is his or her birthright. That is how people gain their citizenship, unless they have been naturalized, in which case they have the same rights and privileges.
Here is something from the U.S. Our government always likes to quote some of the governments it likes some of the time. This is with respect to the U.S. Supreme Court. It is a quote by Lorne Waldman, the president of the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers, on February 5, 2014. He states:
The US Supreme Court got it right over 50 years ago when it said that citizenship is not a licence that the government can revoke for misbehaviour. As Canadians, we make our citizenship feeble and fragile if we let government Ministers seize the power to extinguish it.
As I said, there are some parts to this bill that we would be pleased to support if they were separated into different components. On the other hand, there are parts of this bill that give us fundamental concern. I know the government has an allergy to experts and expert opinions, but expert after expert has said that this legislation will be open to constitutional and charter challenges.
It is too late to plead for a more in-depth debate, but when the bill gets to the committee stage, let us at least hope that we will have a wholesome debate and that the Conservatives will accept the amendments we will take to that stage.