EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Thursday, May 11, 1995

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[English]

The Chair: Good morning. We'll wait until we have a quorum in order to report on the report of the steering committee. We'll go on with our witnesses.

I'd like to welcome again Ms Sunera Thobani, from the National Action Committee on the Status of Women, and also Amy Go. When you're ready, you can begin.

Ms Thobani, please.

Ms Sunera Thobani (President, National Action Committee on the Status of Women): I'd like to begin by apologizing for being late. I'm sorry. We just came in from Toronto this morning.

I'd also like to begin by thanking the standing committee for giving us this opportunity to make our presentation. We would like to ask to submit a written brief later on. We'll just make an oral presentation here, but we would like to submit a written brief some time soon.

The Chair: You may do that any time.

Ms Thobani: Thank you.

The National Action Committee on the Status of Women is an umbrella organization. We represent over 600 women's groups from across the country. The membership of NAC includes organizations of immigrant and refugee women, as well as organizations that serve the needs of immigrant and refugee women. We therefore represent the interests of immigrant and refugee women in our organization in a very direct manner.

The NAC has worked on the issue of gender-based persecution for a number of years now. We lobbied for the introduction of the immigration and refugee board guidelines, which were introduced in 1993. At that time, NAC had adopted the cases of 14 women who were being deported and had called upon then Immigration Minister Valcourt to rescind their deportation orders.

The NAC has a long history of working very hard to make the links between violence against women and the form that gender-based persecution takes of women and the centrality of violence to that persecution. The United Nations High Commission for Refugees has estimated that there are over 20 million refugees in the world today. The figures within the international women's movement are much higher than that.

Even if we accept the 20 million figure, 80% of them are women and children, yet out of the refugees who are accepted in Canada, over half are men. Clearly there's a deep gender barrier that exists at all levels of the system, which works against providing women refugees and the children with what they desperately need.

For two decades now NAC has been calling upon the Canadian government to recognize the link that exists between women's inequality and violence against women. Violence against women is one of the ways in which women are kept subjugated in our society, and the relations of male dominance are perpetuated.

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As a result of the work of the international women's movement, this link between violence against women and women's inequality was recognized at the United Nations human rights conference in Vienna, and violence against women was defined as a violation of women's human rights. The United Nations clearly recognizes this link and, in its declaration on the elimination of violence against women, it states that violence against women constitutes a violation of the rights and fundamental freedoms of women, impairs or nullifies their enjoyment of these rights and freedoms, and they are concerned about the long-standing failure to protect and promote these rights and freedoms in the cause of violence against women.

The declaration goes on to say that violence against women is a manifestation of historically unequal power relations between men and women, which have led to domination over and discrimination against women by men, to the prevention of the full advancement of women, and that violence against women is one of the crucial social mechanisms by which women are forced into a subordinate position compared with men.

The United Nations resolution goes on to state its concern that some groups of women are especially vulnerable to violence, such as women belonging to minority groups, indigenous women, refugee women, migrant women, women living in rural or remote communities, destitute women, women in institutions or in detention, female children, women with disabilities, elderly women, and women in situations of armed conflict. The United Nations calls upon states to condemn this violence against women and to take steps, at both the national and international levels, to eliminate this violence against women.

For us in Canada, and for NAC, it has been a matter of great pride that Canada has been the first country in the world to recognize the gender-based persecution of women, to recognize violence against women as being central to this persecution, and to introduce the now famous immigrant and refugee board guidelines.

These guidelines have, however, come under sharp criticism in the current growing anti-immigrant climate in this country. The two main arguments that are made against the guidelines are that Canada's borders will be flooded with refugee women in the millions and that the guidelines impose western values on other cultures. None of these arguments is true in NAC's opinion.

The first one amounts to nothing short of fear mongering. The guidelines have now been in operation for two years, and we have seen no significant increase in refugee applications, or intake. What we have seen, however, is something that we commend, and that is the move towards treating women refugees equitably.

As for the second argument, the oppression of women and the persecution of women are a function of the unequal power relations between men and women. To condone this oppression, in the name of culture, is to strengthen the structures that maintain women's inequality. In every country today there are women's organizations standing up for the rights of women in their communities, and it is the protection of these rights that Canada should support above every other consideration.

In terms of the mandate of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, NAC calls for the following.

One is that the immigration and refugee board guidelines should be strengthened by being enshrined in legislation. Adequate training and monitoring mechanisms need to be established immediately in order to track the effectiveness of these guidelines.

Our second recommendation, bearing in mind that the guidelines need to be strengthened, is that visa officers abroad should nevertheless apply the guidelines on gender-based persecution to the selection of refugees abroad.

The third recommendation, which is where a lot of NAC's work is focused, calls for an immediate halt of deportations of women in Canada who are victims of violence and claiming the right to stay in Canada on the basis of gender persecution. Applications by women, who are victims of violence, for consideration to remain in Canada should be considered as eligible on humanitarian and compassionate grounds.

Furthermore, we would like to call on this committee to recognize that the imposition of the $10,000 sponsorship bond, announced by Immigration Minister Marchi, will have a drastic impact on the lives of women who are sponsored by their relatives and who are victims of violence. As the majority of sponsored relatives are women and their children, this sponsorship bond will have the impact -

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Ms Clancy (Halifax): On a point of order, Madam Chair. I'm sorry, but I really have to comment, Ms Thobani.

As you know, the statement was a misquote. Mr. Marchi has stated that the question of sponsorship sureties is still under discussion. It really is not quite fair to call it a $10,000 sponsorship bond. That decision is not yet made.

The minister is quite sensitive to the point you're making. I would appreciate it if you would acknowledge the fact that the minister did make that statement subsequent to the first erroneous report. Thank you.

The Chair: Would you like to respond, Ms Thobani?

Ms Thobani: Yes. The NAC is going by what we have seen the minister as having been quoted. The NAC organized a press conference on Monday.

Ms Clancy: He did make that subsequent statement.

The Chair: Ms Clancy, Ms Thobani, we can have a question period after.

Ms Thobani: Could I just provide some clarification?

The Chair: Very quickly.

Ms Thobani: I will be very brief. NAC did have a press conference on Monday. We spoke to members of the immigration department, and we were not informed that this was a misquote. We haven't seen anything public around trying to deal with the misquote.

The Chair: Thank you. Please continue.

Ms Thobani: To go back, as the majority of sponsored relatives are women and their children, this sponsorship bond will have the impact of making women more dependent on their families. It will also strengthen the control male sponsors assert over these women, should their sponsorship relation break down.

The potential of abuse and violence against women in this situation is horrendous and will put at risk the lives of many women, as they will be denied access to social programs and services that could provide them with alternatives in moving out of situations of domestic violence.

This bond will take us back to the days when women were indentured to men. The impact of this bond will be to indenture newly sponsored women immigrants to their sponsors.

We would also like to ask this committee to recognize that the head tax of $975, announced by the Liberal government, will act to restrict the number of women who can apply for the right to stay in Canada. The hated head tax is a grim reminder of the abuses immigrants have experienced in the past. It represents a shameful period in Canadian history.

By revising it, not only is the government fostering a climate of anti-immigrant sentiment, but it will also hinder the ability of women who want to escape situations of domestic violence. They will be unable to do so because they will simply not have the money to leave their families and apply for the right to remain in Canada.

The NAC also supports the recommendation by the Metro Chinese and Southeast Asian Legal Clinic that the standing committee ask that the Minister of Immigration develop a set of humanitarian and compassionate review guidelines to deal specifically with women victims of spousal abuse. This new set of guidelines must place the safety of women and children first.

