House of Commons Hansard #19 of the 45th Parliament, 1st session. (The original version is on Parliament's site.) The word of the day was citizens.
This summary is computer-generated. Usually it’s accurate, but every now and then it’ll contain inaccuracies or total fabrications.
Promotion of Safety in the Digital Age Act First reading of Bill C-216. The bill proposes a duty of care for online operators regarding child safety, strengthens reporting of child sexual abuse material, criminalizes deepnudes and online harassment, and protects civil liberties. 100 words.
Post-Secondary Education Financial Assistance for Persons with Disabilities Act First reading of Bill C-217. The bill proposes tuition-free post-secondary education for Canadians with disabilities to remove barriers, unlock potential, and promote inclusion in colleges, universities, and trade schools. 100 words.
Alleged Misleading Minister Testimony in Committee of the Whole—Speaker's Ruling The Speaker rules on questions of privilege from the Members for Mirabel and Lakeland, alleging ministers made misleading statements in Committee of the Whole regarding carbon rebate funding and Bill C-5 project selection. The Speaker explains procedural requirements for such questions and the high bar for finding deliberate intent to mislead. Finding procedural rules not met and no evidence of intent, the Speaker rules no prima facie case of privilege exists. 1500 words.
Citizenship Act Second reading of Bill C-3. The bill amends the Citizenship Act to address "lost Canadians" and allows citizenship by descent beyond the first generation. It requires a Canadian parent to demonstrate a substantial connection (1095 cumulative days in Canada) for future generations. Government members state it corrects past injustices and responds to a court ruling. Opposition members support fixing "lost Canadians" but criticize the bill for potentially diluting citizenship, lacking security checks, and not providing estimates of impact or cost. The Bloc supports the bill's principle but highlights immigration system dysfunction. 57300 words, 7 hours in 2 segments: 1 2.
Brad Redekopp Conservative Saskatoon West, SK
Mr. Speaker, I was going to say it is always a pleasure, but I am not sure it is, to listen to the member from Winnipeg—
Brad Redekopp Conservative Saskatoon West, SK
Okay, it is a pleasure.
Mr. Speaker, there are things that we have been trying to get at today that we have not gotten an answer for. I know that the member is very knowledgeable, so I am hoping that he will have an answer for it. It is the number of people who would be impacted by this legislation. It is important because we have heard numbers in the hundreds of thousands, and the government seems to be unable to provide a real number. It is important because the legislation would potentially cause a lot of extra bureaucratic work in different departments, and certainly it would cost Canada money. I am curious if the member has a number of how many people this legislation would impact. If he does not, why?
Kevin Lamoureux Liberal Winnipeg North, MB
Mr. Speaker, I do not have a number, and I do not necessarily know, even within the bureaucracy, if there would be a hard and fast number. I suspect that there might be some fairly accurate guesstimates, but I think that we might be able to flesh out some of that information once we are at the committee stage.
I suspect we would be talking about several thousands of individuals. A lot depends on the number of people who would want to put in their applications. We could have x number out there who are potential, but it does not necessarily mean that all of them would actually put in the application, so the only way that we could determine a hard number is to go ahead and anticipate. We will get answers through the passing of the legislation, and there might be some ballpark numbers to provide some level of comfort for members.
Mario Simard Bloc Jonquière, QC
Mr. Speaker, you know as well as I that the Liberals were very bad when it came to immigration. The massive arrivals of temporary migrants in Quebec put considerable pressure on public services. There was the non-repayment of fees relating to those temporary migrants and the Roxham Road psychodrama.
However, we are now considering a measure for which there is consensus. We discussed the bill during the previous Parliament and everyone seemed prepared to get on with it. I would like to reach out to my colleague from Winnipeg North. I would like him to tell me why the Conservatives seem to have such major reservations about a bill for which there is, after all, broad consensus.
Kevin Lamoureux Liberal Winnipeg North, MB
Mr. Speaker, I am an optimistic guy at times when it comes to the Conservative Party. I believe that the Conservatives will have the summer to reflect on the issues that are within Bill C-3, and I hope we will see where there might be merit to making some changes so that the whole House will get behind the citizenship bill. I hope we all recognize the deadline that is before us so that, come November, we can actually respect the ruling of the court.
