EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Thursday, December 5, 1996

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[English]

The Chair: Welcome to the meeting of Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration. The order of the day is pursuant to Standing Order 108(2), a study on the regulations regarding landing of undocumented refugees.

Today we welcome Ms Nancy Worsfold, executive director of the Canadian Council for Refugees.

Would you like to introduce the other two members who are with you, Nancy? You may begin. You have ten minutes.

Ms Nancy Worsfold (Executive Director, Canadian Council for Refugees): Thank you.

Representing the Canadian Council for Refugees today are Laran Affi, who is a member of our executive committee, and Mohammed Tabit, program coordinator of Midaynta, a Somali service association in Toronto.

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I'd like to thank the committee for holding these hearings. We're very pleased that on such short notice you could hold hearings on this issue, which has so profoundly affected 14,000 people's lives.

[Translation]

We would like to thank the committee for its willingness to listen to our point of view on a matter so closely affecting so many people in Canada.

[English]

I'd like to start by saying that we believe there are two fairly serious misnomers in the regulatory impact statement and in the regulations.

First, the regulatory impact statement states that the Canadian Council for Refugees was consulted. It is in fact true that we sat in rooms and flapped our lips and sounds came out, but as absolutely nothing that we said was taken into account in these regulations, I do not think it is a proper use of the word to say that we were ``consulted''.

Furthermore, the name of the class is a fairly high misrepresentation of the situation. The name of the class is ``undocumented convention refugee class in Canada''. It should read ``unsatisfactorily documented convention refugee class in Canada'', because contrary to the image created by the name, many of the individuals affected by this situation do have identity documents. They have birth certificates, school leaving certificates, municipal IDs and employee cards, but some immigration officer has decided that those documents are not satisfactory.

I will introduce the position of the Canadian Council for Refugees on identity documents and will outline some of our concerns about what we call CIC's document fetish.

The Canadian Council for Refugees believes that the legislation should be amended to go back to the pre-1993 situation. There is no evidence that the pre-1993 situation caused problems. There is no evidence that there were people in that class who have subsequently, because of lack of documentation, created problems with regard to Canada.

But given that this committee is not looking at legislative change, the fall-back position would be that the satisfactory identification condition be interpreted to include identity documents other than passports, and that statutory declarations - otherwise known as affidavits - not be summarily dismissed by immigration officers studying files.

Why are we in this situation? The move to paper processing within Immigration has created a need for a paper proof of identity. The bureaucratic imperative to create systems that save money has created this incredibly costly and wasteful situation.

Relying on paper to prove identity is foolish. There is no absolute relation between passports and identity. Let me tell you about two Canadian examples.

My daughter was born three and a half years ago in Montreal. Her name is Constance Worsfold Gervais. Her Montreal birth certificate makes no distinction between surname and first name. When I applied for her passport it came back with her surname as Gervais. I had second thoughts about this and asked a lawyer about it, who told me to write a letter and get it changed. So tell me: what is her name?

We know that around the world there are different forms of names with different surnames and first names and that translations from different languages and different alphabets cause problems. Names are not absolute.

Another way in which documents are uncertain is that documents are issued by people, by fallible, corruptible people. In Toronto, two CIC officers are facing criminal charges for selling permanent residence.

Are bribes taken in the Canadian passport office? If you pay a bribe for a government-issued document, is it valid?

Is a passport issued by the proper authority with false information on it a real document? Is a passport purchased in the bazaar false if it has the true name and true birth date?

Another example of the outrageous bureaucratization in these regulations is the process of the timing of the waiting period. Some people go through the IRB process in a few months. Others take a couple of years to be accepted as refugees. Why does the waiting period for this class start after the IRB decision? If what you want to look at is the individual's actions while in Canada, surely the need to be fair overrides the bureaucratic need to separate the landing process and the refugee determination process. These regulations can rob someone of two years of just getting on with their lives for some imaginary need to separate the refugee process and the landing process.

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Fifty years ago the Government of Canada split native families apart through the residential school system. They thought they were doing the right thing. Now we are paying the price. Now the government is splitting apart Somali and other refugee families. Are we going to have to wait another fifty years for justice?

Mr. Mohamed Tabit (Canadian Council for Refugees): My name is Mohamed Tabit. I'm program coordinator for the Midaynta Association of Somali Service Organizations in Toronto, a member agency of the Canadian Council for Refugees.

I would like to thank you, first, for this opportunity to address you. I'm certain a greater understanding of the issues involved will convince you that the current proposals are unacceptable and punitive to a group of people who have done nothing wrong and have only decided to become true contributors to this great country.

I want to address two issues that are very important, the family reunification aspect and the war criminals. Convention refugees from Somalia, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, Rwanda, Zaire, Iran, and others are particularly affected by this regulation. The problem of delayed or denied family reunification is the most severe consequence of this regulation. Refugees often leave behind immediate family members in dangerous conditions where they are subject to violence, rape, and disease. Delays in family reunification have resulted in depression, a deep sense of isolation, and family disintegration within the refugee communities.

A few days ago I met a little girl. Her name is Amina and she's six years old now. She was born on the run in 1990 in Somalia by the side of the road somewhere along the Somalia-Kenya border. She has no documents, and because she is not documented, the rest of the family cannot be landed. Because the family cannot be landed, her father cannot be sponsored.

The father is in a refugee camp called Dhadhap. It's hell on earth, with bandits surrounding the camp. He cannot understand why his wife and children do not bring him here. He is convinced his wife no longer wants him and he has spoken of divorce since.

This little girl left her father at age three and cannot expect to see him until she is twelve years old. This is a violation of the right of the child.

What problem could there be, then, to land a six-year-old girl and reunite her family? The majority of undocumented convention refugees are women and children: 80% is the figure released by the Department of Immigration. Landing convention refugees is basic to family reunification. Without it there is no hope of parents and children being reunited. However, as you can see, the current proposals do nothing really to assist with the urgent problem of separated families. The plight of these families should be a high priority of any program for landing refugees. It's the most humane and compassionate effect of landing.

Finally, I would like to say a few words about the war criminals. It has been suggested that Canada needs to know who is coming into this country and that to maintain security it's important to have documents. I want a safe and secure Canada too, but my experience, and the experience of many immigrant communities, is that criminals are well documented. Usually they have funds and access to the best documents. Besides, Canada has the legal tools to remove any war criminal at any time.

No immigrant community wants criminals in its midst. They don't want their persecutors to come after them here in Canada. In Montreal the Rwandan community reports to the government to take action against accused war criminals. To my knowledge, the Somalis deported by Canada as war criminals were all identified by the Somali community and all had valid documents. Documents do not prove whether or not someone is a criminal.

We believe the use of documentation in the above context is an inappropriate way to deal with the security concern. Instead of acknowledging the information and assistance of refugee communities regarding criminals, the current proposal alienates the very people they need help from. If the majority of unlanded refugees are women and children, then what's the problem? Is a six-year-old a danger to the security of Canada?

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I hope I have been able to assist you in understanding why this five-year waiting period or any statutory waiting period is unacceptable to refugee communities. Thank you very much for your time and consideration.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Tabit.

Okay, you have only one minute, and I'm going to be very strict because we have to get through this today.

Ms Laran Affi (Member, Executive Committee, Canadian Council for Refugees): Okay, that's fine. I'm going to focus on the impact on education.

When you apply for the Ontario student assistance program, to be eligible you must be a Canadian citizen or permanent resident of Canada. If you want to apply under the Canada Student Financial Assistance Act, it also says you must be a Canadian citizen or a permanent resident. That means a lot of students who've completed high school successfully are ineligible for scholarships or OSAP for any kind of training that would assist them in becoming productive members of Canadian society.

We're not eligible for a lot of jobs. It causes depression. Mental health is an increasing issue in our community thanks to this identity document issue. We believe five years is a long time to ask someone to wait to put his or her professional and student life on hold. We also have to consider the consequence to Canadian society and the consequence to the Somali Canadian society, which is alienation and marginalization in this society.

We believe this law will hinder our integration into Canadian society. Immigration itself is inconsistent in what it considers to be a satisfactory identity document. During question period I would be more than happy to answer how immigration officers continuously contradict themselves on what satisfactory identity documents are.

