Mr. Speaker, I rise in the House to urge the government to take actions to address the impact of the significant and troubling shift in humanitarian policy in the United States, following the most recent presidential election. Despite the fact that President Trump's discriminatory travel ban continues to be struck down by the courts, other anti-immigrant measures have not. As a result, fear and uncertainty have greatly increased among those with precarious immigration status in the United States, and it has without a doubt fuelled a significant increase in asylum seekers crossing into Canada.
To cut to the facts, for all of 2016, the RCMP intercepted 2,464 individuals at irregular crossings. From January to April 2017, the RCMP has already intercepted 2,719 individuals. Should irregular crossings continue at this rate, we could expect over 8,000 interceptions this year.
It is very important to properly understand what these irregular crossings are. The current government's approach of simply ignoring that this is even occurring has allowed misinformation, fearmongering, and anti-refugee rhetoric to spread unchecked. This is a fundamental failure for a government that claims to be “back” and says, “Welcome to Canada”.
Asylum seekers from the U.S. crossing irregularly into Canada are not illegal border crossers. Canada is a signatory to international conventions and has obligations toward the acceptance and treatment of asylum seekers. The current process, where irregular crossers are intercepted by the RCMP, turned over to the CBSA, and have their asylum claim processed and sent to the Immigration and Refugee Board is following both our domestic and international legal obligations.
These individuals are not jumping any queues. These individuals are being correctly treated as in-land asylum claimants. They are not displacing government-assisted refugees or privately sponsored refugees, and they certainly are not displacing economic or family class immigrants. Canada's immigration levels plan has an allocation for in-land asylum claimants. Lastly, this is not a crisis of people streaming across the border, though it is a significant increase, with causes, and some that have solutions. Should the government get around to actually acknowledging the problem exists, it can be addressed.
One of the main drivers of irregular crossings from the U.S. is the safe third country agreement. As a result of this agreement, individuals crossing from the U.S. into Canada at authorized border crossings will be turned away at the border, based on the notion that the American asylum system is of equal standing to ours, and if its system rejected the claim, we can safely assume ours would as well. Unfortunately, that is simply not the case, especially given the new and troubling shifts under its current administration. We now have proof of this.
On Christmas Eve 2016, Seidu Mohammed, a Ghanaian asylum seeker whose refugee claim in the U.S. was denied, walked across the Canadian border into Emerson. Freezing temperatures left Mohammed badly frostbitten and cost him eight fingers. On May 17, the IRB accepted his asylum claim. Mr. Mohammed said his claim was rejected in the U.S. for similar reasons to those the Harvard immigration law program, Canadian immigration legal scholars and students, humanitarian and civil liberty associations, and others have for repeatedly calling for the safe third country agreement to be suspended. During his lengthy, punitive immigration detention, he was unable to access counsel and adequately prepare for his hearing. Under our system, he was able to do so.
I have called for the suspension of the safe third country agreement—