Debates of June 12th, 2014

Strengthening Canadian Citizenship Act

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Minister of Employment and Social Development and Minister for Multiculturalism]

Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to join in the debate on Bill C-24 and the major changes it makes to the Citizenship Act.

I am pleased to take part in the debate on this bill, which makes significant changes to our Citizenship Act. I am proud to be with the hon. Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, who introduced this bill. As the former minister of citizenship and immigration, I worked hard with the public servants at Citizenship and Immigration Canada and with new Canadians to strengthen the value of Canadian citizenship, which is one of the most important things we possess as parliamentarians and citizens. Citizenship unites us and defines us. It is the basis of our values and our shared identity as members of the Canadian family.

When I became the minister of citizenship and immigration in 2008, I quickly learned from new Canadians of all backgrounds because I listened to them. Those new Canadians, from more than 180 countries around the world, came to Canada to start a new life and become Canadians. They were chasing the Canadian dream, freedom and opportunity. As economic immigrants from the four corners of the world, they wanted to benefit from freedom and the rule of law, traditions enshrined in our constitutional and parliamentary system.

The vast majority of those new Canadians shared a sense of Canadian identity and a sense of duty towards this country. They wanted to strengthen that identity. They did not want to pursue diversity for the sake of diversity. They appreciated our country's diversity, yes, but they appreciated the unity of that diversity even more. That is what I learned and heard from new Canadians of all backgrounds.

I also learned that new Canadians are clearly the strongest defenders of the importance of the integrity and value of Canadian citizenship. New Canadians were the ones who brought to my attention some of the terrible situations and fraud networks that seek to abuse our immigration and citizenship system. New Canadians were the ones who informed me of unscrupulous consultants who manufactured evidence of residency in Canada for obtaining citizenship.

New Canadians were the ones who complained to me about new citizens who cannot speak one of our official languages and therefore cannot really be active members of our society. New Canadians were the ones who told me, with regard to our shared citizenship, that not enough value is placed on the knowledge of our country, its history, its identity and its values.

When I became Minister of Citizenship and Immigration in 2008, by listening with some humility, I hope, to new Canadians from all origins, I learned that their view was that successive Canadians governments had not invested enough importance in protecting the integrity of our shared citizenship.

I learned from these new Canadians about fraud networks organizing fake proof of residency to obtain citizenship and people becoming citizens who did not speak either of our common languages, even at a basic level. They also knew little or nothing about our country's identity, history, and values.

That is why, in 2009, we launched the citizenship action plan to re-establish the value of Canadian citizenship and restore integrity to the process of its acquisition. It was to say that Canada is an open and generous country, but that it will not tolerate those who seek to abuse its generosity. We went systematically through all of the different aspects of the program. We began with combatting citizenship fraud.

I insisted that our officials at CIC focus not just on the quantity of applications processed, but also take seriously the quality of those applications, meaning that they ensure that people actually meet the real legislative requirements contemplated by this Parliament in its adoption of the 1977 Citizenship Act. Specifically, applicants for citizenship first have to demonstrate that they are resident in Canada for at least three out of four years. Second, except for those with severe learning disabilities or those who are older or very young, they have to demonstrate that they can communicate in one of the two official languages. Third, applicants have to demonstrate a basic knowledge of Canada.

What did we find? First of all, in terms of residency, we found that there were consultants out there brazenly selling, as a service to foreign nationals, the fabrication of false evidence of their residency. If members do not believe me, they can go and google it and see online that there are consultants in certain parts of the world who brazenly advertise the value of Canadian citizenship.

To give one regional example, in the Gulf states, a foreign national from a developing country who gets a Canadian passport finds that their salary suddenly increases. There is a commercial value attached to the acquisition of a Canadian passport, but some people do not want to come here and actually live here in order to obtain it. They would rather stay in a tax haven, making a good living while a consultant fabricates fake receipts for rent, financial transactions, and the like. These consultants are handsomely paid.

I would like to thank and commend members of the Canadian Lebanese community for having brought this issue to my attention. When I learned about it, I insisted that our officials, the Border Services Agency, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police investigate these allegations of fraud, which they did. As a result, to date more than 10,000 cases have been identified of individuals either obtaining citizenship fraudulently or being in the process of doing so. We know that there are many thousands more.

To put this into perspective, it is a relatively small fraction of the overall number of people who obtain citizenship. However, to protect the value of the passport for bona fide citizens, we have to clearly demonstrate serious sanctions and rigour for mala fide applicants of citizenship. They would be the applicants who do not actually live here or who have no connection to Canada.

Similarly, I was disturbed in my early tenure at immigration to encounter a significant number of people who had obtained Canadian citizenship in their adult years, whether they were middle-aged or in young adulthood, but who could not communicate in either English or French. The notion that citizens should be able to speak one of our two languages is not an invention of the government. It is not unique to Canada. It has always been a feature of our citizenship law, ever since the first one was adopted in 1947 by the government of Prime Minister Mackenzie King.

Why? It is because citizenship represents full membership in our political community. It implies participation in our shared civic life. It grants the right of self-government through voting to select one's own government or, indeed, of participating in it by running for public office. One cannot do those things fully if one does not have the ability to communicate with one's fellow citizens.

This is not to denigrate or make a pejorative judgment about those among us in Canada who have limited or no English or French language proficiency, many of whom are wonderful, hard-working people and well intentioned. We honour them and we hope that they will become full members of our civic community. We invest hundreds of millions of dollars to this end. This government has tripled the public spending on settlement services, including free language classes to assist those people in becoming proficient.

By the way, the opposition members always say we should have evidence-based policy. I agree, and that is what this bill is based on. The evidence tells us that language proficiency in English or French is the single most important factor in the economic and social success of newcomers to Canada, bar none. That is not an opinion; that is the cumulative result of virtually every study done in this respect in Canada and around the world.

Language proficiency in English or French in this country is the key that unlocks opportunity. It is the bridge into our full participation in our political and civic community. We do no favours to tell new Canadians that we will ignore it if they do not have even basic competency in English or French. That is analogous to telling high school students that even though they do not pass the grades, even though they are not numerate or literate, we will give them social passes through to grade 12. We all know that does not do them any favour when they get out into the real world; similarly, it does not do newcomers any favour to tell them that they can become members of a community with which they cannot yet communicate.