We recommend that the minister seek and consolidate the input of women's organizations, particularly those dealing with victims of violence, in determining the factors that need to be looked at in assessing the degree of vulnerability of an applicant.

These are our recommendations. I'd be happy to take questions from the committee members.

The Chair: Did you want to add anything, Ms Go?

Ms Amy Go (Member, National Action Committee on the Status of Women): Not at this moment.

The Chair: Thank you. We'll begin with Mr. Nunez and have five-minute rounds first.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez (Bourassa): Thank you for your presentation, Ms Thobani. I support your claims. At a time when refugees are widely looked down upon, you are showing a lot of courage by bringing your claims forward to our committee and making this excellent statement.

I also share your concerns regarding some of the points you raised. I would like to know more about the way the immigration head tax will restrict the incoming of women from some particular continents, countries or regions of the world.

[English]

Ms Go: I guess it's very clear that with the recent immigration, the majority of sponsored immigrants are coming from Asian and African countries. As we know, the standards of living in these countries have no comparison now to the North American or the European countries'.

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So first of all, to apply this universally regardless of the context and the economic and political situations of these countries where the sponsored immigrants are coming from would have a severe impact on those countries in particular.

As we have heard through many deputations and from groups that are lobbying against the head tax, this head tax represents years of earnings in certain countries, and months of earnings in others. So it's very important to recognize the discrepancy of this application and the differential impact, particularly on Asian and African countries.

The fees will also affect the refugee women who are applying inland and the women who are applying for humanitarian and compassionate review. As you heard in the brief from the Canadian Council for Refugees, there are women who, even though they meet the guidelines and the eligibility criteria, have been discouraged by the fees and have been deterred by them from getting the rights of landing.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: As to the sponsorship program, as you said, the Minister of Finance announced in his Februrary 28th budget, that bonds will have to be paid. Could you explain how these bonds will seriously hinder the incoming of immigrant or refugee women?

[English]

Ms Go: We are very pleased to hear that this is now an uncertain matter, because -

Ms Clancy: It's not uncertain. Sorry, may I, on a point of order, Madam Chair? I'd be delighted to discuss it with Ms Go later. There is no question that sureties will be called for. That was stated absolutely; they will be called for.

As you are both well aware, immigrants sponsored through the family class have always been required to sign an undertaking. I would hope that no one here is suggesting that immigrants, who are among the best at fulfilling their duty to the state, are unable to and do not fulfil their duty. We know they do.

There is work going on between the department, the minister, the Secretary of State for International Financial Institutions, and various financial institutions as to what particular form of surety can fulfil this desire. This isn't new. The surety side of it is a new development.

Ms Go: Okay.

Ms Clancy: But I would hope, Ms Go and Ms Thobani, that you're not suggesting that immigrants in the past would treat cavalierly their agreements with the government.

Ms Go: No, not at all. I think what we have to look at, if that's the case, is the whole issue of surety. Then look at the causes, the reasons there are sponsorship breakdowns. We must also look at the enforcement side.

I think statistics from Metro Toronto show that 14% of sponsorships break down. Of that 14%, we would have to identify why they are breaking down. Are they for economic reasons? From the experience I have working with immigrant communities, many of them are due to economic hardship, because of layoffs and financial situations. Also, many, many, particularly for sponsored immigrants, are due to abusive relationships.

So I think we need to look at the causes. If there is an issue around enforcement or if there is an issue around abuse, then deal with that, because that's the main cause for sponsorship breakdown. That's the only solution: to eliminate violence, to address the economic hardships, to make sure there is full employment for everybody, including immigrants. That's the way we should go.

On the other hand, to impose further requirements, whether it's in the form of a bond or some other kind of surety, is to discourage the other 86%, to unnecessarily penalized them for the 14% who, due to their own fault or not, have a sponsorship breakdown.

We need to look at those reasons. But look at the impact of surety if the reason for sponsorship breakdown is abusive relationships and this causes immigrant women to have to stay in such relationships.

Look at the sponsors. From their perspective, if they think ``oh my goodness, if the government is going to take away my car, take away something from me - ''

Mr. Nunez: Like a house.

Ms Go: Exactly, or whatever. Then, I think they are going to put more pressure on the immigrant woman to stay in that relationship. Even now, we see many women who are very fearful of reporting because they don't want to jeopardize other family members, whether they are children or their parents.

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At the same time, they are concerned about their own status. They don't understand that once they're landed immigrants, they are landed immigrants. They think that's going to be taken away from them.

I think, for many reasons, we have to look at the imposition of additional surety...or whether it's in the form of bonds...it will have adverse impact on women who are already vulnerable.

The Chair: Thank you. I would just remind the committee that what we are examining today is the gender-based refugee claims.

Mr. Mayfield (Cariboo - Chilcotin): I think I should be able to remember that.

The Chair: I wasn't referring only to you, Mr. Mayfield.

Mr. Mayfield: I appreciate that.

I found the debate over gender-based issues and the guidelines to be frustrating. The political sensitivity around these issues seems to result often in discussion of the guidelines or opposing them as opportunities for being labelled sexist and discriminatory.

It's not my intention to speak in these terms. In my own professional life before entering politics I was involved, at least part of the time, in working with refugees - men, women, children...and families. I can think of a young Vietnamese man who managed to get out the water and end up in Canada. His first concern after that was how to rescue his sister from the refugee camps. It was a great satisfaction not only to see him here but also to have them reunited and begin their lives together.

I'm thinking of a family who managed to escape an extremely tough situation, with their lives under constant threat of death in the chaos after political change in Iran. I was extremely frustrated that the family was never able to get one brother out. Their concern was that he would be returned to Iran and face execution there. He got as far as Turkey, but Canada decided he could come no farther.

These are heart-rending things. My frustration is, when we begin to discuss these issues in terms of gender, race, or nationality...I've been using the figure of 19 million refugees in the world. Today you raised that to 20 million. I'm not arguing with you on that. It may be 20 million.

I'd like to ask you what your views are on equality in this issue. Could you talk a bit about that, please?

Ms Thobani: I'd be happy to do so, but I'd like to begin by pointing out that the 20 million figure is not my figure or NAC's figure. It's the figure used by the United Nations. Within the international women's movement the figure that is used more generally is close to 100 million.

In terms of gender inequality I think every government today, with very few exceptions, recognizes the extent of women's inequality that is embedded in our economic, social, and political structures. The United Nations certainly has made huge strides in the last few years in recognizing this inequality and in calling for the urgent need of governments to take actions to counter this inequality.

I think the inequality of women is a very well-recognized fact by most governments in this country. Government's own departmental studies and analyses document this. It's the case in Canada today that recognition of women's inequality is pretty standard across the board. I don't know whether you would be arguing that there is no gender-based inequality.

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If we live in a world in which this inequality exists at all levels, then government immigration and refugee policy and every other policy have to take into account the reality of this inequality and work to counter it, if we are to have a government that is committed to protecting the rights of women.

Ms Clancy: Hear, hear.

Mr. Mayfield: I'm wondering, as you make that statement, whether you see any legitimacy in the way Canada seeks to offer refuge and comfort. In my estimation it should be to those most desperately in need, to those whose lives are most seriously threatened.

With the figures that you're suggesting, there's certainly lots of room for selection. Do you think it's appropriate for Canada to take into consideration its own social and economic needs as it selects even refugees, as well as immigrants?

Ms Thobani: Not in terms of refugees. I think Canada has international obligations, which it should live up to. Canada prides itself internationally in the world community to be a leader in terms of a humanitarian and compassionate approach. Canada has legal requirements that it has to live up to.

