CIMM Committee Report

Supplementary Report of Her Majesty’s Official Opposition The Conservative Party of Canada

Family Reunification Study

_______________________________

David Tilson, Member of Parliament for Dufferin – Caledon

Michelle Rempel, Member of Parliament for Calgary Nose Hill

Bob Saroya, Member of Parliament for Markham – Unionville

BACKGROUND

Over the course of October and November 2016, the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration conducted a study on the federal government’s policies surrounding family reunification. The testimonies of over 51 witnesses were used to analyze the effectiveness of the government’s current policies in an attempt to improve Canada’s approach to family reunification.

Many of the Committee’s meetings were rendered useless due to the government’s decision to make numerous legislative changes to the family reunification immigration streams in an apparent disregard for the ongoing studies being conducted. For example, the federal government changed the age of dependants and conditional permanent residence for sponsored spouses during the course of our study, both of which were topics addressed in many of our meetings.[1]

The topic of “family reunification” was so broad that the Committee was unable to gather adequate data on any single issue.  It only gained a passing overview of a range of programs including, but not limited to, parents and grandparents, caregivers, refugees, adoption, and dependent children. Given their significance and complexity, any one of these topics could have been the subject of its own committee study. Instead, they were all grouped together, which served to obfuscate these important subjects.

REASONS FOR A SUPPLEMENTARY REPORT

It is the opinion of the Conservative Members that the Report on Family Reunification tabled by this Committee was insufficient in achieving all the objectives of the study. Since the structure of this study precluded an in-depth investigation of any of the seven items outlined for inquiry, it is irresponsible of the Committee to produce such wide-ranging recommendations without sufficient supporting evidence.[2]

Furthermore, the recommendations in the main Report will most likely lead to transferring the costs of immigration to the provinces and remove existing safeguards from our immigration processes, which will make it more vulnerable to abuse.

Due to these factors, the Conservative Members of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration offer the following supplementary document to the Committee’s Report on Family Reunification. This supplementary report responds to the main Report by voicing the Conservative Party’s opposition to specific recommendations and proposing supplementary recommendations under the following headings:

• Immigration planning
• Processing times and backlogs
• Client services
• Spouses and partners
• Dependent children
• Research

Immigration Planning: Costing Increases

We have concerns with Recommendation 1 of the Report, which states:

That Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada continue the recent trend of increasing the level of family class immigration and that the family class category continue to increase as overall immigration levels rise.[3]

This recommendation is based on the unsubstantiated assumption that we can continuously and unconditionally increase immigration levels and shows a lack of understanding of the wait times that family class applicants currently experience. Many of the witnesses noted that wait times for the family class category have been particularly onerous. For example, the Canadian Council of Refugees described in their briefing that it takes an average of 51 months to process caregiver dependent applications.[4]  Such concerns were also noted by Beth Martin, who conducted PhD research on family reunification in Canada:

differences between immigration streams and within Family Class were perceived to be a result of backlogs that had built up when the number of submitted applications exceeded the number of applications to be processed.[5]

Ms. Martin’s briefing demonstrates how backlogs accumulate when the amount of applications received overwhelm IRCC’s processing capabilities.

Through this recommendation, the Liberal government has chosen the unproven tactic of countering backlogs by increasing the number of applicants in the stream. The alternative option, however, is to impose a limit on applications in various streams of the family class. The previous government applied this measure in cooperation with other steps to reduce wait times, and it resulted in a 40% decrease in the backlog by 2013.[6] Reducing the backlog should be a top priority and this cannot be accomplished if thousands more applications are added to an ever-increasing pile. 

Additionally, the Committee’s Report does not consider the higher costs for the federal and provincial governments that could ensue from this recommendation.  As family members age, they are likely to require more assistance, specifically in terms of healthcare. Parents and grandparents brought to Canada under the family class category may not be able to work or find employment, depending on their age. This can become a burden on the federal government in terms of financial support, as well as a drain on the provinces through their various social programs and health care resources.

It is our opinion that this recommendation has been made by the Committee without a clear understanding of the impact it will have on both the processing times of applications and the monetary and resource costs it will incur.

We therefore voice our opposition to Recommendation 1 of the Report.