One of the things that Canadians responded exceptionally well to with regard to the immigration aspect of the question is that we have a Prime Minister who really has amplified the issue of immigration levels that are sustainable. I really believe that Canadians have responded well to that, and we are focused on ensuring that the sustainable numbers do protect the interests of all Canadians.
Bardish Chagger Liberal Waterloo, ON
Mr. Speaker, I want to thank my friend and colleague for sharing with us about his time in uniform. I am really grateful to our men and women in uniform for the rights and freedoms that we have and, as has been mentioned numerous times today, with rights and freedoms come responsibilities.
I recognize that citizenship is definitely a privilege. It is an honour. My family immigrated to Canada, and I was born and raised here, but what I find interesting is that many individuals who are my age also immigrated to Canada when they were very young; they have been in Canada their whole life and they work for Canadian businesses. When they go abroad and perhaps expand their family, those children do not have the right to citizenship.
Today, there is a lot of conversation in regard to security. If a second-generation, not-born–Canadian person is abroad and gives birth to a baby, that baby would not have any reason to have securities done. The opposition is talking about securities.
Could the member just elaborate on the importance of recognizing that a child of a Canadian citizen is a citizen?
Kevin Lamoureux Liberal Winnipeg North, MB
Mr. Speaker, within the legislation, dealing with that second-generation child being born, to automatically rule out that child for whatever reasons ultimately does a disservice. That is the reason I tried to share my thoughts in regard to the economy and trade and how the world is a much smaller place. Having Canadian ambassadors by the thousands out and about is good for Canada in many, many different ways. I would ultimately argue it helps our lifestyle here in Canada.
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Mr. Speaker, I would like to congratulate the member for Winnipeg North on his maiden speech of this afternoon.
It is remarkable to sit here and listen to the member drone on and on, blaming Harper. It is almost as if the member had not been sitting in that exact same spot for the last 10 years as part of the government that sat and did nothing about this problem.
On a different issue, the immigration department released its report this week on misconduct and wrongdoing in the department, including rampant bribery issues, problems with misconduct, ethical lapses and privacy breaches. I wonder if the member opposite could tell us what the government is going to do about these problems within the immigration department, instead of blaming Harper.
Kevin Lamoureux Liberal Winnipeg North, MB
Mr. Speaker, one of the things that the Conservatives are a little sore on is the issue that there is more turnover in the Liberal benches than there is in the Conservative benches. We are talking about a new Prime Minister and a new administration. The Prime Minister has been a member of Parliament for two months; Pierre Poilievre was a career politician. In terms of change, and this is the reason it is important to recognize it, we have a new Prime Minister with a new administration that is going to tackle the problems that my friend just raised in the form of his question—
The Assistant Deputy Speaker John Nater
Order. The time has expired for questions and comments.
It is my duty pursuant to Standing Order 38 to inform the House that the questions to be raised tonight at the time of adjournment are as follows: the hon. member for York—Durham, Housing; the hon. member for Yorkton—Melville, Natural Resources; the hon. member for Kenora—Kiiwetinoong, Housing.
Eric Duncan Conservative Stormont—Dundas—Glengarry, ON
Mr. Speaker, this being my first opportunity to be on my feet for an extended time, I just want to take the opportunity to thank the great people of Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry for giving me the honour of coming back to the House of Commons for a third time. I am extremely proud to serve as their federal member of Parliament. I want to welcome the residents of North Glengarry, who are new to the riding. It is going to be a little bit easier for the Speaker now to say Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry, without the “south” in there. We have reunited all of S, D and G, the city of Cornwall and Akwesasne.
I want to take the time while I have the floor to thank all of those who helped out in our recent campaign, from our campaign team, volunteers and door knockers to the thousands of people who took signs and, at the end of the day, those who marked and cast their ballot for me. It is something that I never take for granted and I am deeply grateful for.