It is no coincidence that these words come from the same root. Citizenship is entrance and participation, full membership, in a community, which is obviously implicitly predicated on the ability to communicate. That is why, as part of the citizenship action plan, we defined clear, objective benchmarks for proficiency in English or French for the first time and began testing people. In the past they just had to come in and do a two-minute interview with CIC officials. They would frequently be coached by their immigration consultants on the standard questions. That is how people with no language proficiency in English or French ended up fraudulently, I would say, obtaining our citizenship. It was wrong and it no longer happens.

Then we went about revising our program on knowledge of Canada. That is the third requirement. In the 1977 act and the 1947 act, it is required that people must have a basic knowledge of Canada's values, history, laws, and political system. It is what is called civic literacy.

Again, this is not a reflection of this government or of me alone, but of people across the political spectrum, including many social democrats, many small-l liberals, and many academics and intellectuals. They include people like Jack Granatstein, a prominent Liberal and Canadian historian; people like Andrew Cohen, a prominent small-l liberal professor at Carleton University and author of a book on this subject; people like Rudyard Griffiths, who wrote another book on Canadian identity. All of them, and others, have identified a real challenge in this country with respect to civic literacy, including understanding our political institutions and how they took shape and what our obligations are—not just what our rights are, but also what our responsibilities are as citizens. These things are essential, especially in a country of such diversity, especially in a country that is maintaining one of the highest levels of immigration in the developed world, especially in a country that welcomes a quarter of a million permanent residents every year.

We must be intentional about ensuring that those newcomers who become members of our community through the citizenship process know the country they are joining and understand its laws and its customs. This is why, for example, we were very blunt in the new citizenship guide, Discover Canada, which leads to the new and admittedly more rigorous test, in saying that Canada's tolerance and generosity do not extend to certain barbaric cultural practices, including so-called honour crimes, female genital mutilation, spousal violence, et cetera, and that such crimes are condemned and severely punished in Canada”.

In Canada, we are generous, we are pluralist, but we believe in certain objective values, such as the equality of men and women, values that are rooted in our history and our identity. That is why we brought in the new test and why we brought in the new study guide. In the old test, which was 20 multiple choice questions, one standard set of questions, unethical ghost immigration consultants got the answer key and actually sold it to applicants for citizenship. Consequently, 98% of those who wrote the citizenship knowledge test were passing, because they just memorized the answer key and because, frankly, the information was so insipid.

Under the citizenship guide called “A Look at Canada”, published by the previous government, there were nearly two pages of information on recycling, but there was not one sentence on Canadian military history. This building was reconstructed in the 1920s partly as a monument to our war dead from the Great War. The Peace Tower houses the names of over 114,000 Canadians who made the ultimate sacrifice for our democratic rights. Our citizenship is predicated on those rights, yet new citizens could write the test and become Canadians without ever having heard or read a word about our war dead, about the greatest Canadians.

This government took the position that it was more important for new Canadians to know the meaning of the red poppy than the blue box, more important to know about our military history than such prosaic mundane matters as recycling.

[Joe Preston, Conservative, Elgin—Middlesex—London, ON]

The War of 1812.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Yes, indeed, Mr. Speaker, we even know the role of aboriginals, francophones, and English Canadian militia together defending this country against the American invaders in 1812. Yes, we are proud of those who made sacrifices to create this wonderful experiment in ordered liberty in the northern half of North America. We do not ridicule their role in Canadian history. It is interesting that back in the day, the War of 1812 was considered a Liberal touchstone of Canadian nationalism, but now it is ridiculed by members of the Liberal Party.

We believe in civic literacy. This is not to say that every new citizen should be fluent in English or French or have a Ph.D. in Canadian history, but they should have some basic grasp of knowledge of the country of which they are becoming members. The culmination of all of this is the act that is before us. It is the first major legislative effort to reinforce the value of Canadian citizenship. I know from empirical public opinion research and from my endless anecdotal experience that the vast majority of new Canadians, both citizens and permanent residents, support the strengthening of our citizenship, such as the provision to allow for the deemed revocation of citizenship from convicted terrorists and traitors. Let me say a word about that because it has been a subject of contention here.

Citizenship is predicated on reciprocal loyalty: the loyalty of Canada to the citizen and the loyalty of citizen to the country. Our laws have always permitted a renunciation of that citizenship. American Texas Senator Cruz just renounced his citizenship this week, as an example. Therefore, one can renounce one's citizenship and it can be revoked if it was obtained fraudulently. Every other Liberal democracy in the world—save one, Portugal—including the United Kingdom, the United States, Australia, New Zealand, France, the Netherlands, and Sweden say that if someone commits a violent act of disloyalty against his or her country, it constitutes a repudiation of his or her citizenship.

We should not wait for someone to commit an act of violent treason or terrorism against this country to sign a form renouncing his or her citizenship, because he or she has renounced it in his or her violent action. That is what this bill says. By the way, 83% of Canadians polled support the deemed renunciation of citizenship from convicted terrorists or traitors, and a larger majority of those born abroad support it than those born in Canada. This bill is being proposed precisely to support new Canadians and the value of their Canadian passports and to reinvigorate their pride in their shared citizenship. We support them and we invite the opposition to do the same.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I listened carefully to the minister. He brought up the issue of terrorists. We know that the definition of terrorist may vary from country to country.

Imagine that someone who opposes the dictatorship regime in China, a country with which we signed a free trade agreement, is accused of being a terrorist and seeks refuge here. Would we let that person come to Canada? I would like the minister to answer that question.

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Mr. Speaker, first of all, fortunately, we do not have a free trade agreement with China. Second, clearly we would allow that person to come to Canada and, after the bill is passed, we will allow bona fide refugees from China who are unfairly persecuted by the Chinese system to come here.

