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Thursday, September 30,
1999 How warm our
welcome?
Debating Canada's immigration
policy in the wake of this summer's migrants
National Post
NDP:
Pat Martin
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LIBERALS: Dennis Mills
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BLOC: Bernard Bigras
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REFORM: Leon Benoit
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CONSERVATIVES: David
Price
| With the arrival
on the shores of British Columbia of 600 Chinese refugee claimants
this summer, Canada's immigration and refugee system has come under
fire. Critics of the current system, led by the Reform party, have
demanded a federal government crackdown on human smuggling into
Canada. A National Post poll this month showed the push for
immigration reform is backed by a majority of Canadians, two-thirds
of whom believe the current system does not work. Elinor Caplan, the
Immigration Minister, has rejected calls by Preston Manning, the
Reform leader, to eliminate illegal immigrants' right to appeal
deportation orders. Ms. Caplan said she will not override the
Charter of Rights, but promised to increase the power of authorities
to detain claimants, a move that would speed up the process.
Receiving the Chinese migrants has cost the federal government more
than $2-million so far.
Giles Gherson, National Post political editor: Today's topic is
the nation's policy towards immigration and refugees, an issue that
received a lot of attention this summer. Now let's be clear at the
outset that illegal immigration is different from legal immigration,
but in many ways the two come together with the incredible wave of
migration taking place across the globe.
Bernard Bigras, Rosemont (Bloc Quebecois): This summer the
arrival of a number of boatloads of illegal Chinese refugees again
raised the issue of our reception of people who travel to Canada and
then claim refugee status. These events highlighted the weaknesses
in our procedure for handling refugee claims, and underlined the
need for an immediate response from the Liberal government. These
weaknesses are: Confusion about the division of the role and
responsibility among all those involved; second, the infrastructure
of the co-ordination and the control is inefficient; and of course
there is an unacceptable backlog in processing claims. The delay is
currently more than one year, which is intolerable.
Leon Benoit, Lakeland (Reform): I think immigration is for
Canada, and Canadians, so why haven't Canadians been asked what they
want in terms of immigration? From listening to Canadians I've heard
that they do favour independent immigration. Certainly, they want
people that are going to very quickly become independent after they
come to Canada and add to our economy very quickly. I've heard that
Canadians want genuine refugees and right now are concerned that in
fact too many people are being accepted as refugees who should be
applying under the independent categories. And they favour reuniting
families. And quite frankly none of this system is working to focus
on these people. Family reunification often takes two to three years
or more, independent immigrants ... I've talked to businesses people
who want or desperately need a certain skill or expertise and the
process to get people into the country to fill that void is just too
slow. So clearly the system is not working the way I believe that
Canadians want it to work.
Pat Martin, Winnipeg-Centre (NDP): I think that asking: ''Are the
rules too lax?'' is really putting the cart before the horse. We
can't deal with the subject of are the rules of admission too strict
until we make up our mind -- How big do we want Canada to be? We
have to have that debate first and then set realistic targets and
then craft our rules in a way to meet those targets. Wilfrid Laurier
said, ''we should be a country of a 100 million people,'' and
Trudeau said, ''we should be 50 million by the year 2000,'' yet
current immigration policy is crafted to keep people out, not
welcome them in. So to answer your question, if our goal is to keep
the people out of this country, and to keep the population stagnant,
then the rules are just right. But if we accept that immigration is
an engine for economic growth, and we want to encourage more growth,
then the rules are too strict and we need to eliminate barriers like
the racist head tax.