The Chair: Thank you very much, and I thank you also for being here on such short notice, as Nancy Worsfold said.

We'll begin with Mr. Nunez for ten minutes.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez (Bourassa): Thank you and my congratulations to the Canadian Council for Refugees.

Some days ago you held your national annual convention and I had the opportunity to take part in the first days's meetings. I greatly appreciated your work on behalf of refugees along with the presence of many participants from ethnic communities and people who were former refugees themselves. I'd like to congratulate you for the work you're doing, particularly for undocumented refugees in Canada or those who arrive with documents that are considered unsatisfactory by the Department of Immigration.

My first question deals with the acceptance of such documents. Nancy, you sometimes said that even a passport is not sufficient to identify a person. The Act refers to satisfactory documents and officials interpret this provision in a very restrictive manner. What documents do you consider to be acceptable for the purpose of landing?

Ms Worsfold: Thank you for your comments on our convention.

[English]

First, I'd like to say that the Canadian Council for Refugees does not do individual case work, but I will ask both Laran and Tabit to address the way in which documents are addressed.

It is our understanding that on a regular basis real documents are dismissed as false and false documents are accepted as real. For some people certain documents will be acceptable, while for other people the same document will not be acceptable. We have some case examples.

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Ms Affi: It's almost hit and miss in terms of which documents are accepted by which immigration officer. For instance, Somali became a written language in 1972, and I had one client who had a driver's licence that was in Italian. The immigration officer refused it because, after he talked to the client and asked her if she had ever been to Italy, her answer was no. He refused the document as being false. Well, Somalia was colonized by Italy, so a lot of documents were issued in Italian.

Some families have birth certificates. I've worked with a family of nine where the mother and children all provided birth certificates. Seven of the family were landed on the basis of the birth certificates and two were refused. If you ask immigration officers why, they will just say it looked fake.

One client provided a municipal identity document, which immigration refused. The lawyer then asked immigration to send it to the RCMP to verify whether it was an original document, because it was alleged that it had been altered. The RCMP's opinion was that as far as it was concerned this document had never been altered. Immigration still refused it, saying it was going to go with its gut feeling that this was an altered document.

With Somali names, even though we write in the Roman alphabet, we use certain words that do not exist in English, so documents from Somalia are written in Somali. For instance, you don't have the word

[Witness speaks in her native language] in English, so when we write our name in English, we Anglicize our name and it's written as A. So the

[Witness speaks in her native language] gets dropped and it just becomes, for instance, the name Ali. Immigration officers will say this is how your name is written in the Somali documents and this is how it's written in English, therefore this is the wrong document.

We're not very obsessive about birth dates. Sometimes it will have only the year written on it. When you come to Canada you're told you have to have a birth day and a birth month. So if you look at the immigration documents, a lot of Somalis were born on January 1, October 21 and July 1 because those are days that are significant in our history. There are little things like that, and as Nancy said, they will sometimes refuse legitimate documents and accept false documents.

So as far as I'm concerned, they're way out to lunch in terms of how they evaluate documents.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: I see, that's quite clear. The Minister and the government told us that the purpose of these regulations was to prevent Somali criminals from establishing their permanent residence in Canada.

You know that the Criminal Code is very severe with citizens who have committed crimes. You were involved in the discussion on Bill C-44, which also contains very severe provisions relating to criminals in general, and more particularly to war criminals. Under this Act, permanent resident's status can be withdrawn from a person who is not properly entitled to it and in some cases it is even possible to strip a person of a Canadian citizenship.

In your opinion, do not the Criminal Code, Bill C-44 and other Acts already provide sufficient protection to Canada? Do we really need such a provision or regulation?

Ms Worsfold: Thank you, Mr. Nunez.

I'd like to emphasize that the Canadian council is not concerned only with the situation of Somalis but also that of other groups. We recognize that criminality is an important consideration.

[English]

As Mr. Tabit explained in detail, the refugee community itself is far more concerned about war criminals than anyone else, because refugees do not want to see their persecutors walking down Yonge Street or Bank Street.

We believe it is foolish to put thousands of people into limbo when there are already many ways in which status can be revoked if things go wrong later. As it stands, to remove someone, refugee status would have to be revoked anyway. It would have to be a move for vacation. So there are ways, and we believe absolutely, as you have said, that Canada is sufficiently protected.

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Ms Affi: Refugees don't come to Canada with a lot. They do, however, come with their determination and their children. We're not here to commit crimes, and as Nancy said, we don't want those who persecuted us at home, who are the reason why we fled, to be here with us.

The Somali community has consistently identified people who committed war crimes in Somalia to Immigration. Immigration was very reluctant to deport these people. We were the ones who identified them.

Mr. Tabit: Those 80% are women and children or undocumented people. We know of families that are well documented, but because one child is not documented, the whole family has been put in legal limbo. So the communities are concerned about the security of this country. Like Canadians, they don't want criminals or their persecutors to come after them here in Canada.

In Toronto, I remember refugees in this country were demonstrating in front of the houses of those criminals. They are the ones who were reported and were forced to be deported from this country. So everybody is concerned about criminality.

The Chair: I'm not doing a second round, Mr. Nunez. You have one last question. Your ten minutes includes the answers, by the way.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: You referred to the five-year waiting period, a measure that the Bloc Québécois was opposed to because it goes against family reunification and results in a number of problems relating to work and post-secondary education. Do you have a counter proposal to make to us?

Ms Worsfold: No. In our view, this waiting period has nothing to do with the fact that a person must prove his or her identity.

[English]

We do not accept the idea of a waiting period. If there is a government again in Afghanistan or Somalia, how will those governments issue passports? It will be with the documents being refused here - birth certificates and school leaving certificates. The whole thing is silly.

In Canada you get a passport - if you're born in Canada - with your birth certificate. So it just goes through one more step. The same thing will happen - and I hope it will happen soon - when there are real governments again in Afghanistan and Somalia. That, of course, doesn't address all of the other problems with regard to people who fear to approach their governments because the governments, notably in Iran, have histories of persecuting the families of those who have made refugee claims in Canada.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: Thank you.

[English]

The Chair: Thank you. Ms Meredith.

Ms Meredith (Surrey - White Rock - South Langley): Thank you, Madam Chair.

My questions are for you, Nancy. Do you not think Canada should have a requirement for documentation?

Ms Worsfold: I believe Canada should have a requirement for proving identity.

Ms Meredith: So you feel Canada should have a requirement for identity documentation?

Ms Worsfold: For establishing one's identity.

Ms Meredith: Which is identity documentation.

Ms Worsfold: No, it's not.

Ms Meredith: Then what is a document that establishes identity, if not an identity documentation?

Ms Worsfold: I believe I have made the argument that there is not an absolute relationship between paper identity and identity. The Canadian Council for Refugees believes that people who have gone before a quasi-judicial tribunal to prove their stories have gone through tests of credibility of their stories and that should be sufficient. There is no absolute relationship between paper and identity, but somebody who has gone before a tribunal has to have been -

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Ms Meredith: Maybe I didn't make myself clear. I wasn't talking about a refugee claimant going through the process of being accepted. I was talking about Canada receiving individuals at the borders and at the airport. Should they not require identity documentation?

Ms Worsfold: I'm sorry, I don't understand the relation with these regulations.

Ms Meredith: When people arrive in Canada, they need travel documents to get here from Somalia, from Afghanistan, from Iran or from any European country. They require travel documents to go from a foreign country to North America. Is it unfair of Canada as a country to expect to receive, at the point of entry, some documentation of identity, some travel documentation?

Ms Worsfold: That is contrary to the spirit and the letter of the Geneva Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees. In the convention it is recognized that people in refugee situations cannot always get legitimate documents. I am talking about refugees.

Ms Meredith: I'm not talking about legitimate or illegitimate or phoney. I'm talking about documentation. My understanding from the department officials is that a lot of individuals arrive in this country without any documentation. Should Canada not require some travel documents, some identity documents, for those persons at the point of entry? I'm not talking about whether they're using incorrect documents or what not. Should they not require some documentation?