Under the existing Immigration Act, a foreign national who is found guilty of a crime, such as terrorist activity or other serious offences that would also be considered crimes in our country, is not eligible to come to Canada. The same standard exists in the citizenship bill. The existing Citizenship Act clearly states that anyone who commits an offence overseas, such as an act of terrorism, that would also be considered an offence in Canada is inadmissible as a permanent resident or citizen. The key is figuring out whether the crime is actually a crime under Canadian law and not just under Chinese law.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Speaker, I listened intently, as I often do to my colleague the minister. I have said, to enough people that it probably has made its way back to him at some point, that I actually believe him to be the most rigorous and hard-working minister in the cabinet. In the land of the blind, notwithstanding the fact that I disagree with much of what he says, he is eloquent and very articulate and rigorous in his arguments.

I know the minister has spent a significant amount of time with Canada's multicultural communities and has worked hard within those communities. I have spent a fair bit of time with those communities as well. When they speak of Pierre Trudeau, Canada's citizenship laws, Canada's identity and multiculturalism, and these policies that have defined a modern Canada, they speak in a very positive way.

Does the minister agree with his successor, the new Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, that the changes made to Canada's Citizenship Act in the 1970s cheapened our citizenship?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for Kings—Hants for his very kind words. He and I were both elected to this place 17 years ago last week, I believe. We are becoming old veterans of this place. Hard to believe, we were both elected in our twenties. I thank him for those comments. I hope that the comparative remark was not being damned by faint praise.

Objectively speaking, the 1977 Citizenship Act did lower the bar to obtain citizenship quite significantly. At the time, I am sure that it was well intended. However, I honestly believe the consequence of it has been that some people, thankfully a small minority, have consequently taken our citizenship for granted. I refer to that not insignificant number of people who I know obtained or sought to obtain citizenship without living here, as I said before, and without really speaking one of our languages or knowing much about our country.

The bill before us is not radical, is not a change by orders of magnitude. It is more in the order of a change of degree or modification, raising citizenship for residence requirements from three years to four years, for example. It would still be easier to obtain citizenship under the scheme proposed in the bill than in virtually any other country in the world.

We are saying that we should re-establish the value of citizenship. Maybe we went too far in lowering the standard that allowed, regrettably, some small minority to take our citizenship for granted in 1977. Hopefully we can find a consensus on this issue.

[Lois Brown, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of International Development]

Mr. Speaker, one of the very unfortunate issues that we deal with in constituency offices, and it happens in my constituency office in Newmarket—Aurora, is that people who have been misled by immigration consultants come into the office. It is unfortunate that in many cases they have spent enormous amounts of money attempting to get their citizenship, yet they have been led down the garden path, as it were, and have not had the proper instruction.

My colleague has spent a fair bit of time working on issues related to this problem. Could he comment on how we would regulate immigration consultants?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Indeed, Mr. Speaker, one of the things I became aware of as Minister of Immigration was the terrible stories about exploitation by “ghost” or unscrupulous immigration consultants. We brought in a new law that makes it a crime to operate as an unlicensed immigration consultant at any stage during the process of an application. If individuals facilitate an immigration application for consideration, they now must be licensed consultants.

We put in a new regulatory body with much more integrity and much more of a focus on enforcement called the Immigration Consultants Regulatory Council of Canada.

The bill before us seeks to add citizenship consultants to that regulatory framework. Those who sell advice or facilitate applications for citizenship for a fee, for consideration, would now have to be licensed consultants in good standing of a regulatory body designated by the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration to make sure that there is follow-up. If people are cheated, robbed, or given bad advice, they can make a complaint. Sanctions could be laid and the consultant could lose his ability to pursue that business.

[Marc-André Morin, NDP, Laurentides—Labelle, QC]

Mr. Speaker, the minister just talked about people who renounce their citizenship and the possibility to do so. He talked about Google. I have been wondering for some time about the case of a Canadian citizen who committed fraud, was sentenced and spent years in a U.S. prison. He gave up his citizenship to get a British title. My question is very short: what is happening with Conrad Black?

What can the minister tell us about his case?

[Jason Kenney, Conservative, Calgary Southeast, AB]

Mr. Speaker, clearly, under the Privacy Act, the minister cannot comment on a particular case. That being said, a foreign national who applies for permanent residence is ineligible if he has committed a serious crime. However, there is a review process.

The process is called restoration.

This means that a foreign national who was sentenced for a serious crime cannot acquire Canadian citizenship, but the legal procedures for reviewing that sort of decision still apply.

[Pierre Nantel, NDP, Longueuil—Pierre-Boucher, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to say that I will be sharing my time with the member for Chicoutimi—Le Fjord.

I am very pleased with the tone of the debate this evening. I think that this is an important issue. Evidently, everyone here thinks so and sees the importance of our efforts as parliamentarians.

My colleague's question about an exceptional case was quite pertinent because, after all, the minister—we have to recognize this—is speaking with a great deal of experience, and will only point out the positive aspects of this bill, which is not his bill but that of his colleague. His reply to my colleague's question revealed precisely the element of discretion in a decision about a private case, and that is what bothers me the most about this bill.

I am not an immigration expert, but like all MPs, many cases are brought to my attention and my staff does a good job of handling them. I am the MP for the riding of Longueuil—Pierre-Boucher. Many people choose to settle in this riding when they come to Canada. On many occasions we have to deal with the problem of people who apply for citizenship and then are confronted with a very unwieldy system.

I find it reassuring that the government has decided to address the state of the immigration system and that it has chosen to move forward with legislative reforms because the immigration mechanism seems to be broken and unwieldy today.

In my riding of Longueuil—Pierre-Boucher, I see some very serious problems, which have particularly serious consequences for the human beings who come to our offices because they are caught in a process that is literally frozen. These are individuals, families and people who have come from elsewhere to earn a living, to work on a project and quite often to contribute to their adoptive country.

The people who come here have not seen their families in sometimes two, three or four years. They hope that by filling out the right forms and being patient, they may perhaps bring their loved ones closer to them. However, the crisis in the system that handles immigration applications is more serious than ever.

Every day in Longueuil, I hear about men and women who have been waiting for months or years to see their spouses. This situation is the result of the decisions and the policies of our friends opposite, our Conservative friends. It is also the result of budgets that have been reduced while needs have grown. Those decisions have tremendous repercussions on people's lives.