Similarly, we have significant concerns with recommendation 2:

That Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada consider designing the economic and family class programs together, recognizing that the characteristics of the two streams are interdependent.[7]

The committee did not hear enough evidence to support such a recommendation. Furthermore, the main Report includes numerous recommendations for the collection of data on the economic impact of different family class immigration streams and it would be inappropriate to make such a recommendation until that data is available.

We therefore voice our opposition to Recommendation 2 of the Report.

Processing Times and Backlogs

In our current system, the processing wait times for parents and grandparents are excessive. As the Metro Toronto Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic noted in their written submission, “the processing time for PGP (Parent and Grandparent) applicants is unconscionably long.”[8] This point of view was supported by many witnesses, including Anila Lee, the Chief Executive Office of the Centre for Newcomers, who told the committee: “the processing time is anywhere between three to five years in length, which is really quite an excessive amount of time in terms of wanting to have your family unified.”[9]

Given these excessive wait times for family reunification, we recommend:

1. That IRCC prioritize keeping the backlog in family reunification low by maintaining prudent caps on the number of applications for family reunification they accept each year.

Client Service: Increasing Transparency

Due to the backlog, the low quality of communication, and the lack of transparency, immigration applicants often have no other recourse but to use Access to Information and Privacy (ATIP) requests in order to obtain information on the status of their application. According to the Canada Spousal Sponsorship Petitioners, roughly half of all ATIP requests filed by Canadians relate to immigration inquiries. This percentage has grown under the current Liberal government.[10] 

Ms. Martin commented that many participants in her study called IRCC a “black hole.”[11] Applicants are turning to ATIP requests because they are not receiving the appropriate information about the status of their application.

Given this egregious waste of time and government resources, we recommend:

2. That IRCC improve the IRCC portal in order to include detailed information on the status of applications in order to reduce unnecessary confusion, decrease the need for applicants to contact the department or to file ATIP requests, and eventually phase out the need to ATIP one’s own application.

Spouses and Partners: Limiting Marriages of Convenience

Although there are legal mechanisms in place to enforce the provision that fraudulent marriages are grounds for being denied entry for the purpose of immigration, it is evident from the testimony that IRCC does not have the capacity to enforce these mechanisms. As Vance Langford, of the Canadian Bar Association, testified, “It was clear that there was a lack of resources in the enforcement area, so it wasn’t done. I’ve been involved in reporting cases. We just don’t have the resources to enforce it.”[12]

Given that as the situation stands, the system is prone to abuse due to lack of enforcement, we recommend:

3. That IRCC devote adequate resources to responding to the issue of marriages of convenience in order to protect the integrity of our immigration system.

We must express our concern surrounding Recommendation 17, which proposes that the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations be modified to require the Canadian government to prove that the relationship between the sponsor and the foreign national seeking citizenship is both not genuine and was entered into for the purpose of immigration. This modification changes Section 4(1) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations into a two-step test, and as a result undermines the government’s ability to detect actual cases of marriage fraud.  IRCC officials who confront these issues on the ground continue to view marriage fraud as “a very real problem.”[13] Furthermore, department officials Sharon Chomyn, Mark Giralt and Olivier Jacques, when questioned directly about Article 4 of the Regulations, did not advocate for the recommended changes.[14]

Marriage fraud causes strains on the immigration system, burdens taxpayers with extra costs and is a risk to the financial and physical safety of Canadians. In many cases, Canadian citizens are being victimized by foreign nationals who are seeking to gain citizenship in Canada.[15] Sergio Karas, a specialist in immigration law, stated in Committee that “the financial and personal costs to Canadians or permanent residents who have been duped into entering into relationships of convenience are staggering.”[16] Mr. Karas advocated for a reporting system and enforcement of laws surrounding these marriages. Such testimony points to the need to uphold legislation protecting the integrity of Canada’s immigration system.

We therefore voice our opposition to Recommendation 17 of the Report.

