Citizenship and Immigration committee  We'd be happy to send you the survey that we did.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  The definition should be very simple because of the models that were used to set up the Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants. Effectively, they're the law society, and we're the bar association. The bar association is voluntary.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Logically speaking, yes. What I think I said was maybe in three or four years, if the better regulator is working perfectly, we'll say maybe it wasn't necessary, but it's a very good first step. Theoretically—and I'm not speaking only for myself, but for many of our members—we t

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I believe that in the interim it's just like the issue of dealing with ghost agents by making it an offence in the immigration act and making CBSA and the RCMP the enforcers. This issue of the minister and the department having control over the regulator of immigration consultan

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Well, clearly, we all make a living, because other people agree. In general, if I could tell you from a practical standpoint, the reasons people come to us are either that they hate forms and are fearful of making a mistake, or they have no time. So they look to the advice of a p

Citizenship and Immigration committee  As I said in the presentation, we believe this is a huge step forward. The question we're asked all the time is what if you change the regulator? How do we know we won't be here in five years, ten years, or twenty years? Well, they don't ask that question about law societies, whi

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Well, the legislation isn't designed to solve all of the problems. It goes a major step along the way toward what individuals are allowed to do if they're in Canada in terms of immigration procedures and practices. With regard to the regulation, you can have a perfectly designed

Citizenship and Immigration committee  We have to be careful to see how much we add up. The total amount of fees that we're actually paying, if you include now the levy for CMI, for the materials we must have, are closer to $3,600. And if you subtract from that the errors and omissions insurance of about $200, we're s

Citizenship and Immigration committee  --without errors and omissions insurance, so subtract errors and omissions insurance. As Warren said, that's driven by real estate and other high-cost transactions, whereas we're only talking about the practice of immigration; the fees to do that are much higher per person.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Sure. I'm also a member of CMI. It would be silly not to be, because they give us a lot of things for free, or they were free. In regard to that survey, we participated in a listserv of several hundred professionals who share ideas and solve problems. Unanimously, the individual

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Without giving away any specific details of what our bid proposal will be,--

Citizenship and Immigration committee  --it's really incumbent on the process that there be no uncertainty in the market or in the marketplace. It's also clear that if the decision is made to appoint a different body as a regulator, there has to be a transition period. The bid process itself asks for a clear descripti

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Yes, that is correct.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Absolutely.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Sure. I think if everyone had a picture in mind of a bad consultant or someone who is out to cheat people, it would be a guy meeting someone in a dark corner of some restaurant in downtown Toronto or Vancouver or Delhi. He would have an individual who had been referred to him by