Actually, the processing times beggar belief. In June 2014, to sponsor a spouse or a dependent child, the processing time was 23 months at the Canadian embassy in Beirut, Lebanon. To sponsor a spouse living and waiting in Kenya or South Africa, the wait is 21 months. At our embassy in Senegal, you have to wait 25 months before getting a call back; in New York, it is more than 30 months. More than two years, that is ridiculous!

These are figures, but for the people on the waiting lists, they are not just figures. For the people that I met in Longueuil and those my team met in our offices, these are not just figures. These are real lives. They spend months and years of distress, helplessness, sleepless nights and loneliness worrying about their loved ones. It is their host country that is imposing this on them.

These are the consequences of poor decisions made in Ottawa relating to money invested far from where the needs are the greatest. That is the real problem. However, there is nothing tangible before us today that addresses this specific emergency.

We have seen demonstrations here on Parliament Hill. Take for example the 10,000 people who had filed their applications at the Citizenship and Immigration Canada office in Buffalo, in the US, shortly before the government closed that office. Every one of those applications were redirected, sent from one office to another and lost for more than a year, leaving the applicants worried and apprehensive.

The minister of immigration at the time reacted by calling this huge blunder an effectiveness measure for taxpayers. I kid you not. When a government proves itself unable to run a visa office, it is certainly not a measure of effectiveness for our international reputation.

We know that the challenges are enormous. However, we regret that the government has not been up to the challenges of the immigration file. The resulting chaos has reached proportions that are, frankly, embarrassing and unworthy of a G7 government and a country that would impose quality standards in the provision of services to citizens.

When the cries of those caught up in the mess were heard loudly enough to have a bearing on the Conservatives’ electoral prospects, then we finally saw money being thrown at the problem in the 2013 budget. We are talking about $44 million over two years. Since the money will not go any further, we are in the last year of that spur-of-the-moment cash grab.

In view of the crisis, the government resolved more than once to resolve the problem, but we saw that the situation got worse, not better. We see today that the processing times and the backlog of applications have doubled since the Conservatives came to power. That is really something!

Despite this disastrous situation that has particularly affected many residents of Longueuil, we see that Bill C-24 contains no effective solutions for reducing the bottlenecks in the immigration system, which really seems to have broken down completely.

I would like to focus on what is probably the most appalling and the most worrying aspect of Bill C-24, and that is the across-the-board attribution of powers to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration. This is a trend we have seen frequently and in many different forms. The Conservatives prefer to put powers in the hands of ministers and their staff, because it allows them to act without accountability and behind closed doors.

Bill C-24 proposes giving the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration the power to revoke citizenship in certain specific cases. For example, a person who has been convicted on certain grounds, in Canada or abroad, may have his Canadian citizenship revoked, not in a fair and equitable trial in the courts, but by the minister's office. This means that the minister will be asked to make such decisions by himself.

This is also the case when the minister, or his staff, is convinced that a person obtained Canadian citizenship through fraud. While previously these issues were decided by cabinet or the courts, now it is the minister's office that will have the authority to revoke Canadian citizenship on the basis of suspicions. In other words, this is a power that will not be exercised in a fair environment.

We are being asked to trust the Conservatives. Really? We are being asked to close our eyes to the exercise of this discretionary power. I do not think so.

We are right to ask questions about this procedure. When someone commits a crime, there are consequences and penalties that are applicable to everyone, regardless of ethnic, national or social origin. This is how things happen in Canada, as they do in countries that respect fundamental rights. Our courts are the tools we use to judge illegal acts and impose punitive or dissuasive measures.

The powers that would be granted to the person holding the office of minister of citizenship and Immigration under Bill C-24 are also dangerous because they would allow the minister to base his decision to revoke citizenship on a judicial decision handed down in another country.

For example, let us look at the power of the minister to consider a conviction handed down in another country carrying a prison sentence of five years or more for an offence which, if it had been committed in Canada, would have been classified as a terrorist offence under the Criminal Code. This means that decisions made by Canada would be based on judicial rulings handed down even in a non-democratic country, or in autocratic or totalitarian regimes, or even in states where the justice system is corrupt.

What Bill C-24 proposes is that while most citizens would receive a criminal sentence, others could lose their Canadian citizenship. We are talking about a two-tier citizenship: some fully benefit from the rights associated with being a Canadian citizen, while others have conditional or temporary rights.

This very problematic way of doing things is also reflected in the government's proposal to now require that a citizenship applicant confirm his intention to reside in Canada. That is an unreasonably vague condition, and it puts a heavier burden on applicants. In other words, by obtaining his citizenship under this condition, a new Canadian may have doubts about rights that are usually taken for granted by other Canadians. He can legitimately wonder whether he has the right to travel over long periods of time and whether he can work abroad without getting his citizenship revoked by the government because he did not demonstrate an intent to reside in Canada.

Freedom of movement should be a prerogative of all Canadian citizens, not just those who were born here. The president of the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers talked about an “implicit threat” that will generate a sense of insecurity and worry among people, given that the government may decide to arbitrarily revoke their citizenship if they leave Canada too soon, or if they stay abroad too long.

Since I only have one minute left, I will now talk about our strong feeling that this bill gives too much power to the minister and his office.

We have reasons to find it sad to see a party that keeps boasting about its love for multiculturalism, and whose ministers tour immigrant communities during election campaigns, suddenly turn around and make family reunification harder and Canadian citizenship less accessible.

We, on this side, are convinced that a more humane approach to immigration is needed. We know that immigrants contribute tirelessly not only to our economy, but also to the common good. We know that when family members are allowed to live together, their lives and health are better, and we make sure they have an integration and support network to better connect with their host community in Canada.

I sincerely hope the Conservatives will take note of our concerns and will acknowledge them, not only in the context of this bill but also in their actions over the year and a half left to the 41st Parliament.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for the focus he has put on Bill C-24, the strengthening Canadian citizenship act, by being present this evening to speak to it and ask questions.