David Price, Compton-Stanstead (Conservative): Well, what we're
looking at here first of all is the B.C. case this summer, and I
think we should really look at that situation. We've called back the
immigration committee to sit so that we could have the minister of
immigration called to account. Because we want to see what's
happening with our coast guard, our RCMP and our Department of
National Defence. Do they have the manpower and the funding to deal
with the situation? And we've also written to the minister and
suggested that we would support a toughening of our existing
legislation. Now what we've proposed as amendments to the
Immigration Act is to allow protective custody for refugee claimants
-- especially those with no ID, and in the B.C. case, the ones in
danger of being kidnapped by criminal elements. And we also want the
earliest possible criminal prosecution to take care of those
smugglers and also to lengthen the minimum prison terms and increase
the fines for the traffickers. And something we proposed in 1987 is
an amendment to the Immigration Act to allow Canadian authorities to
turn back vessels at sea, before they reach shore, of course
provided that the safety of the passengers has been assured.
Dennis Mills, Broadview-Greenwood (Liberal): Well first of all it
seems that there's a broad consensus here on a number of issues, but
the one that seems to get the most consensus, and I will be a part
of it, is that the Department of Immigration is simply not working.
And this started essentially 10 or 12 years ago, when we started
with drastic, radical cuts to the Department of Immigration. The
backlog in some offices (abroad) is three, four and five years
before applicants are considered. Because of this backlog, we have
created what I would call a ''phony refugee'' status system in
Canada. Eighty percent of my time as a Member of Parliament in
downtown Toronto is dealing with immigration cases that mostly
relate to refugee status, when a great number of those people simply
came here and claimed that status because our system was broken
abroad, and we could not look after it. And what we now have in
Canada is a backlog upwards of two and three years, and it doesn't
matter whether you're an opposition parliamentarian or a government
parliamentarian, no matter how hard you try to get the department
rebuilt with public servants, we just can't get it done.
Mr. Bigras: It's not a revelation, you know. In March, 1997, the
auditor-general concluded all that. I hope that in the Throne Speech
we're going to have a new orientation. I think it's very important
to have a major reform of immigration, and I think it's time to
renovate the Immigration Act.
Mr. Benoit: It sounds like we all agree that the system is
broken, badly broken, now. We proposed several changes over the last
six years, and I'm wondering why the government hasn't acted -- not
one piece of legislation to solve this problem. Pat Martin said that
Laurier and Trudeau had this vision of Canada having 100 million
people ... I'd like to hear what Canadians see for Canada and
immigration. I think it's time for a national referendum on the
broad principles of immigration, and let Canadians have their say as
to what they want from immigration. I think immigration is such an
important issue and we do depend on immigration, certainly, to help
build our economy -- this country's been built on immigration -- so
why haven't Canadians ever really been given a say? Let's have a
referendum held with the next election on the broad principles of
immigration including numbers, including what we see for Canada in
terms of population over the next 10, 20, 30 years. Until we do
that, we can't possibly build the immigration system that Canadians
want.
Mr. Martin: Well, I'd rather not focus on the narrow issue of the
Chinese migrant boat people. It would be wrong for us to be shaping
immigration policy based on what is really an anomaly of this
current influx. I think that Western developed nations are going to
be facing a day of reckoning soon when it comes to the mass movement
of people. We've got this spectre of people sitting in a mud hut
watching Mary Tyler Moore reruns on a colour TV, and hearing all
about the West, and they're not going to be satisfied living in
abject poverty for much longer. And they're going to do anything
that they can to better themselves. So we better be ready for lots
more.
Mr. Price: I definitely don't agree with a referendum. That's not
the way to work. I think the (parliamentary) committee itself has
done excellent work. Now, I'm new to the committee. But when I read
the past reports, like the report that they did in June of 1998,
that has some really good items in there. What I'm wondering is, how
come this is not coming forward, why isn't a bill coming forward
that has some of this material in it?
Mr. Mills: My greatest concern is the backlash in our community
that is developing towards new immigrants coming to this country,
and that makes me very nervous. The focus and attention on British
Columbia over the summer was a specific example of where people
started making broad, general statements about immigrants in
general. We have to deal with this issue head on, in a constructive
way and very quickly. Otherwise the backlash towards immigration by
those who were immigrants themselves at one point in time is going
to be huge.