Dependent Children: Adoption and Parent – Child Relationship

We have great concern over recommendation 23 which asks

That Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada consider recognizing broader definitions of parent-child relationship that do not require formal adoption.[17]

The Committee did not have the opportunity to study the effects of such a recommendation in its entirety. Since this is a highly sensitive issue, which touches on questions of abuse through child trafficking, we believe it is essential for the Committee to do a more in-depth study on this topic before making a recommendation. Under current rules and definitions, the rights of the children in question are upheld. Alexandra Hiles,  an IRCC official, stated with respect to adoption that, “officers are committed to preventing the abduction of, sale of, or traffic in children, and all adoption applications are processed with extreme care.”[18] Therefore, it would be irresponsible for the Committee to make this recommendation without further evidence, especially considering that this could open a gap in our system that could lead to increased levels of human-trafficking.

We therefore voice our opposition to Recommendation 23 of the Report.

Similarly we have concerns with recommendation 24, which states

That the Federal Government work with the provinces to review exceptions to the adoption moratoria on countries whose adoption systems are considered unreliable.[19]

This recommendation has been made without a clear understanding of the adoption process and how it connects to Canada’s broader international commitments. Ms. Hiles demonstrated the need for Canada to honor its international commitments in her testimony,

When processing adoption applications, officers also need to ensure that they are meeting Canada's commitment to apply the standards and safeguards of the Hague Convention on inter-country adoption.[20] 

Canada should continue to prioritize the rights of the child and meeting its commitments to international standards. This recommendation was made without prior understanding and evaluation within the Committee of the role of international law with regards to this topic. Therefore, this recommendation ignores international law and requires further study before the Committee can entertain such changes.

We therefore voice our opposition to Recommendation 24 of the Report.

Research: Study of Economic Benefits

We are concerned with the apparent disregard for the provinces and territories in the recommendations included in the main Report. For example, as we heard from Arthur Sweetman, of the Centre for Health Economics and Policy Analysis,

we might not want to be imposing health care and social assistance costs upon provinces. The federal government may want to choose to reimburse provinces for health care and social assistance costs directly associated with the family reunification or the family class program.[21]

This highlights the fact that the effects of immigration are felt across all levels of government. It is therefore imperative that their needs and requests be taken seriously.

We are also cognizant that Canada’s aging population is a serious concern, especially in terms of the long-term sustainability of our social programs. Dr. Sweetman noted,

The parents and grandparents program needs to be considered from a demographic perspective. It goes against the motivation used by this government for other parts of its immigration policy, and we need to be considering immigration policy as a whole.[22]

Taking into account the needs of the provinces, we recommend:  

4. That IRCC maintain the suggested 30/70 ratio preferred by the provinces with regards to immigration levels. This guideline suggests that 30% of immigration be humanitarian/family reunification and that 70% be based on economic immigration.

CONCLUSION

The Conservative Party of Canada submits this supplementary report with the objective that the pressing issues raised in the family reunification study will be adequately examined before unsubstantiated recommendations are instituted into Canadian immigration practices. In short, the Committee’s Report on Family Reunification lacks data-driven policy recommendations and relies on vague anecdotal evidence on an overly broad range of topics.

The critiques and recommendations put forward in this supplementary report will serve to bolster our family reunification programs and re-build trust in our immigration system, both for Canadians and applicants who have become disillusioned and frustrated with the backlogs and the lack of transparency. Furthermore, this report highlights the areas where the government must conduct actual financial analysis if it does not want to lead the federal and provincial governments further into debt. Without the modifications proposed herein, the government’s Report on Family Reunification proposes irresponsible policy changes that will lead to an increased financial burden on taxpayers, a ballooning of the application backlog and an undermining of the regulations that ensure the integrity of our immigration system. 

List of Recommendations

1. That IRCC prioritize keeping the backlog in family reunification low by maintaining prudent caps on the number of applications for family reunification they accept each year.<

2. That IRCC improve the IRCC portal in order to include detailed information on the status of applications in order to reduce unnecessary confusion, decrease the need for applicants to contact the department or to file ATIP requests, and eventually phase out the need to ATIP one’s own application.

3. That IRCC devote adequate resources to responding to the issue of marriages of convenience in order to protect the integrity of our immigration system.

4. That IRCC maintain the suggested 30/70 ratio preferred by the provinces with regards to immigration levels. This guideline suggests that 30% of immigration be humanitarian/family reunification and that 70% be based on economic immigration.