In the case of immigrants, I think study after study documents the contribution that immigration makes to the Canadian economy. This country has been built by immigration. I know of no country in the world today that has been impoverished as a result of immigration. There are in fact many, many countries, Canada being an outstanding example, that have been built by immigrants.

I do think Canada does have obligations to refugees, which it should live up to. In terms of immigrants, I think we're living in a climate right now where, not just in Canada but in most of the Western world, there is an attempt to erode the rights that immigrants and refugees have acquired through hard struggle. There is a move to try to scapegoat immigrants and refugees for economic and social problems in the country. In Canada certainly we're seeing that kind of climate being fostered very strongly right now.

Ms Clancy: Ms Thobani and Ms Go, in spite of my earlier points of order, may I welcome you and say I'm very happy to - you'll have your chance, Osvaldo, just stay calm - welcome you and thank you for your presentation. I look forward to your written brief as well.

I have two questions I wanted to ask. The first is with regard to the figure of women and children refugees worldwide, figures on which I agree with you in both cases. Regarding the broader figure, the worldwide figure of 100 million: would you not agree that probably the major problem for those women with regard to claiming refugee status in Canada or anywhere else is access?

I mean we're not even talking about the remotest possibility of their being able to get to Canada to make a claim before the Immigration and Refugee Board. We're talking about most of them not having the remotest possibility of getting to a Canadian mission abroad and going before a visa officer - Kurdish women, for example, and indeed a number of women in Bosnia and various other places.

The other problem that we very much have to look at is something that everyone admits is a problem but as yet is not really coming up with any solutions or specific steps. I'd ask for your help on this when your written brief comes in.

We know that on the selection process abroad, because of the various criteria, that young males tend to be the refugees of choice, if you will. I would be very interested in the long term in seeing what some of your policy people would say to us about changing that criteria. How could we improve that criteria to improve our ratio of women refugees, the ones who are lucky enough to have this access?

Ms Go: I totally agree with you about the first point that the majority -

Ms Clancy: Don't even get close.

Ms Go: - don't even get close. I think that issue needs to be looked at.

I also agree with your second point that in terms of our selection process abroad, preferential treatment or selection has been granted to the young men.

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To tie that to what I think Mr. Mayfield has just mentioned, unfortunately this is again that issue around economic, social, and political reasons and how we balance them.

Ms Thobani was saying that we have to look at our responsibility on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, not just for economic reasons. Unfortunately, many times when we select, in the absence of strong enforcement and in the absence of clear criteria and guidelines and definitions of what we mean by gender-based, social, or political persecution, very often bad interpretations of economic viability or the chances of their having a better settlement in Canada then get into those assumptions and bases for selection.

I think when we review that we need to look at the fundamental assumptions when we select the refugees abroad. Those issues of economic, social, and political grounds should all be clearly laid out and defined. We can say that, yes, the people who need it most should be selected. Then we can look less at them in terms of adjustment or perceived settlement ability.

The whole issue around changing the criteria is then really how clearly we should define gender-based persecution in terms of looking at the context of where the persecution is coming from. I think we have not been immune to the knowledge and the information that there is a lot of gender-based persecution in war-torn countries, such as systemic rapes or other kinds of blatant violations. Those have to be clearly defined in our guidelines and criteria. I could assure you that NAC would definitely look into this and develop a brief on it.

Ms Clancy: My second question relates to something that you said, Ms Thobani, with regard to removals and gender guidelines of the IRB and FDRCCs and all of the process.

I didn't hear you suggest that we should just accept the claims, but you were referring to a heightened sensitivity and awareness of gender-based discrimination, particularly that gender-based discrimination rooted in domestic violence. Am I correct? It did sound like that, but I knew you didn't mean that. I wanted to give you a chance to say that. Sometimes I feel like that, and I'd like to.

Ms Thobani: We have to recognize the difficulties that are involved in women being able to prove -

Ms Clancy: The burden of proof.

Ms Thobani: That's right. This often tends to work against women in many instances. I think that needs to be addressed as well.

Ms Clancy: Good, thank you very much.

[Translation]

Ms Debien (Laval-East): Good morning, Ms Thobani and Ms Go. Welcome to the committee. At the end of your presentation, you made a number of recommendations and I would like to refer to two of those.

First of all, you suggested that the guidelines be entrenched in the legislation if I understood you correctly. A number of witnesses have told us the opposite. They were saying that since Canada signed the social group clause of the Geneva Convention, it was not necessary to legislate in this matter.

Secondly, you are asking the committee or the Minister to set up guidelines based on humanitarian reasons for women who are victims of violence. What would these guidelines be that the Minister could use when he has to make decisions based on compassionate grounds?

[English]

Ms Thobani: At the moment, these guidelines are discretionary. We feel that we have to put teeth into them; otherwise, they can be used in some instances and not used in many more instances.

In terms of legislating this gender-based persecution and the recognition of that, we feel that's a very important thing. That is what will put teeth into the guidelines right now.

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As you are no doubt aware, they are discretionary. There is no way of tracking how often they're used or how much influence they actually have as they currently exist.

We feel that legislation would make the whole thing real, instead of just giving so much discretionary power to individuals who are not accountable. We have we have no way of tracking whether they're even using the guidelines at all.

Ms Go: I think we have to look at the issue of the application of that whole principle. I think what we have is a very general principle. I think we need to look at how that principle can be implemented. As Sunera says, right now, it goes case by case.

The second question you raised was about the humanitarian and compassionate grounds. Right now, there is no definition of how to assess them. It's up to the individual immigration officer to decide what something may be or may not be. However, because of a lack of training and understanding of violent situations faced potentially by women, that aspect of risk that women are being put into will not get interpreted.

We are suggesting that, in terms of setting up clear guidelines, we have to place the safety of women as the primary concern. Whether they are at risk and how that risk should be defined is not just in terms of the claim itself, but also in terms of the violent situations they are facing when they are being sent back to their countries and to the inside of their own homes.

We're suggesting, in terms of looking at gender-based violence and persecution in a context that includes domestic violence as an assessment in the guidelines for humanitarian and compassionate grounds, that we need to explore more and work out the language.

The key is that, even if we have the guidelines and the built-in criteria, we still need to have training and very clear enforcement for making sure there are evaluations and collections of data and information to build up a better system.

Situations change, so I think we need to constantly review them so that various women in risk situations can be included, not excluded, from those criteria. There are a lot of things that need to be built up, including not just the language of the criteria, but the whole system around implementation.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: If I understood you correctly, you made a recommendation concerning a moratorium for women who are victims of violence. You are aware of the record of this government. Do you believe that your request will be heard?

[English]

Ms Thobani: When we first adopted the 14 cases, the same argument was made. I think it is the responsibility of organizations like NAC to continue lobbying the government to change its practices. Certainly in this particular instance, it is a matter of great urgency for us.

I'd just like to tell you that when NAC adopted those 14 cases, we were flooded by women across the country who wanted NAC to speak on their behalf.

We just do not have the capacity to meet the needs of those women, but it's our responsibility. We will keep on lobbying. We expect support from parties such as yourselves when we make these demands. We expect you to be asking the same questions. We will continue to call upon this government also to recognize the urgency that exists in these women's lives and to stop condemning them to situations in which their lives are threatened.

It's our job to do that. We'll carry on doing that. We'll carry on pushing this government.

Mr. Nunez: Good luck.

Ms Thobani: Thank you.

Mr. Mayfield: I'd like to continue from where we left off before.