However, the member made reference to the fact that there was not much in the bill to deal with the backlogs. I am sure it was probably an oversight on his part.

I would like to focus his attention on a specific part of the bill that would change the decision-making process for granting citizenship from a three-step process to a one-step process. In effect, this would give officials in the citizenship and immigration stream, who are familiar with cases, the right to grant citizenship, rather than go through the three steps they go through now.

Experts in the field and officials from the Department of Citizenship and Immigration have done the analysis. We estimate that going from a three-step process to a one-step process will reduce the processing time from as high as 30 months to under a year.

Is the member familiar with that, and could he comment on the three-step to one-step process?

[Pierre Nantel, NDP, Longueuil—Pierre-Boucher, QC]

Mr. Speaker, once again, I really appreciate the tone of the questions, and I thank the hon. member for the work he does and for his question.

Of course, I realize that the government wants to speed things up, but the problem is that everyone here represents his or her riding and has the trust of his or her constituents and party leader. This means that every point of view expressed here is relevant, valid and democratic. Incidentally, there are very different ways of doing things, depending on the school of thought. To us, the problem is that while it is much easier to make quick decisions if only a small group is involved in the process, this is of course contrary to the public interest. In the context of the last parliamentary session, it is easy to understand why we do not trust the government.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, Bill C-24 proposes to amend the Citizenship Act by expanding the age requirements of applicants to 14 to 64 from 18 to 54 for knowledge and language requirements. This shift in age requirement will be problematic for immigrant and refugee children.

UNICEF has expressed concern in that testing could lead to challenges with reuniting children with their families and could therefore lead to the deprivation of the child's right to family reunification under the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. It also does not take into account the stress that testing may cause or a child's ability to perform successfully in a test environment. These children may also be dealing with a fear of authority or trauma from their home country.

What does my hon. colleague think about this?

[Pierre Nantel, NDP, Longueuil—Pierre-Boucher, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I have to say that that is an excellent question.

I am going to answer by saying that I had one family that came to my office many times to explain their problems. The members of that family had been ordered to leave the country. They tried to find arguments, to reach another stage and to present new arguments in an attempt to get out of this situation. It was a child who had the responsibility of presenting the arguments. These people had a problem understanding the language and they had a 12-year-old girl at the time. The matter was not settled and they had to leave the country. That young girl was heartbroken because she had this deep feeling of not having succeeded in defending her family.

I thank the hon. member for emphasizing the human aspect of this issue. I certainly agree about the value of Canadian citizenship. It is only natural to want to protect it, but there are lives involved and young people who are affected.

Again, I thank the hon. member for raising this issue.

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I want to congratulate all my NDP colleagues who have spoken to this bill. We are proving that the NDP is reasonable and carefully studies all the issues put before us in order to find ways to improve these bills. Some make their way to committee where, again, our NDP team proposes good amendments. Essentially, these amendments are based on expert opinion and cases that we come across.

A number of my colleagues live in regions with a large population of newcomers or people who are applying to live in Canada and become permanent residents and eventually Canadian citizens.

The teams at their offices deal with a lot of immigration cases. I live in the riding of Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, which is in Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean. It is in northeastern Quebec, two hours from Quebec City. This region is considered remote. However, even in my beautiful region we are very open to others. This did not happen overnight. It took years, even decades to achieve this open-mindedness and it took some special people in Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean to make that happen. I am really proud of my region today. This month, the first African grocery store opened in Saguenay. I think that is great. It shows an openness to the world. More and more people are even coming to Saguenay to start their new life. My riding assistants and I see all the administrative and bureaucratic problems that newcomers to Canada have to deal with. It saddens me a bit.

Nonetheless, I am proud to be able to speak to Bill C-24 today and share my view on all this, even though the 10 minutes I have been given will not be enough to cover everything.

Fundamentally, everyone recognizes that Canadian citizenship is of considerable value, but we do not want a politicized approach to this issue. This is unfortunately what the Conservatives are trying to do right now. As I mentioned, we have seen this kind of situation all too often since the Conservative government came to power.

Other parts of the bill also raise concerns. I will try to cover as many of them as I can. For instance, revoking citizenship has given rise to significant legal concerns. We are still worried about the proposals designed to concentrate powers in the hands of the minister. I am disappointed in all the Conservative ministers when they use their power to undermine democracy and give preferential treatment to their own friends.

We would hope that the minister would commit to working in co-operation with us to make real improvements to our immigration legislation, but unfortunately the minister has chosen to put forward a bill that is probably unconstitutional, while the Conservatives on the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration turned down all of the amendments put forward in committee. This is not reasonable. The Conservative government thinks that all its bills are perfect and that they cannot benefit from amendments coming from the opposition. Members of the opposition do, however, represent a very large percentage of Canadians, who voted for them, and they represent their respective parts of the country.

I expect the government to show some openness, but unfortunately we see its prejudice instead. This can also be seen in the way it looks at new immigrants and even refugees.

I have my own personal opinion about this. It may perhaps bother some people, but I find that the Conservative government uses new immigrants and cultural communities to broaden its electoral base by promising them heaven and earth. Unfortunately, the government drops them when they are no longer needed, when these voters are not in one of their demographic groups of voters or are not rich enough for them.

We have also seen this in terms of tighter immigration regulations. The new Canadian citizens must have a good chunk of change to be able to settle in Canada, or else they are not the kind of people that the Conservatives want to have in Canada.

I can say that the New Democratic Party supports families and this also includes family reunification. We understand that everywhere in Canada, everywhere in the provinces and even everywhere in the world, not all families are as privileged as the Conservatives opposite and their rich friends. The citizens at home may be sure that the members of the NDP will continue to be fair toward everyone and to show they sincerely care.

I will begin with the first measure that raises concerns. Bill C-24 concentrates new powers in the hands of the minister, including the power to grant or revoke the citizenship to those holding dual citizenship.

The government has a strong tendency to create laws that concentrate power in the hands of its ministers. The NDP condemns this practice. We cannot trust the Conservatives. By granting new powers to a minister, we are exposing ourselves to the real possibility that they will make arbitrary decisions based on political motives. The revocation of citizenship is problematic, since even the idea of giving the minister the power to revoke citizenship raises serious questions. Canadian law already comprises mechanisms to punish people who commit illegal acts. It should not be up to the minister of citizenship and immigration to make these decisions.