I am grateful for my family and my close network of friends. I have a great big group of second mothers, as I call it, not only volunteers but family and a wonderful group of friends that support us in this unique work that we do and lifestyle that we have of, as I always say around home, getting our meals and miles in. I want to thank my family: my dad, Ed; my mum, Bea; my sister Jill; and my step-parents and step-siblings. I would be a little while listing the five stepsisters that I have, but I wanted to say how grateful I am for their love, encouragement and support.
I am pleased to rise today to add my contributions to the government's legislation, Bill C-3, an act to amend the Citizenship Act of 2025. This is not the first time we have seen a bill in this form. We have actually seen this as a Senate private member's bill in a much different form, one that I think would be much more beneficial. I will get into that in my comments here over the course of the next several minutes.
I want to start by talking about the value and the importance of citizenship in this country. One of my favourite things is when we get the list, on a monthly basis, from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, of individuals in our ridings who have recently obtained Canadian citizenship. It provides us an opportunity to send them a scroll of congratulations. One of the things my staff and I are proud of is not only signing each scroll and certificate but putting a passport application in there and letting them know that they can come to our office for service, making that connection.
One of the things we want to do is to show how proud we are of the value of Canadian citizenship. It is a privilege and an honour. We have people come back in, people I have met from all over the riding, in the community, both in Cornwall and S, D and G. They will come in and appreciate that scroll and show just how proud they are to be Canadian. It is an immense privilege to have the chance to do that.
Bill C-3 will do that in a few different ways. We agree with some measures and sections. There are others that we have some concerns about, and I will get into that. The bill is a recycled version of Bill C-71 from the last Parliament that was tabled by the Trudeau Liberals. Bill C-71 came out of a Conservative private member's bill from a wonderful senator of ours, Senator Yonah Martin, that was heavily amended, Bill S-245.
I want to say that the reason we are here is that in 2023, the Ontario Superior Court ruled that the first-generation limit was unconstitutional. The government chose, in this case, not to appeal it. It had the opportunity to appeal and test that in court, but it chose not to. Instead the government committed to changing the law. The court did say, and it is important in our discussions, and I am going to be talking about this, that the “substantial connection test” would be appropriate to ensure that these new citizens were actually connected to Canada. That is a major concern that we have.
Right now, the plan is a very poor test, frankly. The fact is that there is 1,095 nonconsecutive days, with no way to know how that is all done. Again, we talk about having a connection to Canada, that privilege of citizenship, that connection to Canada for an individual to have. It is certainly strained in the way the government has this written.
I want to start with some of the areas that Conservatives have found agreement on that need to be addressed. First is the provisions for adopted children. For myself, when reading about the legislation and our briefing notes and hearing other colleagues today speak about this from our side of the aisle, when it comes to the adoption of children and making it easier for Canadian parents and facilitating citizenship when they adopt children abroad, this issue is something that is worthy of merit and consideration in this legislation.
We need to make it easier in this country for parents to adopt, whether that is domestically or around the world. In this measure right now, the current process is a PR process, a permanent resident process, that parents have to go through and so forth. The bill would treat adopted children the same as natural born. I think that is a step in the right direction. When we talk about cutting red tape, this is one way we can do that, by making it easier for families to adopt. There are still a lot of processes to go through and a very stringent requirement for parents to do so, but when they adopt a child from another country and that adoption process is final, that is when they are treated the same as natural born and get that. It is an easier process as opposed to going through PR and that process, which can sometimes be complicated and difficult for families to navigate as they have gone through many other forms and processes already to go through the child custody and adoption process.
Conservatives have been on record on this before. My colleague from Saskatoon West has done a great job on this piece of legislation and on many of these topics already.
There are several quotes that came from the immigration committee, where we have been on the record on that. We stated, quote, we want to see adopted children have their citizenship respected in the same way. That means allowing them to pass it on without going through unnecessary bureaucratic hurdles. We have been on the record before in this House and at committee. We will continue to do that here in the House as we go through this part of the bill.
Another part of the bill we can support, for which I am going to give two positives, if I could, is restoring citizenship for lost Canadians. We deem that to be reasonable. I want to give, as I did earlier, kudos to our Conservative senator. There is a smaller number these days, but we have a wonderful Senate caucus over on the Conservative benches there. Senator Yonah Martin's bill, Bill S-245, was designed with a clear and narrow goal: to restore Canadian citizenship to a small cohort of lost Canadians. I would say her effort was non-partisan and targeted to remedy a situation that came up nearly 50 years ago in our country.