Of the refugees who stand waiting for shelter in other parts of the world...I think I understood you to say that Canada should not take into consideration, in looking at this large number of people, its own social and economic needs as it looks at refugees. Is that correct?

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Ms Go: Do you want to finish?

Ms Thobani: Yes, in terms of refugees, Canada has obligations that it should live up to.

Mr. Mayfield: I'm not quibbling with you over that. What I'm having difficulty understanding is that we're only going to be selecting; we only have the capacity for a limited number. Unfortunately, there will be people who will not be coming to Canada.

With that in mind, as we select whatever it is, 20,000 or 25,000 refugees - don't force me to accept those numbers - who in your view should have priority? How should we make our decision?

Ms Thobani: Well, statistics show that women are the largest number of displaced people or refugees in this world. Statistically speaking that should be reflected in the numbers that Canada accepts.

Those who need the protection should be the ones who have the priority. There's no question that women are the ones who, in today's world, require that protection the most, and women should be given priority. The recognition of the gender-based persecution of women will ensure that women do continue to receive this priority when they make their application.

Ms Go: I want to respond to your saying that we're not looking at our social and economic needs when we select refugees.

We're saying that in the face of a lack of analysis showing that immigrants and refugees are a burden on the economy; to the contrary, they are a plus and a contribution to the economy. I think by accepting them we are actually already contributing to the social and economic well-being of this country. So I think it's wrong to think that in our acceptance we are assuming that these people are coming to us and draining our resources, because there are no facts to show that. The facts have shown otherwise.

I think the other question around the priorities is to make sure that the priorities be given to those who are at risk. As you have said, how do we define those risk situations? In our analysis, it is because of the current lack of criteria that take into consideration the gender-based violence, persecution and oppression faced by women, that women are unfairly assessed. Because of their unfair assessment, they are turned down.

What we are trying to say is that we have to balance that. We have to look at those because they are the factors that put people at risk, that displace women, that make them want to flee their countries of origin.

I think this is to exactly respond to what you are saying. We have to look at who should be coming in and who are the most at risk, to challenge our assumptions and to add those criteria to our guidelines.

Mr. Mayfield: I don't want to keep referring to my own personal instances too frequently, but I have great difficulty in thinking of women as being liabilities. As a husband and the father of two daughters, three strong women whom I'm extremely proud of, I don't look at women as liabilities, and I don't look at women immigrants or refugees as liabilities to our country.

But I do look at them through the same eyes as I look at men and children. I think we are human beings together. Whatever your background is, you didn't choose that when you were born any more than I did. So I see ourselves as human beings.

We do struggle and strive to better ourselves and to have the most favourable circumstances for our loved ones and those who are near to us. On that basis, I keep arguing for an equality of opportunity and equality of consideration for men, women, and children - human beings.

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I have to keep coming back to this: can't these priorities be reached without pre-defined gender guidelines?

The Chair: Ms Thobani, very quickly.

Ms Thobani: Yes, very quickly. I agree with you that we are all human beings. But we live in a socio-economic structure that continues to make women unequal. If you don't address that inequality, then you keep perpetuating it. That is the argument we make.

If you do not accept that women are treated differently and unequally in our refugee intake process, then we continue perpetuating that inequality. The guidelines are a measure to counter that inequality in leading us towards a situation in which both men and women will be treated equitably.

Mrs. Terrana (Vancouver East): Good morning and welcome, and thank you very much for being so strong on an argument that always gets to me. I've been in a situation in which I understand exactly where you come from.

Apart from the fact that we talked about strengthening the directives in the legislation, the guidelines, we also heard from some witnesses that we should not reopen the Geneva Convention in order not to get into again a big.... What is your feeling about this? That would be probably the best way to go about it in order to establish some order in the world in the area of refugees.

Ms Thobani: Well, the argument I'm most familiar with for not going ahead with that is that in the current climate we are likely to see a restriction of the definition of refugees rather than an expansion to include gender-based persecution.

I think it's an important point, but Canada certainly is not restricted by what is contained in the United Nations convention. Canada can go further -

Ms Clancy: It has.

Ms Thobani: It has gone further in introducing these guidelines, and it should go further in legislating that recognition. I think Canada can be a world leader -

Ms Clancy: It is.

Ms Thobani: That's right, and it can continue to be so. So Canada certainly is not restricted by that in any way.

Mrs. Terrana: When you talk about the guidelines, some people feel that they are adequate and some don't. What is your feeling about it? How much more should be added to these guidelines, or should they just be imposed on the people who are accepting the refugees, deciding on the refugees?

Ms Go: I want to refer to the submission from the Canadian Council of Refugees. They have clearly identified some gaps in the guidelines, as well as problems with implementation, training, and the lack of enforcement. I think all that should be reviewed. It's not just the guidelines, or the wording, or the gaps that we need to address, not just the language, but the whole area. So as Sunera said, we'll be very happy to submit a more detailed brief that will address those specific issues.

Mrs. Terrana: My other concern has to do with the offices abroad, those people who.... I've had a few complaints from my own country; it does not send any refugees abroad, but still there were concerns about the way all these guidelines were applied.

Ms Clancy: The other countries?

Mrs. Terrana: Yes, the other countries, but it just seems that...anyway, it's a long story.

What is your feeling about the way the countries, the visa officers abroad, apply these gender-based guidelines? Also, how would you solve the problem?

Ms Go: As I have mentioned, the visa officers outside tend not to use those guidelines and very often use the assumptions that are in a way defeating the purpose, principles, and values we are trying to uphold. So I think it is an issue of not just enforcing, but making sure everybody understands that these guidelines have to be enforced.

At the same time, there is the real issue of training and monitoring. How do we make sure that all visa officers get through adequate training and they're accountable to the enforcement of those guidelines?

That's why we need to have very good tracking systems making sure that the cases are adequately reviewed, and then the individual visa officer can be held accountable for that. At the same time we need to look at the monitoring of the whole system and the access for groups to also have access to the information and how we can collectively address these issues.

Mr. Knutson (Elgin - Norfolk): I'd like to ask a fairly brief question. I'm sitting on a subcommittee and we're hearing evidence that women immigrants, provided there's proper settlement training - and that usually means language training - relatively quickly catch up and over their lifetime outperform Canadians in terms of economic contribution to the country.

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Putting the $975 within that context, and the fact that we're giving it a loan, isn't the issue of their income in their home country irrelevant, given that when they come here they can do well and easily afford the $975?

Ms Go: I would agree that refugee and immigrant women do strive for best in terms of economic and social contribution. But I think we also need to look at the context. When they come in they are also facing systemic barriers and very often they are kept in low paying jobs, in jobs where they are most vulnerable to being laid off. You know, they are the first to go when there are plant closures and similar situations.

I agree that refugee and immigrant women are trying their best. At the same time, I don't necessarily agree they are economically better off in many situations. To the contrary, in terms of economic hardship, they need their families most for support and all that. In those situations, those are the ones who will not be able to afford to bring in their families for their support, to establish their employment, to re-establish their careers, to seek other training opportunities, etc.

I think we have to recognize that those opportunities will also be affected. Those opportunities, when taken away, affect their contribution and their political, economic, and social participation in Canada. So I think we need to look at it not just in the context of individual affordability but also in the context of when we take away that opportunity we are hurting ourselves collectively.

The Chair: Ms Thobani, would you like to add anything?

Ms Thobani: No, that's fine, thanks.

The Chair: Thank you very much. We'll look forward to your written brief, and we look forward to your other presentations in the future before this committee.