Another problem with revoking the citizenship of dual citizens has to do with creating a two-tier citizenship system in which some Canadians could have their citizenship revoked, while others who committed the same offence would be punished through the criminal justice system. The Conservative government is quite good at double standards, and I find that shameful.

Under the provisions of this bill, the minister can revoke citizenship based on certain criteria. The first criterion is whether the minister or an authorized employee is satisfied on a balance of probabilities that the person obtained citizenship by fraud. Up until now, these cases were generally referred to the courts and to cabinet. That will no longer be the case.

This poses some serious problems in that the minister would have the power to revoke an individual's citizenship on the basis of suspicions alone, and no independent tribunal would rule on whether the accusations were true. Unfortunately, some people seeking refugee status in Canada have experienced some degrading and downright shocking interrogations at the hands of officials or other people in positions of authority.

Some people say that if they were to return to their country, their life could be in danger, but the Conservative government and its henchmen insist that their home country is perfectly safe, even though the international media say that this is not the case. Sometimes we hear that the sexual orientation of refugees from extremely homophobic countries is questioned. I have heard some horror stories. I find it very worrisome that the minister could revoke citizenship on the basis of suspicions.

In the United States, for example, the government can file a lawsuit to revoke an individual's naturalization if it was obtained illegally and the individual concealed or falsified relevant facts in the naturalization application process. In such situations, the individual has the right to take the case to court, which I think is reasonable. Any decision can be appealed, and the individual is guaranteed due process.

The second criterion applies to a person convicted under section 47 of the Criminal Code and sentenced to imprisonment for life for treason, high treason or espionage, or a person who was convicted of a terrorism offence as defined in section 2 of the Criminal Code—or an offence outside Canada that, if committed in Canada, would constitute a terrorism offence as defined in that section—and sentenced to at least five years of imprisonment.

The problem is that this measure makes absolutely no distinction between a terrorism conviction handed down in a democratic country with a credible and reliable justice system and a conviction in an undemocratic regime where the justice system could very well be corrupt or beholden to political interests. This revocation process can be used without the Federal Court ever seeing the file. The measure is retroactive and very problematic.

The third criterion applies to an individual who served as a member of an armed force or an organized armed group engaged in armed conflict with Canada. This revocation process has to go through the Federal Court, which must confirm that the person suspected of these actions really did serve in one of the organizations mentioned while a Canadian citizen. This measure is retroactive.

I would like to talk about the minister's power to grant citizenship, which is also problematic.

[The Deputy Speaker, Joe Comartin]

Order. Your time is up.

The hon. member for Richmond Hill.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I listened to the member's speech and, contrary to the other speakers who have spoken tonight, he has decided to take a more partisan view of the bill and has made some derogatory remarks about members of cabinet and members of the government. He made comments to the effect that they use their power to undermine democracy and give favours to their friends.

Surely this is not the time for any member of the NDP to talk about giving favours to friends, this week in particular, when the Board of Internal Economy has found that the NDP has given a $1.17 million favour to its friends. I would ask that the member refrain from using that kind of language when debating a bill of this nature. I know that he is a member of Parliament, as we all are here, and he has a role to play in defending his party, but the language he is using is certainly very aggressive.

I would ask the member the same question I asked the previous member. Would going from a three-step process to a one-step process for granting citizenship benefit him and the constituents in his riding?

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, my Conservative colleague asked a number of question. I will start by answering the first one.

The NDP is pleased to use the parliamentary resources of the House of Commons to inform Canadians about what is happening here in Ottawa, unlike the Conservatives, who prefer to use the resources available to the government, such as the Prime Minister's plane, to send their rich friends and party fundraisers all over Canada at the taxpayers' expense.

Basically, my colleague opposite is saying that my speech is partisan. It is true in the sense that we are having an ideological debate in the House of Commons. It is particularly true with regard to the NDP's vision of immigration and newcomers to Canada.

We believe that our beautiful, multicultural country should open its doors and welcome good candidates for Canadian citizenship with open arms. We should not revoke their rights for arbitrary reasons, which is what the Conservative government wants to do by putting the power in the hands of the minister.

[Kirsty Duncan, Liberal, Etobicoke North, ON]

Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague for his speech. We have worked together often on health issues.

The interest in promoting the integration of older children into Canada seems to motivate the proposed language amendment. Some research shows that older children who lack capacity in one official language may have difficulty in acquiring one at an older age. This is not a sufficient reason to compromise the convention rights of children. The testing process is not a reliable indicator of a child's ability to become a productive citizen.

Does the member think that the requirement for children ages 14 to 18 to successfully complete both language and knowledge testing should be removed?

[Dany Morin, NDP, Chicoutimi—Le Fjord, QC]

Mr. Speaker, I would like to thank my Liberal colleague, who is one of my favourite members, at least on the Liberal side. She does excellent work on every issue she is involved in.

She is absolutely right. Like me, she is passionate about children and their well-being. The work we do in the House of Commons is for the future of the next generation of Canadians, which includes young newcomers.

Although I agree that adult newcomers must show that they are able to speak one of Canada's two official languages—if for no other reason than to improve their integration into Canadian society—I am somewhat bothered by the fact that 14-year-olds will now be required to know one of the official languages when they arrive in Canada.

If their parents are able to speak one of the official languages, but for various reasons, the child has not yet learned to speak French or English, the age of 14 is much too young to require them to do so. If these young people are able to successfully integrate into a Canadian school, I am convinced that they will learn not just one official language, but both and become bilingual.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration]

Mr. Speaker, I am both pleased and proud to rise in the House tonight to once again speak in support of Bill C-24, the strengthening Canadian citizenship act.

The Citizenship Act in its current form has not been updated or reviewed since 1977. It is now almost a generation later, and while changes have been made to many other pieces of legislation, the Citizenship Act has yet to be addressed. We must ensure that it is relevant and will meet the needs and challenges our citizens and prospective citizens in today's Canada have.