Conservatives supported that bill at every stage to ensure the Canadians who were unfairly left out of previous citizenship reforms, including those stripped of their citizenship at age 28 under section 8 of the act, could have justice and a fair process. However, the process went through the Senate, and it was a good part of the way through the House and committee. The NDP and the Liberals then hijacked it and made several significant changes, which is where we are at today, many of which are in the form of Bill C-3.
Conservatives have said that while we support the measures I just spoke about, we cannot support the bill in the current form, because there are several other issues of challenge. It dilutes the integrity of Canadian citizenship by automatically extending it to multiple generations. Several of my colleagues have mentioned this in their comments today and have asked Liberal members to provide a number. We are unable to substantiate the number of applicants and the impact this is going to have on immigration, IRCC and the department in this country. How many more will obtain Canadian citizenship through this? It will be countless as it goes on through generation after generation. There is no number to know that. We do not know the cost on services of obtaining passports. There could be old age security and guaranteed income supplement applications and eligibility that come from it. Some of it could be retro, depending on how all this goes, so it could be very difficult in that way. Therefore, I think that is a major issue we have that we need to discuss and to have further clarification on.
One of the challenges is not only the countless generations but also the minimal substantial connection test. I mentioned the 1,000 days the government has put in the legislation. One of the key challenges is that it is nonconsecutive. It goes back, at the end of the day, to the court ruling the government referenced, which said there is space and an opportunity for the legislation to come forward to have that substantial connection test. The government has chosen for it to be 1,000 nonconsecutive days.
Conservatives are on record as saying that it needs to be consecutive days. There needs to be a substantial test. That would be a fair way to make sure that the value of Canadian citizenship is maintained by a person's having a real, legitimate, tangible, long-term connection, at even 1,000 days, but a substantial connection at that point, to Canada in obtaining their Canadian citizenship.
There is another key aspect that Conservatives have raised about the current form of Bill C-3 and about Bill C-71. We also raised it during debate on Bill S-245, when it was gutted by the NDP and Liberals, and vastly expanded to what we see now. There is no requirement for a criminal record check to take place.
We talk about public safety in our country and the need to make sure we have a stringent immigration process, a fair, secure and safe immigration process. The fact that there would not be an obligation, it would not be mandatory, to have a criminal background check is completely inappropriate. Earlier, the parliamentary secretary to the government House leader made his comments and interventions about that. He kept saying that the Liberals are open to suggestions and to amendments. Conservatives have been on the record about some of the things we would do and what we want to do. The government has had multiple opportunities to correct the issue by putting it proactively in the bill and making a background criminal check a requirement.
That was debated in the last Parliament in Bill S-245. Conservatives did raise the issue, and we debated it substantially, while the Liberals veered in and around it. Bill C-71 was introduced under the Trudeau government as a piece of legislation, and now the same Liberal government has come back with Bill C-3, yet it has still not put it in. I can assure the House that my Conservative colleagues at the citizenship and immigration committee, if the bill does proceed to committee, will be advocating it. I am very confident that would be an amendment that would come forward.
My comment on this for Canadians is to make an observation about the lack of seriousness the Liberals have shown when it comes to public safety to ensure that Canadians who would be granted citizenship through this process are able to pass a criminal background check. The Liberals have had the opportunity to put this in. The fact that we have had to fight and fight for this, while the Liberals have continually obstructed it, says a lot about their lack of seriousness about it. We will continue to push the topic and continue to do all of this at committee, in debates here in the House, and so forth.
Another major aspect and concern, as I mentioned, is the cost of the bill, as well as the number of people who would be eligible and the countless generations. There are some unintended consequences that would happen if the flaws and issues that we see in the legislation are not addressed. A key part about this is that the numbers are very important when it comes to immigration. We have seen the Liberal government fail time and time again when it comes to the numbers in our immigration system.
