Citizenship and Immigration committee  I will start, but I have my experts here. The basic premises, because of the way things are written in the Citizenship Act, are the issues of being born in or out of wedlock and of what is considered a legal marriage. The definition of a legal marriage is one that is recognized

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I did read to you the proposals that our minister is making in terms of bringing amendments and changes to the legislation. One of them relates to being born abroad to a Canadian citizen in or out of wedlock, and removing the distinction.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I would refer you back to the minister's statement. I can't go into more detail.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Mr. Chair, I'd have to refer you back to the minister's statement. It was also published on our website. In terms of any more substance, I'm just unable to comment on the substance, as this legislation continues to be developed. When it comes to this committee, I'm sure you'll h

Citizenship and Immigration committee  If I may, Mr. Chair, the short answer from my perspective is that the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act was enacted in 2002, so we have a modern piece of legislation that reflects current Canadian values, whereas the citizenship legislation that we are working with includes

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I have had a discussion with the Passport Office. They might be able to provide more detail to you, but what they tell me is that approximately 25% of the people applying for Canadian passports are doing so on the basis of a document issued by Citizenship and Immigration, rather

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I'll let Clark speak to the number of applications for proof of citizenship. I don't have the projections that I can give you now, but I know the Passport Office is working on their projections of their increased volumes based on these changes in the requirements, and we will cer

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Absolutely, and thank you very much for that suggestion. We certainly have, in the past, done newsletters for members of Parliament on issues. We've done sessions on the Hill. I would go further; we do offer up information sessions for constituency offices on all our services.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  We have done a reallocation of resources to deal with the minister's instructions to deal on a priority basis with those individuals who have lived all their lives in Canada, or most of their lives, and are now finding they have a problem with their citizenship status. Separate f

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Whenever we have new legislation, that's always part of the process, but we'll have to stay tuned to see how that new legislation evolves.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Are you referring to what new legislation might bring, or what we're currently doing?

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Well, what we have we can certainly provide to you. It's in the main estimates. That's the amount of money we spend on our citizenship business line, writ large, and therefore that will give you a sense of the resources devoted to granting citizenship or processing proofs of citi

Citizenship and Immigration committee  The global case management system is a system that is under development, but there is an existing rollout for the citizenship business line. It is basically a case-tracking system; that's where we get our data on the number of cases that we're dealing with, but at this point in t

Citizenship and Immigration committee  It related to her announcement on January 24. She specifically asked us to increase our efforts. There have been ongoing efforts to deal with individuals who have questions about their citizenship status, but she asked us to increase our efforts. That was specifically targeted

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I cannot speak to the motivation of the minister; I can speak to my own motivation. My own motivation in dealing with this—and I am the lead ADM—is because we are very sympathetic with the issue for these individuals. We want to help them. We feel that they certainly deserve the