Ms Thobani: Thank you.

Ms Go: Thank you.

The Chair: Before we invite our next witnesses, members, because we have quorum I would like to have an agreement on the 12th report of the steering committee, of which you've all received a copy. Is it the wish of the committee to adopt the report?

Mr. Knutson: May I make one suggestion?

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. Knutson: On the schedule for the gender, my sense is there's not a lot of contention on this issue. I think I'd like us to shoot at trying to get it done in two meetings.

The Chair: Could we dispense with the motion? Do I have agreement? Once we've agreed on the 12th report of the steering committee, then we can go to your point.

Yes, Mr. Nunez.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: We should leave the 12th report until the end so we have a chance to look at it.

The Chair: We discussed that the other day, Mr. Nunez.

Mr. Nunez: Not all committee members were there, and we've just received it. Ms Debien wasn't there. With respect to the first paragraph concerning Mr. Jean-Guy Fleury, I will abstain. I cannot recommend his appointment.

[English]

The Chair: What happens then? He is abstaining.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez said that he would abstain from voting on Mr. Jean-Guy Fleury' nomination, if I understood him correctly.

Mr. Nunez: Yes.

[English]

Mr. Knutson: I'll withdraw my comments if you need to get it passed now. That's fine.

The Chair: I'll call for the vote, then, if that's the case.

Mr. Mayfield: I would prefer to leave it until next week, if it's all right with you.

The Chair: I would prefer to deal with it now. I think we've discussed it in the steering committee. You were present, Mr. Mayfield, at the steering committee meeting.

Mr. Mayfield: I was indeed, and I asked to have it done, too.

The Chair: Yes, thank you. I'd rather dispense with it, if you don't mind. So we'll vote then. Can I have a show of hands of those who are for the reporting?

Motion agreed to.

Ms Clancy: Is that it? I apologize, Madam Chair, but I have to go now to a university convocation.

The Chair: Would the witnesses from the Inter-Church Committee for Refugees please come forward?

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I'd like to welcome to the committee Ms Elsa Tesfay Musa, who is the Refugee and Emergency Relief Coordinator, Primate's Fund of the Anglican Church of Canada; Ms Heather Macdonald, Program Officer, Refugees, Immigration and Race Relations, Division of Mission in Canada, United Church of Canada; and Dr. Nancy Pocock, Quaker Committee for Refugees.

Welcome. We will begin when you are ready.

Since you have submitted a written brief, perhaps you would keep your comments short in order to allow more time for questions and answers. Who will begin?

Ms Heather Macdonald (Member, Inter-Church Committee for Refugees): I'll begin. My colleagues will introduce themselves and their background as we go along.

First, I want to explain very briefly what the Inter-Church Committee for Refugees is. We are a group of 10 national churches representing parishes, congregations, and meeting groups across the country. Hundreds and thousands of people in our constituency are very concerned for the cases of refugees resettled from abroad and the inland claims.

The reason we're involved in this work is basically our religious tradition. We believe in working for and with the people who need protection. Our respective churches have decades of experience, probably going back to the 1910s, working through to the boat trains, and then, since 1979 with refugees, as we have come to understand them.

We are informed by our members who are working in their own localities, who have been very deeply involved in resettlement, that with the changes in the determination system they are now very involved in working with people who are trying to get their status resolved in Canada. As a result, we are kept well informed by people in the field. We also do some national work on Canadian policies and are linked with churches and other NGOs throughout the world. We are representing the local, the national, and the international perspectives.

We come here today to talk about how we do our work. My own background is primarily with resettlement. I was involved in sponsorship; I worked in settlement agencies; I was a volunteer in my own church for over two decades.

In the course of that work, I came to know some women particularly well. I want to share the story of one of them with you today.

At the time of her entry she came under the Women at Risk Program. I used to laugh with her that it was very lucky for her she got here. As we looked after her resettlement in Canada, Justine and I would go through the fact that she was a single mother, she was disabled, she was black. She had every strike against her in our country, and it was amazing she was even selected to come in under the program.

Today, the same Justine is an executive officer of Disabled Peoples International, touring the world and setting up opportunities for disabled women. You can say that Justine was an exception. She probably would never qualify for the travel loan today. She would probably never qualify for the landing fee loan. She was an exception because we made an exception. I think that is the whole point in this issue. The women at risk, if you give them an opportunity, have much to contribute to Canada.

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We are very pleased with the guidelines. We welcome the opportunity to talk about them. But what we need to see is their implementation both within Canada and within the overseas selection program. I think Elsa would like to talk about that program with you now.

Ms Elsa Tesfay Musa (Member, Inter-Church Committee for Refugees): My job with the Anglican Church of Canada requires extensive travel overseas to visit refugee camps. I have just returned from one such visit to a refugee camp in Kenya, in Ethiopia, and in Tanzania for Rwandees and Sudanese and Somali refugees. It gives me opportunities to meet with refugees, to talk with them, but also to visit the Canadian visa offices there and discuss some resettlement concerns that we have.

I would like, therefore, to focus on the section of our brief that deals with the overseas selection process. The overseas section of the brief highlights three areas of concern we share. These are the need for consistency in the refugee policy; the obstacles refugee women face; and the importance of maintaining a humanitarian focus in the refugee process. The brief highlights inconsistencies between the inland and the overseas process. One such example is the importance given to the RIB guidelines here in the inland process whereby RIB members are required to put in writing reasons for not complying with the guidelines, while overseas visa officers are not under similar obligations.

Another point made is the lack of access to counsel, legal aid, and adequate documentation of the status of refugee women in the overseas selection process.

With regard to the RIB guidelines, while we applaud the issuing of the guidelines as a step in the right direction, the Inter-Church Committee for Refugees brief points out that there are various obstacles refugee women have to overcome before they can even benefit from the guidelines.

We note the difficulties regarding access to the Canadian visa offices, which are usually in the capital cities, two or three days by car away from the refugee camps; the requirement to meet the successful establishment criteria that are clearly gender biased and do not take into consideration the skills and experience refugee women bring.

The overseas section of the brief has several recommendations that ask for programmatic integrity to ensure consistency in the inland and overseas process and calls for a clear and complete separation between the refugee and immigration process to ensure the humanitarian focus of all our programs.

I'd like to now give a chance to Dr. Pocock.

Dr. Nancy Pocock (Member, Inter-Church Committee for Refugees): I work mainly with refugees here. I do settlement work and counselling. There's a lot to be done, because I'm finding recently more and more difficulty for the people who are applying in Canada for refugee status. There's been quite a difference in the attitude of the immigration department. They've made it more difficult and, finally, imposed this huge tax of $975.

If you're a refugee who has had to flee without planning - just get up and go - usually you spend all the money you have. Sometimes you don't have money, but by the time you get to Canada you have very little and have to start from the very bottom and build up some kind of life.

If you go through the board and are accepted, you suddenly find that to get your status you have to first pay $500, then on top of that $975. It's impossible for each person. It is not per family; it is for each person. There are women here who have escaped and managed to get to get to Canada, managed to become landed immigrants, and they're not able to get their status because they haven't got the money. Perhaps they have a husband and children. I know several whose husbands are there. I know women with small children here who can't possibly work, and they're trying to bring in their husbands and other children.

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This tax makes it absolutely impossible. It means the woman herself does not get the final papers for her landed immigrant status, and this means she couldn't take certain jobs because people aren't interested in somebody who is not permanently in Canada. She can't take certain courses, because she's excluded unless she has her final papers.