We could survey Canadians, and I am sure they would say a few things. I am sure they would say that they believe that in order to obtain Canadian citizenship through this process, it would not be unreasonable in Bill C-3 to add in a provision that would require a security background check. Most Canadians would say that would be common sense.
Most Canadians would think that if the government is going to introduce legislation that would have a major impact on the number of people eligible for citizenship, passports, services and all of that support, the government would have estimates on how many people would be impacted and what the cost would be to various departments and services. People would think the government would have all of that. It has refused to provide those numbers. Most Canadians would say that they would expect parliamentarians and the government to have that information on hand, available for public knowledge and discussion, when a piece of legislation like this is coming forth.
However, when it comes to numbers, we have seen so many times how the Liberal government has broken our immigration system with reckless numbers. We have seen them, and we know that the Liberals know they have created a failed and broken system after 10 years of being in office, because they are trying to rescind many of the decisions they made. They are now trying to make major changes to the temporary foreign worker program.
They provided over a million international students with permits, with zero plans for them to be housed safely in appropriate circumstances and with affordability. I have spoken to a large number of international students at St. Lawrence College in Cornwall and in my travels in Eastern Ontario and across the country. It has been incredible the number of frustrated international students who heard for years about the opportunity to study in Canada.
Under the Trudeau government and continuing under the current government, the Liberals keep missing their targets. Even after they have realized the issues they have made and tried to cap numbers, they broke the international student system. We heard stories in the GTA of six, eight or nine people staying in a two- or three-bedroom home and sometimes paying $1,000 or more each in rent. These are ridiculous prices. We have heard of international students having to go to food banks.
The reason I raise all of this is that the government and the Liberals, when it comes to our immigration system, in numbers and in a sustainable system, have failed Canadians, new Canadians and those immigrating to Canada, very, very deeply.
We have seen it with respect to permanent residency. Members do not have to take my word for it; the government has admitted it broke the immigration system when it comes to permanent residency, because now it has rescinded and it is attempting to cap the number of permanent residents admitted into Canada and approved every year.
The Liberals have made many changes. They have actually closed the group sponsorship for refugees, which I have been personally supportive of. They have shut that program down. I have done that as a Group of Five; we sponsored a Syrian refugee family. I gave up my house and went to live in my mom's basement for six months, believe it or not.
I was part of a Groups of Five sponsorship opportunity, where we came together as a community to help a family in need abroad. They are doing very well in Canada these days. Because the government has broken the immigration system, and asylum claimants and the whole refugee system are severely under strain, it had to cancel that program in order to try to get its numbers under control.
Now we find the government proposing legislation in Bill C-3, about which we are asking what the number would be, how many this would impact, and what the impact would be on government departments and the economy in our country. We do not know.
I can just see another issue coming of the government's being woefully unprepared for the very legislation it introduces. It just speaks again of virtue signalling on its part, of breaking our immigration system and not learning from those lessons. We continue to see it time and time again.
I will give the Liberals a little bit of a compliment, but I do not want them to take it the right way. They get an A for an announcement. I have never seen people do photo ops and announcements better than the Liberals. That is their compliment. They can get the banners. They get the best backdrops. They have the podium announcement. They have people cheering. They have the news release out. It looks great, and it sounds great, full of Liberal word salad.
However, what happens is that they get an A for an announcement and an F for follow-through. Look at their tax cut today. They talk about numbers. Their big tax cut never came to fruition. It is drastically, astronomically smaller than what they said it was going to be.
The Liberals are not good with numbers. They are not good with numbers on the budget. They will not table a budget this spring. They will not tell us what the deficit is. They broke our immigration system by having numbers get out of control. We have another piece of legislation dealing with citizenship and immigration, for which they do not know the cost, they do not know their numbers and they are not doing the math. Canadians have seen this after 10 years, on repeat, over and over and time and time again.
Conservatives have said that there are measures of the bill that we will support and that we have been on the record as supporting before. However, we have some serious concerns about several of the provisions that need to be addressed.
We cannot support citizenship by descent for countless generations, we need to change the test for a substantial connections test, and we need to make sure every applicant passes a criminal background check. These are common-sense things my Conservative colleagues and I will continue to advocate for, to make sure, at the end of the day, that anybody who comes to Canada and becomes a citizen has an amazing opportunity to afford a home, to get a good job, to get health care and to enjoy what so many of us have had: a great quality of life in this country.