Mr. Gherson: Apparently the Liberal caucus is looking at
recommending some changes to the immigration minister, which would
include putting a premium on immigrants who have university or
college education rather than just skills acquired on the job. And
this has prompted some reaction from immigration experts as to
whether we should be trying to more strictly define the types of
immigrants we ought to be seeking.
Mr. Bigras: That depends on the situation. If you are a refugee,
we have no question about it. As for regular immigration, I think we
have a system in Quebec where we have an accord with the federal
government in which Quebec can select the immigrants. But for
refugees, I think that it's important to put no condition, and
certainly not about education.
Mr. Benoit: Education levels, and the documents showing that you
have educational qualifications in a certain profession, are only a
part of the problem. I have had a Greater Toronto Area immigration
task force now for six months -- people from new immigrant
communities because they're the people most commonly dealing with
the system. And they say that education is only one consideration.
Another very important consideration is an understanding of what's
expected in the Canadian workplace, and making that leap from the
workplace in another country to the workplace in Canada. We have to
have the provinces more involved in the selection process, and we
have to have business more involved in the selection process.
Mr. Gherson: Are you talking about tighter rules?
Mr. Benoit: I'm talking about having provinces identify their
needs more, and giving business more direct input with the
Immigration Department on choosing people they need. Right now,
businesses are frustrated. They just can't get the people they need
to fill the void that Canadians can't fill in their businesses.
Mr. Martin: Frankly, Leon is right in that regard. I can tell you
I met with garment industry owners in Winnipeg and they have a
shortage of 1,000 sewing machine operators. So they actually went
out on a mission to hire people and they managed to find about 80 or
90 in China. The federal government has just now cancelled the work
visas for these people on the fear that they might try and stay here
after their work visas run out. Now why is that a problem? These
people have jobs for them, and these are not sweatshops. These are
good unionized workplaces with daycare centres. There's housing in
the inner city of Winnipeg that I represent. There are houses
sitting empty, schools that need to be repopulated. We want these
people, we have jobs for them. And the Immigration Department
cancelled visas on the grounds that they may try and stay in the
country. What is wrong with that picture? I believe Canada is
underpopulated.
Mr. Price: I agree with Pat totally, and a prime example of that
is the problem faced by people from out of the country coming to
university in Canada. The Immigration Department worries that these
university graduates might want to stay in Canada. Yet that is what
we are looking for. They come here, they get a taste of the country,
they get to see the cultures, see how things work and decide, ''Gee
this is a pretty good country. I'd like to stay.'' And they're
giving them a hard time about it. That's really, really,
unfortunate. Another thing: Leon's very right about the fact that
the provinces should be more involved. Bernard mentioned that in
Quebec we do have the only independent system, let's say, and it has
worked very, very well. We've been able to tailor the immigrant
population coming in to our needs in Quebec, reflecting the
workforce and our cultural group, and I feel it is working much
better.
Mr. Mills: Well, on the issue of skill shortages, I think that is
almost scandalous. In the province of Ontario, specifically in the
Greater Toronto Area, right now we have 100,000 unfilled
construction jobs. Thank goodness that we are going through an
economic boom right now, but it could be so much better if the
department had the capacity to address those skill shortages. There
are men and women, craftsmen and craftswomen from around the world
that could come here and could enhance the economic activity that
we're involved with right now in our country, but the department
does not react to skill shortages. I do not support the notion of
just bringing people here who are university educated, obviously, I
would not oppose it ... I think we have to have a broader view in
terms of the people that we accept, and I would say that if they can
bring a skill to Canada -- I'm thinking specifically in the trades
right now -- I think that we have to open our doors and welcome
them, because we are in desperate need of them now, we're not
training them.
Mr. Gherson: That's great. That brings us to a close, I certainly
appreciate all of your participation, a lot of consensus.
Some honourable members: (laughter) That's unusual.
RELATED SITES:
(Each link opens a new window)
Citizenship and Immigration Canada
The brand-new white paper on immigration policy
Statistics Canada: Immigration and
Citizenship
Statistics from the 1996 national census that look at where
Canadians came from.
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