This is very difficult, more difficult for women than men, because often they have small children and are not able to work and usually they're not trained. They haven't worked at home. They haven't had an opportuntiy to go out into the world. I have worked with quite a few Sri Lankan women, and they have no status at home. They're looked after by their oldest male relative.

One of the Sri Lankan women I worked with, after she got here her husband died before he had gone through the whole thing. He hadn't signed the final papers to sponsor her and her two children. He was dying and I managed to put some pressure on the people overseas to get her sent here before all the details were gone over. She is here; she's been here for four years. She has done very well; she's been working. The children are doing very well at school, and they were able to see their father before he died. He had never seen the younger child and was longing to see that child before he died. I was able to pressure the overseas people and get her here. Now they say she should go back because she hasn't got the final -

The Chairman: Dr. Pocock, I have ruled in the past that we will not discuss individual cases or name individual members. I'd like us to stick to the reason you are here, which is the examination of the gender-based refugee claims, instead of the overall portrait of what the problems of refugees are in coming and leaving and their access and so forth. I'd really like you to focus because we do have the written brief. The comments you're making today are in your brief, so could we stick basically to your opinions on the guidelines and what improvements we can see in the future?

Dr. Pocock: I think the guidelines are excellent. I don't think they're always lived up to by the board or the lawyers. Also, I think women have so much against them that when they go into a hearing they are very traumatized. It is very difficult. I've gone to hearings with several people and I know how difficult it is for them. They come to a room - usually the board is raised above the people - and they feel very insecure and very frightened. At the hearing I went to the other day, they did have the board sitting on the same level as the claimant, but that's the first time I've seen that. I don't know whether it's in all the hearing rooms or not, but it was in that one. It made a difference, because the women don't feel they are before a court with a judge sitting there.

I think the guidelines are excellent, as I say. I think the people who are handling the cases need more training and some more compassion and understanding. Canada prides itself on being compassionate, but I must say it's getting harder and harder to find compassion in our system.

The Chairman: Would you like to add anything, Ms Macdonald or Ms Musa?

A witness: That's fine, thank you.

The Chairman: Thank you very much. I'll begin five-minute rounds with Mr. Nunez.

Mr. Nunez: Thank you for your excellent presentation, for your brief and your recommendations. I am happy the Canadian churches are represented by three women here today.

[Translation]

You have done some excellent work, and you have shown a tremendous commitment towards refugees.

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You have also greatly contributed to the development of refugee policies in Canada. I share your feelings, your concerns, as well as your fears with respect to the immigration tax.

Yours is the first brief we have received which provides a bit of an in-depth analysis of the Women at Risk program. You were involved in reviewing that program. You have helped women at risk. What is your assessment of that program? Others have been critical of it.

[English]

Ms Macdonald: I think it is an excellent program. I'm very concerned about the few women who have actually been able to benefit from the program. I've had church groups waiting to sponsor women at risk for years and no names have come forward. I've had UNHCR officials contact me with individuals they've deemed suitable for that program, which Canada will not pick up. I referred them to other countries because they were in too much danger to wait around.

The program is good. For the women I've personally known who have come through it, you couldn't size them up by saying what their financial contribution has been, but they have made such a contribution in the few short years they've been in Canada, I'm frankly amazed. But I think that program needs to be used.

Ms Musa: I think I would add that there are a number of major problems we've seen in the program. One is the delay. If it is meant to provide protection for women who are in need, it takes too long for women to come here.

The second is the use of the successful establishment criterion. Even women who come through Women at Risk are seen through that criterion. They have to prove to the visa officer that they can successfully establish themselves in Canada.

The third is the recent imposition of the $975 fee, plus a number of other laws saying they have to take their medical tests and so forth. These are women who are not able to come up with such a huge amount of money and it puts them again at further risk.

There has been a review of the program, in which the Inter-Church Committee for Refugees and the Canadian Council for Refugees participated, but we have yet to see any recommendations coming out of that program.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: On page 2 of your brief, you point to a contradiction in Canada's refugee policy. While Canada, according to your paragraph number 6, is not obligated under international law to select refugees from abroad, it seems that we are sparing no effort, as you so rightly point out, to discourage anyone from coming here and submitting an inland claim. I wonder if you could tell us how you are experiencing this contradiction with respect to the refugees your church is sponsoring in Toronto or other Canadian cities.

[English]

Ms Musa: The one I was referring to also in paragraph 8 is the contradiction between the inland process here in Canada and the overseas process.

Refugees who arrive in Canada only have to prove they have a claim to be accepted as conventional refugees. But refugees who apply for resettlement to Canada through the overseas visa section also have to prove they can successfully establish themselves. Now a person who arrives here could have the same kind of background as a person who applies from overseas, but a person who arrives here has a better chance of being accepted than one who applies from overseas.

We keep referring to the successful establishment criterion. It doesn't just apply to women; it applies to men too, but it affects women disproportionately because the criteria that are being used are language skills, knowledge of either French or English, background in education, skills training, having worked outside the home. These are the things that most of the refugee women in the camps would not have, not because they're not capable of doing it, but because they have not been given the opportunities in their home countries. We feel it puts them at a great disadvantage. more so than someone who comes directly here and who doesn't have to prove that.

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Mr. Mayfield: Good morning to you.

In looking at your brief, in the section on overseas selection it goes on at some length about the problems with access to foreign Canadian visa posts. From your experience do you feel this lack of access is really hurtful to those most in need?

Ms Musa: Yes, it is. I can actually cite an example. I've just recently returned from a trip to Kenya. Now in Kenya, the Kenyan government does not allow refugees to live outside the refugee camps. All refugees are expected to live in the refugee camps. Most of these refugee camps are several days away from the city.

The Canadian visa officers do not travel to the camps, unlike the U.S. visa officers. U.S. immigration officers travel to the refugee camps to do interviews. Canadian visa officers do not travel. Refugees are expected to come to Nairobi for interviews.

As we know, most women would not have the financial capacity to undertake such extensive travel or have someone look after their kids, or even be allowed to leave the camps, whereas men would find it much easier to come to Nairobi for such an interview. We have to see it from the society in which they are living and how they have more opportunities to be mobile, whereas the women would not. So that puts the women, again, at a disadvantage.

One way of addressing this would be for the Canadian visa officers to make regular trips to the camps to conduct interviews.

Mr. Mayfield: Has this been a change in policy? If my memory serves me correctly, there was a day on which Canadian visa people went into the camps. Is that not correct?

Ms Musa: It's not a regular process. When I asked this of the visa officers in Kenya, they said it would be only the exception. If, for example, they happen to have visitors from Canada and they need to take the visitors into the camps, then they would take that opportunity to interview people in the camp. But on a regular basis they would not go into the camps, because when we look at the number of refugees who are allowed to come in from Africa - if we take Africa as an example - it's only 650 refugees who come in through the government's process program. The visa officers and Canadian embassy do not feel it's economically wise to be travelling into the camps, which is quite expensive, to interview very few numbers of refugees.

So in instances in other parts of the world and in very few parts of the world where there are greater numbers of refugees coming these officers might travel, but that's not part of their regular work. This is just an exception, it's not the rule.

Mr. Mayfield: Do you feel that our refugees, in the circumstances you're suggesting, would benefit from a reallocation of Canadian resources to facilitate more from the inland claims to the overseas claims? Is that what you're suggesting?

Ms Musa: I wouldn't say more from the inland to the overseas, I would just say -

Mr. Mayfield: I think that's what I intended to say if I didn't say it.

Ms Musa: - hiring more visa officers so that it's at least making it part of their regular work to visit these camps. Those existing officers who are already there, if they are expected to visit the camps on a regular basis, they would do that.