One of the current requirements that I am sure all of us can agree should be enforced is that citizenship should promote attachment to Canada and Canadian values. It should also promote and mandate a responsibility to participate in the life of our communities and our institutions. However, under the current and outdated act, lengthy processing times mean qualified applicants are waiting too long for their citizenship, and the citizenship fees associated do not reflect the full costs.

As I have been saying since this legislation was introduced earlier this year, the measures in the bill represent the first comprehensive reforms to the Citizenship Act in more than a generation. They would ensure that the process reflects the great importance Canadians place on their citizenship, improve the efficiency of the process by which newcomers become Canadian citizens, and deter citizens of convenience.

If implemented, these measures would fulfill a commitment made by our government in the most recent Speech from the Throne and would protect and strengthen the value of Canadian citizenship in four specific ways: by improving processing efficiency in the citizenship program, by reinforcing the value of Canadian citizenship, by strengthening integrity and combatting fraud, and by protecting and promoting Canada's interests and values.

I would like to go into some specifics in each of these areas. As I do so, I will address and try to bring clarity to a number of misconceptions about the bill that have arisen since it was introduced in February.

The measures in Bill C-24 would improve the efficiency of the citizenship program and are the foundation of the initiative we have called the blueprint for citizenship improvements.

Before I go on, I want to quote one of the many witnesses we heard at the citizenship and immigration committee, Ms. Salma Siddiqui, from the Coalition of Progressive Canadian Muslims. This is what Ms. Siddiqui said:

I have heard concerns that Bill C-24 represents a knee-jerk reaction or that it serves a—quote—political process. I disagree. Bill C-24 represents an assertion of the pride we hold in our values of an open, liberal democracy, where our freedoms are applied to all. Ladies and gentlemen, we must be reasonable.

She said this at the meeting on May 14 of this year.

Since 2006, Canada has welcomed an average of more than 250,000 newcomers a year, the highest sustained level of immigration in our country's history. As a result, the demand for citizenship has increased by more than 30%.

The measures in the blueprint for citizenship improvements in Bill C-24 include a streamlined decision-making model, an improved ability to determine what constitutes a complete application, and a strengthened authority to abandon applications where applicants would not take the steps requested to provide information or appear for a hearing. These measures would improve the process, support ongoing efforts to speed up citizenship processing, and ensure that resources are focused on processing qualified applicants.

In addressing backlogs, there are two quotations I would like to bring to the House's attention. Mr. Warren Creates is an immigration lawyer, and this is what he said:

There'll be a one-step process. It's going to take a year. This is what people want. They want clarity. They want certainty and they want efficiency, and the Canadian taxpayer wants that too.

This was said on Ottawa Morning on CBC Radio One on February 10.

Richard Kurland, who is a renowned immigration lawyer in our country, said on Global TV's Global National, on February 6, 2014:

The guesswork is taken out of this new system and your processing time will be, relatively speaking, lightning fast.

I urge the members opposite to support the passage of the bill so that it receives royal assent this summer. The passage of the strengthening Canadian citizenship act would significantly reduce the backlog and average processing time for citizenship applications. This is something the opposition has supported in the past, and the responsible thing would be to support it now.

The blueprint for citizenship improvements mandates a new single-step decision-making model, thus improving processing timelines.

However, a misconception has arisen about this efficiency measure. There is a worry that we are moving away from independent decision-makers. I want to reassure my hon. colleagues in this House that this is not the case. In fact, citizenship officers are unfettered, highly qualified decision-makers who are delegated to review and make approximately 100,000 case decisions a year on citizenship matters. Their decision to grant or deny citizenship would continue to be based on the criteria in the law, supported by objective evidence.

The second set of reforms in the strengthening Canadian citizenship act would strengthen the rules around access to Canadian citizenship, ensuring that those rules reflect the true value of Canadian citizenship and that new citizens are better prepared for full participation in Canadian life.

If implemented, Bill C-24 would lengthen the residency requirement from three years to four years in Canada to four of the previous six years before a person could apply for citizenship. It would clarify that residence means physical presence in Canada, which I think is a reasonable expectation Canadians have. It would require adult citizenship applicants to file income tax returns for four years out of the previous six, if required to do so under the Income Tax Act, to be eligible for citizenship, and it would also to require them to make an upfront commitment that they intend to reside in Canada.

Several people have commented on just those provisions, and I would like to point out some of them.

Toronto Sun columnist Simon Kent said, on February 6 in Straight Talk, that he thought a lot of people would say that it is a reasonable expectation if one wants to live in Canada. If people want to enjoy living in a free and prosperous country like Canada, they should spend time here and live here and contribute to society. He said that he knows it sounds like something out of politics 101, but that people living here, enjoying the fruits of their labour, paying their taxes, showing that they are committed, and having an extended period of permanent residency from three to four years, and maybe even five, before taking up citizenship is a fair and reasonable proposition.

Gillian Smith, executive director and chief executive officer of the Institute for Canadian Citizenship, said:

Our organization works extensively with Canada's newest citizens who tell us that measures taken to foster their attachment and connection to Canada have a positive effect on their successful integration. New citizens' sense of belonging comes in large measure from experiencing Canada first-hand: its people, nature, culture and heritage.

Bal Gupta, a widower, from the Air-India 182 Victims Families Association, endured a tragic experience in his life.

He said:

Well, it's not anything new. When I came to Canada in 1968, at that time the requirement was five years, except that there was a loophole for Commonwealth citizens. For them it was three years. So it is not anything unusual.Also, many countries around the world have a five-year residency requirement, so it is not unusual to have a requirement of four years. I don't think it is something that's unreasonable.

Reis Pagtakhan, an immigration lawyer, said:

First, I would like to support the proposal to change the residency requirement for citizenship from three out of four to four out of six years. I believe that the longer an individual lives, works, or studies in Canada, the greater connection that person will have to our country.

James Bissett appeared before our committee as an individual. Here is what Mr. Bissett had to say:

I'm also pleased to see that we've extended the wait time by at least one year. I argued in 1977 that we shouldn't have abandoned the five-year wait. I think three years has been too short a period for people to know enough about Canada and our cultural systems to apply for citizenship. I approve of that change, even though it doesn't go quite as far as I might have wanted.