Ms Worsfold: Are you talking about at the point of entry?

Ms Meredith: Yes.

Ms Worsfold: And you're talking about CIC's concern that they would rather somebody give them the false document they travelled on rather than have destroyed it?

Ms Meredith: Any documentation.

Ms Worsfold: That is their concern. I don't understand their concern with that, and no, I don't think that is a reasonable expectation.

Ms Meredith: My concern is that the department is coming up with regulations that in essence - and you can correct me if I'm wrong - suggest that there is not a requirement for any documentation from individuals in order to get landed status.

It's not just these two communities I'm concerned about. I see these regulations as being a vehicle in the future to basically say to the international community that Canada will not always require documentation of identity.

Ms Worsfold: Yes, and I would go further. I suggest that we return to the pre-1993 situation, and I challenge you to find reasons why that is a problem.

Ms Meredith: Well, let me just challenge you with that, then. I have a statement by an individual in the immigration and refugee community who says that in 1991 there were 8,300 undocumented refugee claimants who landed in Canada. Last year there were 27,500 undocumented refugees landing in Canada. These are people landing in Canada without documentation. I would suggest to you that perhaps the increase in these numbers shows that we should be concerned about people who arrive in this country without documentation.

Ms Worsfold: There weren't 27,000 last year. That would be the total arrivals and they weren't all undocumented. I think -

Ms Meredith: No, no, no.

Ms Worsfold: I think your figures must be wrong.

Ms Meredith: I think what we are talking about is not the people who are given acceptance. These are people who arrive in this country, whether they are sent back, whether they are allowed -

Ms Worsfold: But there weren't 27,000 arrivals.

Ms Meredith: This is a government official working in immigration who has publicly given these figures.

Ms Worsfold: Of 27,000 undocumented arrivals last year?

Ms Meredith: Of people who have arrived at the points of entry in Canada without documentation.

The Chair: Ms Meredith, we don't argue figures because we don't have the time for that. Do you want to tell the committee if that testimony was before this committee?

Ms Meredith: No, it was...

I want to clarify whether or not you feel it is okay for people to come to Canada without documentation. Or is your concern what documentation should be allowed to be used? Your terminology is ``satisfactory'' identity documents. Is that the concern, or do you believe that people should be allowed to come to Canada without any identity documentation?

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Ms Worsfold: Do you mean come to Canada or be landed in Canada? My understanding was that before this committee were regulations on the landing of convention refugees, people who've gone through the system.

Ms Meredith: I'm sorry, I don't see the distinction. People who come to Canada and claim and are given refugee status based on not having any identity documentation - that is a direct result of people coming to Canada without documentation.

Ms Affi: I can answer that question. Not all refugee claimants come to Canada without documentation. The majority do come with documentation. So I really understand where this is coming from. Even the Somalis and Afghanis and all the other communities have documentation that Immigration refuses to accept.

Ms Meredith: That's the point I'm trying to make. I'm trying to get clarification from you on whether you believe Canada should allow people into the country without any documentation, or is it that the documentation they are bringing is not satisfactory to immigration officials?

Ms Worsfold: There's not an absolute relationship, because people can seek documents after they've been here. Some people can and some people can't. Does the Canadian Council for Refugees believe that somebody can make a claim for refugee status without documents? Yes.

Ms Meredith: So you are saying that you don't feel Canada has any right to require identity documentation.

Ms Worsfold: I believe that Canada has a right to expect people to establish their identity for the purposes of landing.

Ms Meredith: So you're telling me you don't feel that documentation is required, that somebody simply saying ``I am who I say I am and you have to believe me'' is adequate. You are saying that should be good enough for Canadian officials.

Ms Worsfold: At the port of entry?

Ms Meredith: No, you made some comment about a legal document where you are making an affidavit, and that this should be sufficient.

Ms Affi: The Supreme Court of Canada accepts affidavits as proof of identity. Is Immigration better than the Supreme Court of Canada?

Ms Meredith: I'm asking whether you feel somebody's word is good enough for Canada to establish legal landed status.

Ms Worsfold: Somebody who has gone before a quasi-judicial tribunal, who has been accepted by that tribunal and is unable to produce any documentation whatsoever, which is not the majority of the people - yes, I do, and yes, it is the position of the Canadian Council for Refugees. And yes with regard to the port of entry. According to the convention and to our position, should people be able to make claims without documents? If you are really concerned about these so-called security measures, you should look at the millions of American tourists who cross the border without documents.

Ms Meredith: But people had documents to travel, did they not?

Ms Worsfold: Some people did. Some people didn't.

Ms Meredith: So people can travel internationally without any travel documents.

Ms Worsfold: If they were coming on foot through Central America, yes. If they flew, no.

Ms Meredith: And if they were doing border crossings at Mexico into the United States, and from the United States into Canada, you're saying they wouldn't need any identity documentation to make those crossings?

Ms Worsfold: Not necessarily.

Ms Meredith: Fine. Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you, Ms Meredith.

Mr. Wappel.

Mr. Wappel (Scarborough West): Thank you.

Good afternoon. I want to pursue this line of questioning but I don't want to talk about documents. Do you agree or disagree that Canada has every right to require people who wish to come here and stay here to prove who they are?

Ms Worsfold: I believe we have said repeatedly that it is a reasonable expectation that people establish their identity.

Mr. Wappel: Okay. So at some point they have to establish their identity.

Ms Worsfold: Yes.

Mr. Wappel: To the satisfaction of whom?

Ms Worsfold: Obviously it's going to be the government, or some body of the government. Whether it's going to be the Immigration and Refugee Board or CIC...

Mr. Wappel: Right now we're talking about refugees, so let's talk about refugees. Who should they satisfy as to their identity?

Ms Worsfold: Because Canada separates the landing process from the refugee process, people are required to satisfy two different boards with two different sets of criteria. We do not understand why two government bodies don't accept each other's determinations.

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The regulatory impact statement says that the majority of people in this situation are genuine refugees, which means that CIC is saying they don't believe the determinations of the refugee board. That's where the problem is. One body is refusing the determination of another body.

Mr. Wappel: I'm asking you which body should decide the identity of people?

Mr. Tabit: Immigration officers -

Ms Worsfold: Which one does or which one should?

Mr. Wappel: Which one should. I thought I said should.

Ms Worsfold: We believe that somebody who's gone before the IRB and been accepted has established their identity. As for whether or not that should be so in a normative sense, I don't think the Canadian Council for Refugees has a position. We believe they have done so.

Mr. Wappel: So if the government decides it will be the immigration department that decides identity, you would have no position on that.

Ms Worsfold: We have not taken a position on that. We believe that somebody has done it already. Perhaps it should just be the IRB. I don't know.

Mr. Wappel: That's what I'm trying to get at. I think we've established that it is fair and reasonable that Canada should know who is here. The question is this: to whom or to what body, organization or department of government do you prove who you are?

Ms Worsfold: We consider that they have proved who they are to the IRB, but that's not good enough. For the purposes of this situation, the problem is created by separating the landing and refugee processes.

Mr. Wappel: Is the answer to my question that if you prove to the IRB who you are, that should be good enough for all branches of immigration?

Ms Worsfold: I suppose, yes.

Mr. Wappel: All right. I thought it was a simple question.

You said you were consulted, but not really, because none of your suggestions were accepted. I believe those were your words. How many of your suggestions would have to be accepted before you would say you were consulted?

Ms Worsfold: Maybe one.

Mr. Nunez: One hundred percent.

Mr. Wappel: I think I've made my point. Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Wappel.

Ms Minna.

Ms Minna (Beaches - Woodbine): I want to clarify something with respect to the IRB and the landing process.

You were talking earlier about documentation. Sometimes the false document is accepted and sometimes it's the real document, and vice versa. Are you saying that those same documents were presented at the IRB process, were part and parcel of determining that the person is who they say they are and came from the country they say they came from - in other words, that they are a legitimate refugee from that country - and once that document passes over to the other side, the landing part of the process, it's no longer accepted? Is that part of what you're saying?

Ms Affi: No, that's not -

Ms Minna: I want to understand whether the documents you were referring to before had been used and accepted in one instance but not in the other. Are there cases of that kind?