Mr. Mayfield: I will move on a little in your report. In section B on pages 6 and 7, you make a number of recommendations. For example, in number 3 you recommend performing medical checks upon arrival in Canada rather than before the actual departure from the homeland. Would this apply only to Women at Risk applicants or are you suggesting a broad change?

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Ms Musa: No, at this point we're suggesting it to apply only to Women at Risk applicants.

Mr. Mayfield: Do you not think this would inflate the cost of our refugee program and also offer a potential threat to the health of Canadians in doing this? Is having the medical checks overseas, in a sense, not some precaution for our own health in this country?

Ms Musa: Millions of people come to Canada as tourists and on business travel. They can bring all sorts of diseases into Canada. They don't have to go through any medical checks. Refugees are a very small minority and, therefore, I don't feel they pose a much higher threat than those who already come visiting to Canada. I don't see it that way.

Mr. Mayfield: With that response, are you suggesting that we should be looking at the medical needs of people and bringing them to this country to treat them?

Ms Musa: It's not a matter of treating people for medical needs. The kind of tests that they are required to undertake is to see that they don't have communicable diseases such as TB. Overseas, if they are found to have TB, then they would be given a certain time to go through medication and to get better before they would be allowed to come here. Once they arrive, we would have the same process. There are people here in Canada who have TB. It's not a disease that's been wiped out, and we could have the checks and they could go through the same process here.

We are asking that this be done only for women at risk, because these are women who if they stay longer in those camps will be in danger. They could even die. For example, a woman who comes up and says, I am a woman at risk, or has been identified as a woman at risk by UNHCR, puts herself at an even more risk by acknowledging that she is at risk. She is at risk in the camps, at risk from fellow refugees, at risk from bandits around, and by having referred to herself as being at risk, she's even more at risk.

The medical checks and all the other processes take a long time and that puts her more at risk. So we're saying if we want to save the life of this person, we had better bring them in a month or two months; the maximum would be three months, and the medical checks take much longer than that.

Mr. Mayfield: Madam Chairman, I'm sorry. I have to leave the meeting now.

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Mayfield: I regret that and thank the witnesses and apologize for not being able to stay.

The Chair: Thank you for your presence.

Mrs. Terrana: Good morning. Thank you for being here and for the work you are doing. I know we had a few presentations on the part of the group. In my past I was also a part of something like that, even if I wasn't as involved as you are.

First of all, I have to apologize. I did not get the brief for some reason and I didn't read it. Also, I want to say that my riding is Vancouver East; 45% are new immigrants. There are a lot of refugees, and in my office I have one person who just looks after immigration; she's an expert. We're really becoming experts in these matters. So I know what the problems are.

Of course, this is an area that is really very difficult, because as you say, women are at risk in many ways. There are some presentations that we've heard, yours too, and there seems to be inconsistencies in the way IRB applies these guidelines.

You keep saying that they are very good guidelines. I'm glad you say that, because that's what we heard from other people. What can be done to get this situation in order, at least in Canada? Do you have any idea?

Ms MacDonald: I think what would help a lot would be the atmosphere in the hearing room. For the women who come forward who qualify for the gender guidelines, to even think of themselves as a person from their traditional communities is difficult. To talk about the reason they're qualifying under this is far more difficult. So that the video testimony, a reduced fear in sort of courtroom approach, improved documentation on the situation in their home country, so the full burden does not fall upon their personal testimony....

It's a very traumatic thing for these women. It would be for me, and my background is different. The women I've known in the hearing are very frightened of what they're about to go through.

Mrs. Terrana: Would women at risk be less frightened if there was a woman giving them a hearing, for instance?

Ms MacDonald: Definitely.

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Dr. Pocock: I think there should be more training for the board members on what kind of background these women come from. It's hard for a Canadian who's raised in Canada to realize the difficulties these women exist under. It's also hard for the woman to get up and say what she feels and what she feels she should have.

The Chair: Exactly.

Ms Musa: We know the guidelines are good, but they're not excellent. They need to be improved, based on the experiences and the learnings over the last couple of years. The other thing is the guidelines are not binding, so they are entirely dependent on how good the IRB person is who is using them. So it's not only training but getting the right kinds of persons.

Mrs. Terrana: So are you advocating the same as the NAC representatives, that these guidelines be introduced in the legislation?

Ms Musa: We don't even have to do them as guidelines. I was listening to the NAC person, and I agree with them; for us to be asking for the Geneva Convention to be changed to include gender at this time would not be wise. I wish we could do that, but I don't think the atmosphere is right.

But we have our own legislation, and what we could do is include gender in that. The guidelines are much broader there. They have details of what gender persecution would include. Those need to be expanded every day, based on experience. If we even just include gender persecution, that would be something.

Mrs. Terrana: My other question has to do with flexibility. I know there's been a lot of concern about the landing fee, and I have been speaking on your behalf, or at least on behalf of people in groups like yours, who are going to have severe problems in paying this tax.

You are advocating in one of your recommendations that we get rid of the landing fee for all refugees. Would you consider a little more flexibility in the application of this?

I agree with groups like yours; when there is a sponsorship from a private organization, we should look at that. What about the other people - those who come to Canada and can work while they are refugees? Could we have maybe a little more flexibility in the adoption of this landing fee - give them time to pay back the loan or something like that?

Ms Musa: Our first preference would be that there be no fee, because it's a humanitarian program and therefore we should not be expecting someone to pay for this service. It's an obligation.

If we absolutely must have the fee, yes, we need to be flexible. Our concern is if it's left up to the individual person assessing the loan criteria to be flexible, what guarantee is there?

I was reading a recent article about an Algerian man, I think, who was the first person refused the landing fee. What was interesting about that was he was refused because he hadn't been working in Canada, but the other major point for his refusal was that his wife, whom he wanted to bring from Algeria, had never worked. He was given that as another major reason. For me that creates a lot of problems. It disadvantages women more than men.

I would say let's get rid of it. If we have to use it and if we are going to be flexible, let's have ways of monitoring it so it's not left up to the individual person. If there are laws to be given, then there has to be flexibility about repayment of interest-free loans, with a much longer term.

It's a huge burden, because it's not just the $975. If you add the $500 and the various other fees, it can come to over $2,300 for those just in Canada. That's a huge burden to take when one has just arrived in this country.

Mrs. Terrana: I have one last brief question.

The Chair: I'm sorry, Ms Terrana. You'll have to come back. We have time.

Madame Debien.

[Translation]

Mrs. Debien: Welcome, Doctor Pocock, Ms. Musa and Ms. Macdonald. On page 6 of your brief, paragraph 21, you mention the Women at Risk Program and the streams that these women fall into, stream A or stream B. You give a thorough description of each of these. Stream A is for those who are victims of fundamental human rights violations, while stream B is for women who are disadvantaged because of sexist attitudes in general.

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You also mentioned the Joint Assistance Program. Forgive my ignorance, but I wonder if you could tell us a bit about this Joint Assistance Program which you are advocating in place of the Women at Risk Program. I wonder why you prefer one over the other.

Then, at the very end of that paragraph, you suggest that priority should be given to those women who fall into stream A, that is women whose fundamental rights have been violated, as opposed to those in stream B, whose claims are mainly gender based. I don't quite follow.

In that paragraph, you deal with many aspects of the Women at Risk Program. I wonder if you could elaborate on what you are recommending with respect to each of those streams as well as the joint assistance program.

[English]

The Chair: Would you care for clarification, Ms Musa?

Ms Musa: I was waiting for her translation to end.