Kevin Lamoureux LiberalParliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Government in the House of Commons
Mr. Speaker, I really wish you would give me enough time to really go into depth in regard to the comments that were made by the member opposite.
He talks about the numbers, and there is a rationale. I could be just as, if not even more, critical of when Pierre Poilievre sat around the cabinet table and of some of the immigration decisions they made. In essence, in 2025, there would be a reduction from 500,000 to 395,000; in 2026, to 380,000; and in 2027, to 365,000. Pierre Poilievre was asked to comment, and all he said was that the Conservatives would have more “severe limits”, but then he walked away from the mic. He did not want to actually answer any questions in regard to what “severe limits” means. There are all sorts of issues in immigration.
Would the member opposite not agree, given the nature of the beginning of his speech, that there would be an advantage to having the bill go to a committee well before November?
Eric Duncan Conservative Stormont—Dundas—Glengarry, ON
Mr. Speaker, the Liberals have finally agreed with many others whom they attacked and degraded for so many years, and are saying that the immigration levels and targets they set were way too high. People came into Canada, and many became Canadians, but we did not have sustainable measures.
We made a promise, Liberal and Conservative governments for generations, decades, that if a person immigrated to Canada, they could afford to live, they could get a good job, and they could have a good quality of life, but we have seen that eroded over the course of the last 10 years. Therefore, with respect to any numbers that the Liberals cite, attacking anybody else, it is their own record for the last 10 years. They selected those numbers, which were clearly too high, because the Liberals have actually cut back and restricted them on their own, and they broke our immigration system. Their own actions, over the course of the last year, are a full admission that they failed when it came to numbers and the math on immigration.
Andréanne Larouche Bloc Shefford, QC
Mr. Speaker, I note that the Conservatives are using this debate on Bill C-3 to criticize the problems at the Department of Citizenship and Immigration. Wait times are very long. I see these problems in my constituency office as well. These are some of the most serious cases. In fact, cases are getting worse. It is a very outdated department. We agree on that, and we share the Conservatives' criticism of the Department of Citizenship and Immigration.
However, that is not what Bill C‑3 is about. Bill C‑3 actually seeks to respond to an Ontario Superior Court ruling and correct historical injustices against individuals.
Is my colleague casting doubt on the justice system?
Eric Duncan Conservative Stormont—Dundas—Glengarry, ON
Mr. Speaker, it is the absolute opposite. I would reference the court ruling and the legislation we introduced here, and passed, to meet what was required, which does provide the opportunity for a substantial connection test. What we are saying is that 1,000 non-consecutive days is not acceptable. However, the government has the right to put that section in the legislation.
There are parts of the legislation we do support, and there are some we do not. The court ruling itself says that a substantial connection test is reasonable to do. We are saying that what the government is proposing is not reasonable. That is part of the debate, and the Bloc Québécois should be part of it. There are reasons to criticize, and I think that is one of the things we are going to be discussing in committee.
Gaétan Malette Conservative Kapuskasing—Timmins—Mushkegowuk, ON
Mr. Speaker, I have been listening to the debate all day, and for Canadians who are listening, part of this must be very confusing.
I would like to have something clarified. If a Canadian woman has a child in a country outside Canada, with a man from that country, the child is raised in the other country, and then the Canadian woman comes back to Canada, but 30 years from now the child decides to come to Canada, would that child be a Canadian, under Bill C-3?
Eric Duncan Conservative Stormont—Dundas—Glengarry, ON
Mr. Speaker, under the current law, I believe that, yes, that is the way it would be.
However, the challenge in the legislation is that multiple generations, the children of children who live in another country, may not have that same connection, which comes back to the substantial connection test. This could go on for multiple generations. Eventually, there would be people applying for citizenship, through the legislation being proposed by the Liberals, who would not have a substantial connection to Canada.
With respect to the 1,095 non-consecutive days, this is the question people have to ask themselves: Is that really a substantial connection test for obtaining Canadian citizenship and for having the honour and pride of doing that?
