Madam Speaker, on the issue of the previous government's deficit reduction action program, I do not think that the reduction in budgets for the then Department of Citizenship and Immigration actually created any backlogs in the system. I thought the system quite orderly and quite planned. In fact, backlogs went down for many streams of immigration.
With respect to calling on the Prime Minister to withdraw his tweet, I think social media is relevant to the story. The fact is that even today social media is having a huge impact on these irregular border crossings. It is the social media networks that are suddenly triggering a surge in people from Nigeria coming through Lacolle, Quebec, as a result of the power, pervasiveness, and ubiquity of social media.
It was the Prime Minister's tweet that first got people thinking about doing this. The Prime Minister, who has millions of Twitter followers, should tweet out and clarify what the situation is at the Canadian border and tell people not to cross the border at Lacolle, Quebec, or at Emerson, Manitoba, and to do so through regular means. That will strengthen our immigration system and public confidence in that system.