Mr. Bissett was the deputy minister in 1977.

I would like to address the ill-informed argument against some of these measures, which states that the intention to reside provision contravenes mobility rights guaranteed under the charter. In fact, the provision simply signals that citizenship is for those who intend to make Canada their home. Citizenship applicants would be asked as part of the application process whether they intend to reside in Canada. I do not think we would find a Canadian in the country who would say that people can have citizenship even if they do not intend to reside here.

If applicants indicate that they do not intend to reside in this country, they would not be granted citizenship, as Canadian citizenship means contributing to Canadian life. These requirements are not onerous, and they are in line with those of key partner nations, such as the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand.

Nothing about this provision would limit the mobility rights of new citizens. They would be able to leave and return to Canada like any other citizen. In fact, as my hon. colleagues are aware, every government bill presented in the House of Commons is to be examined by the Minister of Justice to ascertain if it is consistent with the purposes or provisions of the charter. Bill C-24, as my hon. colleagues should know, is no exception, and it would not be before the House today in its current form if any such inconsistencies had been found.

The third set of measures in Bill C-24 would help counter citizenship fraud and combat abuse of the citizenship process. Among other reforms, these measures would give the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration the authority to develop regulations to designate a regulatory body whose members would be authorized to act as consultants in citizenship matters. The measures would also substantially increase the penalty for committing citizenship fraud, which has not been increased since 1977; streamline the revocation process; and bar people whose citizenship was revoked before they obtained it fraudulently from reapplying for citizenship for 10 years.

Finally, it would provide the authority to revoke Canadian citizenship from dual citizens who are members of an armed force or organized armed group engaged in armed conflict against our country, Canada, and to deny citizenship to permanent residents involved in the same actions. Dual citizens and permanent residents convicted of terrorism, treason, high treason, or spying offences would be similarly affected, depending on the sentence received in the courts.

These last measures, although they would likely only apply to a small number of individuals, would deliver a very strong and clear message that those who betray our country or take up arms against our armed forces have, in essence, forfeited their right to Canadian citizenship. The opposition parties have criticized our government for this provision. On this side of the House, we are sending a clear message to those who commit serious crimes such as terrorism. Canada's doors are closed and will remain closed to criminals who are undeserving of the rich opportunities that exist with Canadian citizenship.

Any government's priority is the safety and security of its people. The people are who we serve.

We are proud to say these measures are fully in line with our efforts in this regard. This is what Canadians expect and this is what they deserve.

Here is what Shimon Fogel, from the Centre of Israel and Jewish Affairs, had to say about that very issue:

—one of the things that has been percolating is the notion of not just the rights we enjoy but the responsibilities that attach to being a Canadian.

I don't look at this so much as an issue of punishing people by revoking their citizenship as a result of particular undertakings or acts they've committed, but rather that they are so fundamentally at odds with core Canadian values that there's no rationale or way to reconcile Canadian citizenship with that kind of activity.

Sheryl Saperia, from the Foundation of Defense of Democracy, said:

Bill C-24 suggests that Canadian citizenship, whether bestowed by birthright or naturalization, is predicated on a most basic commitment to the state: that citizens abstain from committing those offences considered most contrary to the national security interests of Canada.

Maureen Basnicki, from the Canadian Coalition Against Terror, Alliance of Canadian Terror Victims Foundation, said:

—yes, terrorism is a global situation. Even though Canada has been fortunate in not having large numbers of Canadians who have been killed by terrorists, we do have them, by the way, from 9/11 and from Air India and many other acts of terror. So we can't disregard that. We do have Canadians who choose to engage in terrorist activities. So if this bill or any such legislation could help deter and help Canada with its statement of intolerance for the most heinous crimes—not to create a hierarchy but it targets innocent civilians—if this can help then I think it's a good thing.

While the package of reforms before us today has been well received by Canadians as reasonable, even overdue, changes to Canada's citizenship laws, the most vocal opponents have been telling.

We have heard the manufactured umbrage of activist immigration lawyers who never miss an opportunity to criticize our government's citizenship and immigration reforms. Their feigned outrage is generally born out of pure self-interest in our opinion and that is the case in this instance.

These activist lawyers, some of them opposition partisans, oppose this change because they are attempting to drum up business by promoting the interests of convicted terrorists and serious criminals over the safety and security of Canadians.

I see the opposition House leader smiling over there. That is a fact, Mr. Speaker. There is nothing to smile about. You should be ashamed to make those kinds of comments—

[The Deputy Speaker, Joe Comartin]

Order, please. The member for Richmond Hill has been here long enough to know that he is to direct his comments to the Chair and not to other members in the House.

[Costas Menegakis, Conservative, Richmond Hill, ON]

I should be saying that through you, Mr. Speaker. The opposition House leader should be ashamed of the comments he is making while I am giving my speech. If he does not understand that Canadians do not want terrorists in their communities, around their homes, in their malls, around the schools, then I believe he is in the wrong job. I urge those people to stand with us on the side of Canadians in our great country.

Other misconceptions have arisen over these revocation provisions. For example, some have suggested that these provisions would create a two-class system of citizenship: dual citizens who can have their citizenship revoked and Canadian citizens without another citizenship who cannot. In fact, the reason that these provisions would not be applied to individuals who only have Canadian citizenship is to ensure compliance with Canada's international obligations not to render them stateless.

I can go on and on, but I would like to conclude by saying this. These are necessary improvements to ensure that Canadian citizenship continues to be the envy of the world. Should the bill not be supported by the opposition parties, they are going against measures such as demanding greater attachment to Canada, cracking down on fraud, implementing efforts to effectively deal with the backlog and, importantly, it would mean opposing the option to revoke Canadian citizenship from those who engage in terrorism, espionage, and treason.

Unlike the opposition, our Conservative government is strengthening the value of citizenship by cracking down on fraud, demanding greater attachment to Canada and speeding up processing for eligible applicants. I encourage all of my hon. colleagues to support this very important legislation.