Thank you very much. I can see that it is not very clear and -

Mrs. Debien: No.

Ms Musa: We were also trying to keep the brief as short as possible, to make sure that it's read. So we are glad to have this opportunity to explain what we are really trying to say in paragraph 21.

Regarding the Women at Risk Program, women come through that program through two streams. There are those women we have put as stream A, who are survivors of torture, who also are at extreme physical risk and therefore need to be taken out of that situation immediately. Then there are those in stream B, who have been in refugee camps for several years, who resettlement countries have overlooked because resettlement countries most of the time take men, younger people, those who are assumed to be able to resettle better. So they are overlooked because they have children, and so forth. These fall under stream B. Since they can't return home, life in the refugee camp for over 10 years is no life, and therefore they need to come. Those are the two streams.

Now the refugees, the women at risk who come from either stream A or stream B, come through what is called the Joint Assistance Program. If they come as a government-resettled refugee, then the government provides the financial support, while churches and NGOs will provide other kinds of support to the refugees - they will be available to show them around and to provide moral support to them. That is what we mean by the Joint Assistance Program.

We are saying, give priority to stream A because in stream A, if you don't take them out immediately, they are in danger of being killed. Therefore we are saying, if we are looking at numbers who are coming and if we want to bring these women immediately to Canada, then let's get those in stream A here right away.

In stream B, they have waited for ten years. They can wait for another year and come through other processes. I hope that is clear.

The Chair: Mr. Nunez.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: On page 8 of your brief, paragraph 26, you mention the lack of documentation regarding the human rights situation, especially with respect to women. This lack of information continues to be an obstacle to protecting women, and you make a recommendation in that regard.

This is the first time that this has been raised in the course of our work on this issue over the last few weeks. You recommend that more research be done on women who are persecuted or who fear persecution because of their gender. What type of research could be done in order to help in getting these women admitted into Canada?

[English]

Ms MacDonald: Some of the research, I think, is necessary, such as the research on the customs of the country the woman has fled and the roles she had as a woman in her family and in society. Many people in Canada have difficulty understanding the gender bias within our own country...will have further difficulty and deny its existence in the refugee-producing country.

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That would be some of the key documentation when we have women coming forward on cases of dress code, or the mere fact that they want to pursue an education. There is a case of one woman who is trying to retrieve her daughter because of genital mutilation in her home country. These are the circumstances that have to become clear.

Ms Musa: I want to stress the importance of documentation again, because the members rely heavily on this this. We have to make sure that we have not only the best documentation available, but the most up to date.

Things change so frequently that sometimes by the time documentation is available, there will be one more country or one more instance in which gender persecution is happening, of which we are not aware. We are saying, therefore, let's strengthen the capacity. Let's not just do more research, but let's strengthen the capacity to do the research too.

Mr. Assadourian (Don Valley North): I would like to ask you the following questions. Earlier you mentioned the fact that the Canadian officials overseas in Kenya cannot travel, or they won't travel to the refugee locations because of lack of funding maybe or very low demand, and they go there only when there is a visitor with them. Then they take the opportunity to go.

Obviously the government is trying to cut every corner it can. That may be the reason. Because officials are being reduced in numbers, we don't have enough staff overseas to operate as they used to. You prepared this report, and I'm sure that to implement this report as is, it will cost the government some money.

Put yourself in the position of the minister. You are to be the minister, and the Minister of Finance says that you have to cut 20% of your programs overall and this gender-related refugee program has to be chopped off somewhere, somehow, and it is your responsibility. What section would you cut to make sure the program survives and does the job you think it should do? That is point one.

You mentioned earlier that overseas workers are not sensitized the way you and I here are sensitive on this issue. The other question is, when you present a document like this, do you send them a copy of this report, or would you consider sending them a copy of the report so that they can be sensitized, so they know what you and I are discussing here? May I have answers to those two questions, if you can.

Ms Musa: Okay.

Mr. Assadourian: Are you starting with the second or the first?

Ms Musa: Let me start with the second. It is much easier.

Yes, we would send them. We haven't thought about sending this particular one because it was meant for this group. We could send them other kinds of information.

The other thing is we make every effort, when our staff or our constituency travels, to visit the Canadian visa offices, develop a relationship with them, and provide them with information. We know this is a partnership. They are not out there doing something we don't like, or we are not out here doing something against them. We have to work together. We try as much as possible to visit and exchange information, so that happens quite regularly.

The second point was where I would cut if I were the finance minister. I would be a very different finance minister because I wouldn't start. If I were the minister of immigration and had been asked by the finance minister to cut, I would reallocate.

At this point, because I am not the minister of immigration, I really don't know how much money is spent on what. This is a priority and I have stated it as a priority, as the minister of immigration has. What I would do is reallocate the funds to make sure that the priority....

Mr. Assadourian: From where would you reallocate the funds?

Ms Musa: At this point, I am saying I don't know what gets more, but I would reallocate from what is a low priority to a high priority, which is this particular case.

Not everything will always cost money. There are ways of doing things. I think in the overseas section if these officers are not able to travel for interviews, what they could do is accept the interviews that are done by UNHCR because UNHCR interviews people to find out whether or not -

Mr. Assadourian: Wouldn't we be giving up some of our sovereignty if they accepted interviews by foreigners, in this case UNHCR? It is my sovereign right to interview potential immigrants coming here. If I give you that right, it means I give you part of my sovereignty.

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Ms Musa: The UNHCR conducts the same kinds of interviews, and they use the same convention that Canada uses, so they don't have a different criteria. The only difference is that we then look to see whether or not the person can establish well in Canada, which UNHCR won't, so that would be lost.

We are asking that this be scrubbed anyway. If that is scrubbed and all we are looking for is to make sure that this person is a refugee, I assume that we can accept what UNHCR has done. We at least don't need to do the detailed part. The immigration person can be provided with the information, have a quick look through that, and if the visa officer feels there are some questions that need to be asked, then the person can be called.

This is not an exception. I read somewhere a couple of years ago, and I don't remember it exactly, but immigration officers have the discretion to also forgo interviews as it applies to immigrants. For example, in Hong Kong they don't need to have a personal interview with the person. They can go through the document that is prepared and give a visa just based on that. It's not as if it is something that is absolutely not done anywhere.

The other is, maybe they could have a relationship with NGOs. Many Canadian NGOs work in the camps. They could work with NGOs to do that or work with other governments that actually go into the camps to do the interviews. They use the same criteria that we do. There are many other ways of doing it.

Mr. Assadourian: I agree with you 100% that this is a very important issue. The point made by every witness who comes here is important for them. I agree with it 100%, but as members of this committee, we have to make a decision and make a recommendation. You have to help us with that recommendation. That is the reason I asked the question about where you would cut and how you would do it.

The Chair: I am going to stop here. I am sorry. You are not the minister of immigration. I think you have answered the question. Thank you very much.

Mrs. Terrana, you wanted to ask one more question.

Mrs. Terrana: Yes, especially after this kind of conversation. I have personally been of the opinion all along that we should strengthen our system abroad, so we have fewer people who will end up on our shores, but we have sort of a coordinated orderly way of getting the refugees to Canada.

On this basis and on what you said regarding the concern about these officers, why don't you have a recommendation to the effect that either the visa officers should travel or they should accept the interviews made by a representative of the United Nations? I don't think I have seen it in your brief.

That's about it. Thank you very much.

The Chair: I would like to thank you very much for your informative brief and maybe we will see you as a future minister. We look forward to seeing you again before the committee.

Thank you members, we are adjourned.