I am very proud of our Canadian citizenship and of those people who are able to join, but the big question on that is the multiple generation aspect that is going to cause a lot—
The Assistant Deputy Speaker John Nater
Questions and comments, the hon. member for Beauharnois—Salaberry—Soulanges—Huntingdon.
Claude DeBellefeuille Bloc Beauharnois—Salaberry—Soulanges—Huntingdon, QC
Mr. Speaker, I recognize my colleague's thoroughness and professionalism, but I am wondering about something after listening to his speech.
If he is interested in the issue and in debating it, why does he not agree that the bill should be studied in committee?
Then he would have a chance to debate it and hear from experts.
Why does he want to defeat Bill C-3 at this stage?
Eric Duncan Conservative Stormont—Dundas—Glengarry, ON
Mr. Speaker, it is trust. This is not the first version of the bill that we have seen. We had Bill C-71 in the last Parliament. We also had Bill S-245, a Conservative Senate private member's bill go through, which was gutted and hijacked by the Liberals and the NDP.
I will use the example of the criminal background check's being a requirement. We have advocated for that multiple times, but we have been told, “Oh, take it to committee, and we'll talk about it.” Well, we are talking about it now, because this is about the third time we have had to raise it, unsuccessfully, to get the Liberals and NDP to agree to do all that. Therefore the issue is trust.
We could move it along to committee, but we want to take the opportunity now to raise awareness for Canadians. If the member surveyed 100 residents in her community, I am sure that a vast, overwhelming majority would say that a criminal background check is a very reasonable, common-sense approach. The government could have put that in there, and it comes down to trust. It did not do that, again, and I am not very confident that if the bill gets to committee, the Liberals are going to finally see the light on that.
Kelly McCauley Conservative Edmonton West, AB
Mr. Speaker, in his well-thought-out speech, my colleague talked about trust and how the government cannot seem to tell Canadians how many people would be affected and what the cost would be. This is from Immigration Canada's own website: Support for immigration among Canadians has decreased substantially. These are the government's own words. The number of Canadians who say we're bringing in too many newcomers is up 50% in two years. The government says it is the most concern about the rate of immigration that it has seen in 20 years.
Does the member think the government making these changes in Bill C-3 without knowing how many people would be affected will add trust and confidence to the system?
Eric Duncan Conservative Stormont—Dundas—Glengarry, ON
Mr. Speaker, not knowing their numbers, not knowing their facts, not having a plan is the definition of insanity after 10 years of the Liberal government. This is what the Liberals do. They do not plan properly, do the accounting or do the math. We just get continued chaos and disorder, as we see in our current immigration system.
I will tell members that the number one group of Canadians that I hear from as being most frustrated about our immigration system are new Canadians who just went through the system. I hear time and time again about it, whether it is labour and getting their foreign credentials recognized, the cost of living, the bureaucratic process that many members have raised here today or the archaic system that is IRCC, Immigration Canada.
After 10 years, we have lost a consensus on immigration. Sadly, the consensus is going against the Liberal record of what has happened the last number of years. We need to bring back some restrictions, as the member said. We need to have caps that are enforced and, most importantly, a compassionate system that guarantees that when a new Canadian arrives here, they have a great opportunity at a good house, job and quality of life.
Kevin Lamoureux Liberal Winnipeg North, MB
Mr. Speaker, it is worth noting that our new Prime Minister has made it very clear in every mandate letter that talks about sustainable immigration levels. The new Prime Minister understands what Canadians are talking about with the administration, and it is a part of this new administration's priorities. It is in the mandate letter. Does the member not see that as a positive thing?
Eric Duncan Conservative Stormont—Dundas—Glengarry, ON
Mr. Speaker, the member has been here for several years. I have to chuckle because he is saying the Prime Minister said we need sustainable immigration levels. That is acknowledging the Liberals have not had sustainable immigration levels for many years. That is the record they are going on. This is not a new government; it is a continuation of the same government. We have seen the Liberals break caps they promised to pile on. We are seeing a system just as backlogged. We are seeing just as much frustration in an archaic system when it comes to immigration. It is broken, and they cannot be trusted to fix the system that they themselves broke.