Ms Affi: That's not what I meant. What I said was -

Ms Minna: That's okay, you can all answer.

Ms Affi: The example I was quoting concerned people who had been determined by the Immigration and Refugee Board to be convention refugees from Somalia. You do get a letter saying this is your name, with your date of birth and saying that you are from Somalia.

Immigration is issuing documents with my name on them saying that I'm from Somalia. I don't see why I then have to go through that.

To get back to your question, these are people who have been put in extreme situations where they felt that perhaps if they did get false documents they would be landed. When you place people in situations of desperation, you can expect anything.

I believe this law encourages people to try to obtain false documents.

Ms Minna: My question was -

Ms Worsfold: I would point out that the IRB does ask for documents. As I said earlier, I don't do case work, but the IRB asks for documents. I assume they're looking at the same documents as CIC is.

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Ms Affi: Not always. Sometimes people use identity documents after they have been recognized as convention refugees because of this obsession with getting a paper. The IRB is more flexible in terms of how they identify someone.

Ms Minna: I understand that. I guess I was trying to get at the hit-and-miss problem of documentation and the two bodies that deal with it, to see whether there were instances when the same document was used in both cases and was not accepted in the latter but had been in the prior.

Ms Worsfold: I would imagine there are cases.

Ms Minna: I just wondered if there was any correlation that would be helpful to know. That's fine.

Ms Worsfold: Some of the witnesses later may have cases of that specific situation.

The Chair: I'm going to ask one last question for clarification. In the document you tabled with the committee, which says ``Identity Documents'', you say: ``Urge the Minister to provide sufficient personnel and resources to land these undocumented persons within six months''. Earlier when you asked the question, you said there should be no limit. In other words, is five years too much? Is six months too early? Are you suggesting six months?

Ms Worsfold: No, no, no. The six months is the processing time. There's a difference between the statutory wait and the processing time. Even if there were a five-year wait, there would still be processing time on top of that. Because they've excluded the possibility of including overseas dependents on the application, the overseas dependents will be another two or three years.

The Chair: To your knowledge is there precedent in any other country where there is no waiting period?

Ms Worsfold: Do you mean a waiting period between -

The Chair: From landing.

Ms Worsfold: I am not aware of there being a waiting... Most countries do not distinguish between acceptance as a refugee and residence.

The Chair: So most countries, to your knowledge, do not have a dual process?

Ms Worsfold: They don't have a dual process, no.

The Chair: You also say in your brief that you want to urge the minister to direct these officers to give greater weight to personal interviews and circumstantial documentary evidence. Do you know at this time what types of documents are accepted by officers, or is there no such rule?

Ms Worsfold: It's totally arbitrary, hit and miss.

The Chair: Okay, thank you very much. I'd like to thank the council.

We will proceed. Hopefully there's no vote.

Ms Meredith: Madam Chair, the other day we asked for a list of documents that the department would consider. Have we not received them?

The Chair: We haven't had an answer yet.

Mr. Nunez: It's important that we get that before the end of the consultation.

The Chair: I will try to get an answer.

May I ask David Matas and Tamra Thomson from the Canadian Bar Association to come forward, please.

If you're wondering what the bell is, it's just quorum in the House. When you're ready you can begin, Mr. Matas.

[Translation]

Ms Tamra Thomson (Director, Legislation and Law Reform, Canadian Bar Association): Thank you, Madam Chair.

The Canadian Bar Association is a national association representing over 34,000 jurists from throughout Canada. The Association's primary objectives include improvement in the law and the administration of justice as well as promoting equity in the justice system. It is with this in mind that we are presenting our comments here today.

[English]

The Canadian Bar Association, and particularly the immigration law section of our association, is pleased to have this opportunity to present our views on the proposed regulations.

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With me today is Mr. David Matas, who is the chair of the immigration law section and who has extensive experience in immigration matters, particularly those relating to refugee matters. He will be presenting the substance of our brief today.

Mr. David Matas (Chair, National Immigration Law Section, Canadian Bar Association): Madam Chair, we thank you for allowing us to be here.

The 1993 Immigration Act introduced this requirement of satisfactory identity documents, which didn't exist before. In retrospect we can say it was a mistake, because it hasn't really helped, as far as we can see, the department going about its task of performing its duties of protecting Canadians. It has created this huge marginalized underclass of people who wait indefinitely, are caught in limbo and cannot be landed. The department, to its credit, to a certain extent has realized this mistake, and the purpose of this proposed undocumented convention refugee claimants in Canada class is an attempt to step back from the legislation and to try to deal with the problem that has been created by the legislation.

We have some problems with the proposal. We don't think it's the right solution to the problem the legislation has posed. Before I get onto what I suggest might be a better way the clause could be devised, let me suggest that perhaps the legislation itself could be made to work so we wouldn't be caught with this problem we have been caught with. The problem, of course, is the requirement of satisfactory identity documents. For some people, for some immigration officers, nothing much satisfies them except the passport.

One suggestion we would make to this committee is that you just recommend this provision be repealed. We don't see how it helps immigration or Canada or Canadians at all. It obviously isn't within the power of the Governor in Council to repeal a provision of the act, but you can certainly recommend that.

According to the refugee convention, refugee recognition is supposed to lead to the host state giving identity documents. What we're doing now by creating this identity confusion, this identity limbo, is violating the refugee convention. What we should be doing is just accepting refugee recognition as identity recognition.

Even leaving the legislation as it is, I, for one, haven't given up the hope that it could be made to work. What we need is better and more specific guidelines about what could be a satisfactory identity document. A statutory declaration or an affidavit should be enough - even an affidavit or a statutory declaration from the person concerned.

In law, when somebody swears something to be true, this creates a rebuttable presumption that it is true. Obviously the presumption can be rebutted; not everybody tells the truth. But it's far-fetched to suggest that everybody lies. That's the situation we have now; we don't trust anybody. That is just going too far. I think it would help if we just got our operations memorandum and the Department of Citizenship and Immigration in line with the way the law accepts sworn statements: they accept them but they're rebuttable.

Let's turn to the class itself. First of all, the solution that the government has proposed is let's wait five years. But one thing that jumps out if you look at this is a comparison with another class, what's called the deferred removals orders class. Admittedly some people don't like this class, but what it does is say that if you're here three years after you're ordered removed and the government has not removed you, and the failure to remove is the government's decision and not yours, then you can be landed, and you can be landed even if you don't have identity documents.

If you compare this class with that class, what it means is that if you're refused as a refugee and you have no identity documents, you can be landed after three years. If you're recognized as a refugee and you don't have identity documents, you can only be landed after five years. So you're better off being refused refugee status than being recognized as a refugee.

This is practically true for Somalis. There are Somalis now who are being landed under the deferred removals orders class who have been refused refugee status, but those with a similar lack of identity documents who are recognized are not being landed. They're caught in this limbo.

For Afghans, of course, it's the same, because the government, understandably, has a policy of not removing to Afghanistan. So everybody from Afghanistan, if they're refused, falls within this deferred removals orders class; and if they're accepted, Afghanistan is one of the designated countries, so they would fall under the undocumented class. Again, for Afghans we have five years to wait if they're accepted; three years to wait if they're refused. It makes no sense whatsoever.

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We have some problems with the waiting period, but obviously if there's going to be a waiting period it should be lesser for the recognized claimants, who've managed to establish their identity before the refugee division, than for the refused claimants. We suggest that if you're going to have a period at all, it should be two years, which is less for the recognized than the refused, and two years from the date the claim is made, not from the date of the application for landing.

A second change we propose in the class is it should be for from all countries, not just designated countries. What we have now is two designated countries where there are no governments issuing passports. That's not the only reason there's a problem getting passports. Some governments can issue passports and won't. Some people won't issue to refugees because they don't want to help them establish somewhere else. Some people put themselves, their family or their friends back home at risk if they try to get passports, so they don't try to do that. Some people find it conscientiously repulsive to try to get passports. We would suggest that if there is going to be such a class, it should not be restricted to designated countries; it should apply to all countries.

A third change we would propose is that it deal specifically with the problem of family reunification. There are many problems with these people caught in limbo, but the most acute problem is the delay in family reunification. There's a number of the family abroad taking many years to come to join the family in Canada. The way we figured it, if you have the class as it's enacted now, there would be a wait of between eight and nine years from the time a person arrives here and the time they're able to be reunited with their family. Of course, children exit from the family class at the age of 19, so anybody over the age of 10 or 11 who is left behind will never see their family again in Canada. That's a problem.

We have three different proposals to deal with that. One is that family members should be allowed to come to Canada as visitors once the claimants in Canada are recognized as refugees. The second is that people who apply for landing under the class should be able to include their dependants abroad and not be restricted just to the dependants in Canada. The third is that the relevant date for determining whether somebody is a member of the family class is the time they apply for landing originally under the Immigration Act, not the time the child applies for landing after the parent is landed under this designated class. We would thereby have a lot earlier lock-in date, so we're not going to have somebody cut off from reunification just because they've been waiting a long time.

The fourth set of changes we propose in the class has to do with fees. The way the system is designed now, we will have people paying fees twice to land their overseas dependants, once when they apply for landing under the act and once when they apply for landing under the class. We say people should pay fees only once and not twice.

The purpose of the class is obviously to identify undesirables, to prevent undesirables from staying in Canada, but the delay does not serve that purpose. As we've heard before, there are people who have valid documents who are undesirable, and indeed it's regrettable that a number of the people we've had in Canada have had perfectly valid documents but shouldn't have been here. This is not a good surrogate for dealing with criminality.

The best way to deal with criminality obviously is prosecution. We have a number of universal jurisdiction offences in the Criminal Code, but they're not being used, and frankly, because of a Supreme Court of Canada decision called Finta they're more or less unusable. We need an amendment to the Criminal Code so we can prosecute war criminals, criminals against humanity in Canada, and we just don't have that.

The notion of delay doesn't make sense as a way of catching criminals. It doesn't make sense for a number of other reasons. Besides, the worst criminals tend to be well behaved once they've got here because they're here to escape, not to commit crimes. Secondly, as Mr. Nunez has pointed out in his questions, we now have Bill C-44, so people don't really gain a benefit from being landed in terms of avoiding or delaying removal. We're not really somehow making it easier for them to stay here if we land them and subsequently we find they're criminals.

The last point we would make is the discriminatory impact of all this. We accept that the department is not discriminatory by intent, but it is a fact that most cultures are a lot less document based than we are. There are oral cultures, community cultures, cultures where paper means little or nothing.

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A paper bias means a gender bias, an age bias, an urban bias. It impacts adversely against those least likely to have documents in a cumulative fashion.

We really have to look at this insistence on documentation because of the adverse impact on discrimination it has.

The problem exists. We have created through this 1993 amendment an underclass of people who cannot go to work or go to school without permission, who have difficulty accessing social services, who cannot leave Canada and re-enter, and who are denied family reunification. They are marginalized and their integration is denied, and all of Canada suffers from that.

The proposed class is an attempt to solve this problem. It doesn't solve it, and we need a solution.

The Chair: Thank you very much.

Mr. Nunez.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: I'd like to thank the representatives of the Canadian Bar Association. I always pay a great deal of attention to your views because the briefs you present to our committee as part of the consultation process are always very substantial.

The Chair: We'd also thank the witnesses.

Mr. Nunez: Furthermore, they are presented in both English and French.

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. Nunez: Your recommendations are very valid and relevant. The committee will certainly have to take them into account during the drafting of its report.

I'd like to turn to the constitutionality of this regulation and section 46 of the Immigration Act that came into effect in 1993. Two eminent lawyers appeared before our committee and cast doubt on this regulation which may contravene the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedom since it establishes categories of persons in a discriminatory manner. You also noted that these regulations and section 46 probably constitute a violation of the Geneva Refugee Convention as well as the international convention on the rights of a child, which to my knowledge Canada has not signed.

Could you tell us a little about the constitutionality of this Act and the regulations?

[English]

Mr. Matas: I'm familiar with this court case that has been launched. It basically says that it discriminates against Somali refugees because there are people from different cultures or different nationalities who have different forms of documentation.

We accept that there is discrimination here; that is, discrimination by impact, not discrimination by intent. Whether or not that's going to succeed in court is speculative right now. All we can say is that there is an arguable case. There is a sound foundation for launching it. It's a plausible argument.

As far as Parliament and the government are concerned, they don't need a court judgment to deal with this. It's enough if it's a problem. It's discrimination whether it's a violation of the charter or not.

Certainly there is a problem in terms of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and so on, because all of these refugee conventions talk about the obligation to provide identity. We've turned this around. Instead of meeting our obligation to provide identity to these people we are withholding identity from them because of requirements we impose upon them.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: You suggest reducing the waiting period from five to two years. Can you explain the reasoning for this? We put the same question to officials from the Department of Citizenship and Immigration, and I must admit that I didn't quite understand why they set this period at five years rather than six, four, three or two. Why a five-year period? Why are you suggesting a two-year period, which strikes me as a more reasonable length of time for landing in Canada? What factors or elements did you take into account when coming to this recommendation for a two-year waiting period?

[English]

Mr. Matas: The reason I arrived at two years is because I noticed in the regulations that it's three years if you're refused. So it seemed to me that if it's going to be three years if you're refused, it should be less if you're accepted.

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To my mind, the department has set a benchmark of three years when it put in the deferred removals order class. And it's internally inconsistent within the regulations for the department to propose five years if you're accepted, three years if you're refused. Of course, somebody who is accepted has gone through an identity determination through the refugee division, whereas somebody who is refused never has.

So it seemed reasonable that once you have the three-year benchmark and the department has already established, in the case of the accepted refugee, a prior identity determination, you should be getting something substantially less than three years. That's how we came to two years.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: This regulation will be in effect for two years, that is from the end of December 1996 to the end of December 1998. We asked the officials questions about the number of Somalis and Afghans who do not possess documents the officials consider to be satisfactory. They told us that about 7,000 refugees, probably 50 per cent, would be able to take advantage of this regulation during the next two years. What can you tell us about the two-year period? Have you done any calculations to determine how many refugees this might benefit?

[English]

Mr. Matas: I must confess I didn't pay much attention to that two-year delay, because I'm familiar with the working of previously designated classes. You may be familiar with some of them: the self-exiled class, the Latin American designated class, the political prisoners and press persons designated classes. They always had short expiry times and they were constantly renewed. Just a few days before the expiry date, the Governor in Council passed a regulation changing the expiry date. I assume if this class turns out to be useful and serves the purposes of Canadian public policy, then it will be renewed as these other designated classes continue to be renewed.

So I'm not particularly worried about the fact that there's a two-year expiry.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: As you mentioned, this regulation applies only to Somalia and Afghanistan. Similar problems are occurring in the case of Iran, Sri-Lanka and probably other countries, particularly in Africa. Do you consider it acceptable that only these two countries can benefit from this regulation?

[English]

Mr. Matas: As you may have noted, our proposal was that it not be country-specific, that it apply to all refugees around the world. There is a problem with country designation, because it takes a while for the government to react to any change in a country's situation. It can happen in any country that some governments are going to be really mean towards some people, to the point where they won't even give them passports. They give most people passports, but they just don't want to give Mr. X a passport because they're determined to do everything they can against him. In that situation, the government should be able to use this class, or something like it.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: You know that the acceptability of certain documents depends to a large extent on the official's judgment. It goes without saying that passports are universally accepted documents. I'd like to ask you the same question I put to the Canadian Council for Refugees, what kinds of identity documents would be acceptable?

[English]

Mr. Matas: What's at issue here is not the acceptable document, but establishing identity. The document is a means of establishing identity, but it's not the only means of establishing identity.

Mr. Nunez, I know who you are. I've never seen your passport, I've never seen your birth certificate, I've never seen your House of Commons ID, and I don't need to see them. I know who you are. What we need is to get away from this focus on documents.

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In the case of refugees, they have already been identified or recognized as refugees because they've gone through the refugee determination process, and that should be enough. If it's not enough, we should be taking people's word. We can always question it. We can always go behind it. If there's no reason to question it, we should accept it.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: Although you have discussed the matter, I'd like you to explain how the Criminal Code and Bill C-44 helped Canada fight against criminality among immigrants, either by preventing them from coming to Canada or by deporting them if they committed a serious offence. Is the present legislation sufficient or should we be making provision for even more severe measures, as is being proposed in a private member's bill aimed at dealing with criminality among immigrants, a bill we are studying?

[English]

Mr. Matas: In terms of the Immigration Act it's very strict. Right now, as you know, with Bill C-44, all the appeals have been removed, to the point where we've now had a couple of judgments questioning the constitutionality of Bill C-44.

There are some problems, though, in the immigration law. If somebody is a citizen right now, there is no consolidation of proceedings. You have to repeat the proceedings: citizenship and denaturalization and deportation. That causes unnecessary delays.

There is this problem that is being litigated in the case of Nemsila about whether five years gives immunity. It remains to be seen where that's going to end up. If five years does really indeed give immunity, then there's going to be a need for a legislative change.

The biggest problem is in the area of the Criminal Code. In theory, we accept the principle of universal jurisdiction for a number of offences. It's become unworkable through court interpretation. We need to amend the Criminal Code. That would be a far better deterrent. Simply telling people they have to leave is just a relocation, it's not a punishment.

If we could hold out the threat that people would be prosecuted, tried, sentenced and jailed for international criminal offences, that would be a lot more effective than changing the immigration system.

The Chair: Before I go on to Ms Meredith, Ms Minna would like some clarification before she has to leave.

Ms Minna: I just want to clarify some information that Ms Meredith tabled earlier.

In 1995 you said there were 27,000 undocumented refugees. There were actually 26,000 people who declared themselves as refugees, not 27,000, and of those, 14,000 were undocumented.

Ms Meredith: It was not refugees. It was 27,000 individuals who entered Canada without documentation. As I said, it's whether they're allowed to land, come in; it's whether they declare refugee status or are here as visitors or whatever. According to this article, 27,500 individuals landed in Canada without documentation. It's not refugees I was talking about; it was individuals.

Ms Minna: Thank you.

The Chair: Ms Meredith.

Ms Meredith: Thank you, Madam Chair. Going through a summary of your recommendations, a number of things have raised an issue with me. I want to ask you the same question I asked the Canadian Council for Refugees. Do you feel Canada has a right to ask for documentation, albeit whatever documentation is used for travelling purposes to come to Canada?

Mr. Matas: In a general sense I would say yes. When you ask whether Canada has a right, how do you assess whether there's a right? One has to look at the international legal regime. We talked about the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the refugee convention and so on. None of those specifically say something to the effect that you can't ask for identity documents.

There is something in the regulations right now that does that. There's regulation 14, which says every immigrant shall be in possession of a valid and subsisting passport. We're not questioning that. That's fine. That's not really the issue here.

The problem is the people who have already been identified, recognized as refugees. Are they going to be landed based on that recognition, or is there going to be some additional stuff? That's the issue.

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Ms Meredith: Okay, but I see this particular regulation as having a far wider impact than just this issue. If I felt it was just this issue, I would be less concerned. I see this regulation as having an impact and sending a message internationally that Canada will accept individuals into our country without documentation. That will be the message sent.

My concern is whether or not there's clarity in terms of whether you support no documentation or whether it's a question of what documentation should be good enough to show the person's identity for the purposes of refugee claims or landed status.

Mr. Matas: As I say, documentation is a means to an end, not an end in itself. The end is establishing the identity or the truthfulness of the person. There are ways to do it, and documentation is one of them. But as you well know, documentation can be forged, just as people may not tell the truth. One has to use every means possible to get at the truth.

This proposal deals only with recognized refugees. It may send out some sort of message that goes beyond the scope of the class, but unfortunately there's lots of misinformation out there. I think if there is misinformation, one has to correct it. One can't avoid doing something that may make sense simply because people may get a mistaken impression of it and get the wrong message. I think one has to do what makes sense, even if the message that comes out may be abused and distorted. I think you just have to make sure that what you're doing is communicated effectively, if it makes sense.

Ms Meredith: But one of your recommendations is to not just deal with the issue we have today with the large numbers in the Somali and Afghan communities in this position. You don't want any limitation on the designated countries. You feel this should just be wide open to whomever might want to use this -

Mr. Matas: Yes, but they would still all be recognized refugees. I would not suggest that anybody could be landed without documents. That's not the point of the proposal. The point is that people who have already been identified because they've gone through the refugee determination shouldn't have to go through a double identification. Once should be enough.

Ms Meredith: Okay. You have problems with the five-year time line. In the summation of the regulations from the department, they're saying that the five-year timeframe is there for two purposes. One is to give an opportunity for someone with a criminal background, or that kind of adversative background, to come forward from the community itself for their information.

The second one is the timeframe to establish respect for Canadian laws and the norms of Canadian society, whatever they mean by that.

Are you telling us that this is not an essential part, that criminality can be discovered and dealt with in other areas? But what about disrespect for Canadian laws and norms to which they refer?

Mr. Matas: You mean just the second point, the second justification?

Ms Meredith: Yes.

Mr. Matas: The best way to get people to respect Canadian laws is to integrate them into the system. The more marginalized they are, the less likely they are to become full partners in the Canadian commonwealth. Putting these people off to one side for so many years seems to be a very funny way of trying to engender respect for Canadian laws. And it is discriminatory.

Why are we doing it for these people? You see, there's a linkage in this case between identification and the waiting period. But the reality is that there's no such linkage in real life between identification and criminality. When people commit crimes, it's not because they don't have identity, but for other reasons. I just can't see the connection between the stated goal and the program that's designed.

Ms Meredith: Okay. I would have to assume - I didn't write this, so I'm going on an assumption - that they feel that once you give a person landed status, it is more difficult to deal with the question of their breaking the law and committing criminal activities. It's much more difficult to deal with this thing. Here we have individuals who don't respect Canadian laws and norms - whatever they mean by the norms of society - so therefore we want to remove the landed status. It's much more difficult to do it after the fact than to say that we want an indication from you, the person, as to whether or not you're going to respect Canadian laws.

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Mr. Matas: The question is: how is it more difficult? I'm not asking you to answer that; I have my own answer.

Before Bill C-44, it was more difficult. That's because a landed immigrant who was ordered deported for a criminal conviction could appeal to the appeal division of the Immigration and Refugee Board. The truth is that a recognized refugee who's ordered deported, whether they're a landed immigrant or not, can also right now appeal to that appeal division of the Immigration and Refugee Board. As I understand the law, I don't see how landing advantages the criminal. They're still removable, and landed or not, they have the same appeals.

Ms Meredith: Perhaps it's the fact that the ministry is running into great difficulty in removing people who have been convicted of criminal activities, through the changes that Bill C-44 brought in. We've just seen a second appeal upheld by the Federal Court for somebody who was convicted of trafficking in narcotics. Perhaps the caution that the department had when writing these was because they realized that the changes from Bill C-44 are not helping to remove criminals from the country.

Mr. Matas: I would say that even if you put aside Bill C-44... I made the point earlier that without Bill C-44 there's no difference. A refugee ordered deported without Bill C-44 has an appeal to the appeal division of the Immigration and Refugee Board whether they're landed or not. You don't enhance the appeal rights by landing the person. They have the same appeal rights if they're not landed.

Ms Meredith: So basically you're saying that the protection is already there through the acts.

You want changes to the Criminal Code. As we don't have time...I'm not quite clear what you meant about that.

You feel there's already adequate protection for Canada in existing laws and regulations such that this particular change in the regulation is not required. So the five years as a timeframe to allow Canada to protect itself from criminality and what not is not required.

Mr. Matas: The five-year proposal here is not a protection device; it's an attempt to solve the problem created by the 1993 act, because otherwise these people would just be around here indefinitely without landing. That's the unfortunate situation they're in. Instead of saying it's indefinite, they're saying it's five years.

Ms Meredith: But they could have said - I've argued this point before - that they recognize they have a problem here. They could say they would resolve it by giving these individuals caught in this situation landed status tomorrow. There are other options that the department could have initiated.

Mr. Matas: Indeed. Yes.

Ms Meredith: So it's a question of why the five years, what were those five years meant to accomplish? I've tried to understand why the department came up with five years.

You feel it's not justified.

Mr. Matas: Absolutely.

Ms Meredith: You feel the protection is already there in the acts, in the legislation, to protect Canada for the purposes they're concerned about without giving the five-year period of time.

Mr. Matas: Let's put it this way. Obviously there are many different things I would like to see in the Immigration Act, including things in the area of protection. There's no difference between landed and non-landed in terms of protected Canadians. As Canadians, we do not get enhanced protection by not landing these people, because they have the same appeal rights, landed or not. I just don't see the point of it. They're being put in misery for nothing.

Ms Meredith: Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you. Mr. Cullen.

Mr. Cullen (Etobicoke North): Thank you, Madam Chair.

Thank you, Mr. Matas. I'm sorry I missed your presentation.

I had a question about the numbers that have been floating around. I guess this is some gazetting of regulatory impact. The number of refugees in Canada who are being classified as undocumented convention refugees under this provision is 7,000. Would you agree with this number?

Mr. Matas: Well, I've seen the same number.

Mr. Cullen: You don't have any -

Mr. Matas: I'm a lawyer, so -

Mr. Cullen: I'm an accountant.

One of the issues I've been trying to get some facts on is this. Based on the five-year waiting period now, how many Somalis and Afghans, for example, were declared refugees in 1991, 1992 and 1993? In other words, with a five-year period that would elapse, how many of them would be coming up for this kind of treatment under this proposal in 1997, 1998, and 1999? You don't have any numbers on that, do you?

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Mr. Matas: No, but I assume the department would.

Mr. Cullen: Okay, so I'm asking the wrong -

The Chair: No, Mr. Cullen wasn't here when we... So we have that on the record.

Mr. Cullen: Okay, sorry, we have that on the record. I'll seek it out.

I had another question - a number of issues have come up, and they may well have been raised earlier - and that is about the number of students who are coming to an age where they want to go on to university or to college, Somalis or Afghans who, if they went under the current provisions, would be treated as foreign students, and therefore the fees would be extraordinarily high. Do you have any idea, for example, if your proposal was adopted...and I think you're saying you would reduce it from five years to two years?

Mr. Matas: And start from the time they start the refugee claim.

Mr. Cullen: Do you know how many of these students who are in this difficult position would be satisfactorily dealt with under your proposal?

Mr. Matas: Again, I think we have a clash of professions here. You're asking me for numbers, and I'm afraid I just don't know the numbers.

Mr. Cullen: Madam Chair, do we have those numbers in the record?

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. Cullen: Okay, so I'm again asking the wrong person. I'll ask you a question, then, that you might be more familiar with. It's been more of an extraneous issue in the consultations I've had with the Somali community in particular, but this particular provision does have a two-year sunset clause, as I understand it.

My understanding of this proposal is that if there was no recognized government of the day that could actually come forward with recognized documentation, then in all probability this law or this provision would be carried over and renewed, but if there was an organized government that could provide valid documentation, then there is a possibility that this provision would not be renewed.

You can perhaps clarify if my understanding is correct. Assuming it is for the moment, some members of the Somali community are expressing concern that even though there might be a recognized government at some point in time, given the politics and the tribal situations, etc. - particularly in Somalia, which is an area I'm a little more familiar with - it would be difficult even then to assure the Canadian government that the documentation we were getting was all-inclusive, or fair and equitable. I wonder if you could comment on that.

Mr. Matas: Yes, there are a couple of things. One is the time delay, and the other is the country designation.

The country designation can be changed at any time. It doesn't have to wait two years. It can be changed - I mean the Governor in Council can from one day to the next change the designation. Presumably that's the point of having a class where you designate countries as appropriate from time to time. The two-year period means the possibility of designation ends.

In terms of when and if we get a Somali government, what kind of documents are they going to issue? - that's a good question. This gets back to this whole focus on documents. The point I've made is that we should be concerned about the identity of the person, not the documents they have. The reality is that if and when a Somali government revives, the quality of the documentation may be very poor indeed.

One can say this about many countries. Many countries just don't have the same focus on documents as we do. They pay less attention to them; they're a lot less careful about them; they're not as reliable; the systems are sometimes corrupt.

This focus on documents - when you're dealing with the whole world, it's almost a cultural clash. It is a cultural clash. We're in effect imposing our cultural standards for establishing identity on the rest of the world, and it's simply inappropriate.

Mr. Cullen: If not documents, what then do we rely on?

Mr. Matas: I wouldn't say never documents. Obviously documents are an indicator, and one can look at the documents that are available, but one should look at everything. One should look at what people say. One should at what other people who know them say. One should use common sense.

The problem is that right now we've got documents and documents alone, and amongst the documents we've got a hierarchy of documents in which passports are at the top of the list. That may make sense in a Canadian context, but in a global context that simply doesn't make sense as ``the'' way to establish in a global context.

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Mr. Cullen: I don't know how much time we have.

The Chair: You still have a minute or two.

Mr. Cullen: Okay, thank you.

Let me be the devil's advocate for the moment. The reason I'm here is that I want to listen to the issues. When it comes to relying on what people say - and I know you're saying that's just one of many things - I think most people are of good will, most people tell the truth, etc. How do we rely on the hearsay or verbal evidence on matters so important, though? Do you see that as a set of a number of pieces of evidence that we'd look at?

Mr. Matas: I come at it from the perspective that the person's identity has already been established at the refugee determination. There has been an oral hearing; the person has given testimony and has been subject to cross-examination. There has been a determination of creditability and the person has been found to be telling the truth by an independent expert tribunal. What more is necessary after that? This is not just a matter of somebody swearing an affidavit. This is a matter of somebody going though all the creditability tests that anyone who is a witness in a court of law has to go through. Surely that should be enough.

Mr. Cullen: Okay.

The Chair: Ms Bethel.

Ms Bethel (Edmonton East): Thank you, Madam Chair.

Were you consulted prior to the drafting of this legislation?

Mr. Matas: As the Canadian Bar Association, no. I'm the past president of the Canadian Bar Association -

Ms Bethel: No, this really is a simple question. Was the Canadian Bar Association consulted prior to...?

Mr. Matas: The Canadian Bar Association was not.

Ms Bethel: Is that usual? Are you usually consulted prior to the drafting of legislation?

Mr. Matas: We've had some discussions with the department about the consultation process because we meet with the department pretty regularly. In terms of the way the department has done things up to now, though, they have pre-published in the Canada Gazette for comment, and that has been the consultation.

I must say I find this period of two weeks much too short. They want submissions by December 16, and then the regulations are to come into effect December 30. It almost seems to indicate how seriously they could rethink what they've done based on the submissions when they have a two-week deadline between the time of the filing of submissions and the time it's coming into effect.

Ms Bethel: Madam Chair, I think this is a vital point in terms of consulting. Ideally, if departments consult broadly and wisely, the regulations and legislation that they bring to us will reflect the wisdom of these folks and it will have general acceptance. I just say that in passing. I really do think -

The Chair: Thank you, Ms Bethel, but you weren't here when Mr. Wappel made his comments.

Ms Bethel: Yes.

For my second question, I guess I do want to go back to the beginning. In establishing identity, what criteria and guidelines would the Canadian Bar Association recommend?

Mr. Matas: First of all, we would recommend that refugee determination should be sufficient.

Ms Bethel: Okay, that's fine to say, but what is theirs, then? I'm asking the Canadian Bar.

Mr. Matas: How should the refugee division proceed to determine identity?

Ms Bethel: Never mind who does what now. What criteria would you recommend?

Mr. Matas: I think it's important to look at all of the evidence and to make an assessment based on all the evidence that's available. Don't rule out any evidence a priori simply because of the nature of the evidence, and don't accept any evidence blindly simply because of the category into which it falls.

Ms Bethel: Define for us what you mean by ``evidence''. Give us some good, solid -

Mr. Matas: What I mean by ``evidence'' is not only documents, but I would say every document: birth certificates, school-leaving certificates, voter registration, ration cards - every single form of identification that's available in a documentary form. Secondly, we should also be able to look at oral evidence: the testimony of the person concerned, the testimony of people who know or say they know him or her - basically everything you can think of.

Ms Bethel: One of the recent witnesses suggested that there probably is some inconsistency in those divisions, even among the different sections of the IRB. If that's so, I'd like to hear your thoughts on that. If that's so, then how should we and how could we rely on their determination?

Mr. Matas: Of course, all humans are fallible.

.1710

Ms Bethel: That's okay, but there has to be...

Mr. Matas: The point is that the refugee determination process is a much more thorough and better process, with a lot more skilled and trained people than you get later on down the line with immigration enforcement officials. It may well be that even once you go through the refugee division, you're going to get some mistaken decisions and you're going to get some people who contradict each other, but it's a better and more reliable process than the subsequent process.

I would say, of course, that if you have evidence that leads you to believe the determination was wrong, you shouldn't turn a blind eye to it. There is, as was pointed out, a vacating procedure. The government has the power to get the refugee division to reverse its decision if the government has information that leads it to believe the decision is wrong. The government can also participate in the refugee division hearing if it has concerns about identity. But if it has concerns about identity, doesn't participate in the process, and doesn't move to vacate afterwards, how serious are these concerns?

The Chair: Ms Bethel, one last question. I have to go on to the rest of the witnesses.

Ms Bethel: Sure.

What sort of criteria guidelines do you think should be included in the legislation to resolve the problem of undocumented convention refugees?

Mr. Matas: In our recommendations 1 and 2, we tried to set up guidelines or criteria, but they are not guidelines or criteria for the regulations. They are guidelines or criteria for the operation memorandum that would determine how the act was operated. We only need this regulation because the act isn't being operated, from our point of view, in a very functional way. From my point of view, the whole need for these regulations would disappear if the act was operated in a sensible way.

Ms Bethel: Thank you.

Mr. Matas: I wonder, Madam Chair, if -

The Chair: Please go ahead, Mr. Matas.

Mr. Matas: - I can just pick up on that first point about consultation. One of the things that we have discussed with the government is consultation in advance of publication in the Canada Gazette.

The Chair: Just for the record, though, it was pre-published in the Gazette on November 17, so it's not two weeks.

Mr. Matas: No, the two weeks is between -

The Chair: We won't fight over a few days. I'm just saying that the reason we undertook this was for public consultation. This is the consultation, but if you want to clarify it, Mr. Matas, please go ahead.

Mr. Matas: By ``two weeks'', I was not referring to the time between the publication and the deadline for submissions. It's the time between the deadline for submissions and the coming into effect of the regulations.

The Chair: Okay, thank you for clarifying that.

Mr. Matas: One of the things we have discussed with the government is consultation in advance of pre-publication. On the whole, it has been sympathetic to that and it's one of the things we're trying to push with it - to have consultation in advance of pre-publication.

The Chair: Thank you very much for that.

Ms Meredith wanted a clarification.

Ms Meredith: Yes, I wanted to clarify something, and maybe the researcher can help us here.

Perhaps based on something from the department officials, I understood that for the purposes of education and student loans, a convention refugee was considered in the same way as someone with landed status. Am I wrong in that the provincial government allowed refugees -

Ms Margaret Young (Committee Researcher): What we have is a document from the Government of Ontario that clarifies that recognized convention refugees and their dependents are not considered international students for the purposes of paying the differential between the local fee and the foreign student fee. We have no information about scholarships or student loans in that regard, and we have no information regarding other provinces. I spoke to that official and I asked him if he had any knowledge, by virtue of his position, of what the situation was in other provinces, but he did not.

Ms Meredith: So it's the international student application... Okay, thank you.

Ms Young: It's the fee.

The Chair: Thank you for that, Ms Meredith. That was important.

Mr. Matas and Madam Thomson, merci beaucoup. Thank you very much for your written brief also. That's always very useful.

We will take a five-minute break and then I'm going to ask the members of the Afghan Association of Ontario, the Somali Council for Refugees and the Somali Centre for Youth, Women and Community Development to please come forward.

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.1724

The Chair: Will the Afghan Association of Ontario, the Somali Council for Refugees, and the Somali Centre for Youth, Women and Community Development please come forward?

Please introduce yourselves first. You have ten minutes total for all three groups, and then we will take ten-minute rounds from the members. I apologize for the time restraint, but we also have a restraint in terms of presenting our report before the House rises next week.

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We will begin with the Afghan Association of Ontario.

Dr. Sultan Barekzai (President, Afghan Association of Ontario): My name isSultan Barekzai, president of the Afghan Association of Ontario.

Mr. John Alekozai (Executive Director, Afghan Association of Ontario): My name isJohn Alekozai. I am the executive director of the association.

Mr. Ahmed Hashi (Adviser, Somali Centre for Youth, Women and Community Development): My name is Ahmed Hashi. I am from the Somali Centre for Youth, Women and Community Development in Ottawa.

Mr. Abdul Hakim Mohammed (Settlement Counsellor, Somali Centre for Youth, Women and Community Development): My name is Abdul Hakim Mohammed and I'm from the Somali Centre for Youth, Women and Community Development.

Dr. Abdi Ulusso (Coordinator, Somali Council for Refugees): My name is Abdi Ulusso and I'm with the Somali Council for Refugees.

Mr. Abdullahi Aden (Member, Executive Committee, Somali Council for Refugees): My name is Abdullahi Aden from the Somali Council for Refugees.

The Chair: Thank you. We will begin with Dr. Barekzai.

Dr. Barekzai: Madam Chair, ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of the Afghan community of Ontario, we wish to express our sincere thanks for giving us this opportunity to express the concern of our community about the recent announcement by the Hon. Lucienne Robillard, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, regarding the identity requirement for Afghan refugees in Canada.

The conflict and resulting chaos in Afghanistan is not an Afghan problem alone. As you well know, most of the problems in Afghanistan relate to the intervention of outsiders in Afghanistan politics. The impact on Afghanistan and its innocent civilian population has been devastating. The war in Afghanistan has created a huge refugee population, both internally displaced persons and those who used the last of their resources to find a refuge in a safe country such as Canada.

An ancillary problem to the war and the flight of refugees is that most people, out of fear, do not carry ID with them. Many have lost their proper IDs, and their personal belongings have been destroyed in bombing or confiscated during raids and looting. You should also be aware that Afghan children do not obtain any ID until they are at school age. You should also be aware that under the communist system, the vast majority of Afghans were refused permission to leave the country and passports. Many graduates of universities were denied their diplomas out of fear that they would defect.

Thus, the IDs available to Afghan nationals are limited by Canadian standards. Obviously the ability to carry ID is impeded by the war, both in terms of those fleeing and in the ability to communicate after leaving Afghanistan in order to have documents forwarded to Canada.

We appreciate that the ID requirement has been dropped for Afghan refugees in Canada, but the five-year period is considered an unjust punishment of the Afghan community. This will seriously vanish the hope of hundreds of Afghan refugees who have been desperately waiting for the reunification of their family members.

The Afghan Association of Ontario has worked with Citizenship and Immigration Canada for several years, and we believe we have established a good working relationship. We are strong in our belief that we should assist Afghans to be full, participating members of Canadian society.

We feel that the five-year requirement breaks the history of our dealings based on cooperation and good faith. We did not expect that the Hon. Lucienne Robillard, Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, would ignore the long suffering of Afghan refugees and would introduce a five-year waiting period to qualify them for permanent resident status. This is an onerous burden that prevents the majority of Afghans from fully participating in Canadian society.

We urge the Canadian government to reconsider this policy. We would gladly participate in meetings to resolve this issue to our mutual advantage. Thank you very much.

The Chair: Thank you. If there's a written document, we would be happy to have copies of it.

Now, from the Somali Council for Refugees, one representative, please.

Dr. Ulusso: Thank you for the opportunity to appear before this committee today to put forward our point of view on the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration's announcement on Wednesday, November 13, 1996.

The Chair: For the members, you do have a written brief. We appreciate it. Thank you very much.

Mr. Ulusso, please.

Dr. Ulusso: I would like to dwell on 1992, when the government brought in the new legislation, