Public Safety committee  —in increasing the capacity of the IRB. This increases their capacity to about 17,000 additional hearings each year, but we are—

Public Safety committee  —making additional investments and doing additional work in reducing the number who are presenting themselves—

Public Safety committee  —and in my opinion, the combination of all of those things will be effective in reducing the backlog.

Public Safety committee  If all we were going to do was increase IRB's capacity by the current amount we've increased it, which is 17,000 per year, that would simply be consumed by the existing backlog, which they inherited, but we are doing other measures as well, which I believe will be effective in re

Public Safety committee  Let me be very clear. We're adding people who actually do the important work of conducting these hearings.

Public Safety committee  Under Canadian law, people are entitled to due process—

Public Safety committee  —and the capacity to do those hearings was very significantly underfunded and diminished for a long period of time, and we're restoring it.

Public Safety committee  What I can confirm is that as the agreement currently exists, the safe third country agreement applies only at regular border crossings. This is a bilateral agreement between our two countries, and we cannot unilaterally change that, although there have been a number of recommend

Public Safety committee  Again, I don't want to get ahead of those discussions, but I will tell you that every option is on the table. I haven't ruled out any possibility.

Public Safety committee  No. I would disagree entirely with—

Public Safety committee  —that characterization, but my responsibility is to ensure that Canadian law is upheld—

Public Safety committee  —and Canadian humanitarian principles are adhered to—

Public Safety committee  I would much prefer that people would present themselves at regular border points, and we're going to do everything possible to encourage that, including in discussions with the United States.

Public Safety committee  Success would be that all people coming to this country would cross at a regular border point.

Public Safety committee  We're going to do everything we can to encourage people to cross regularly into our borders.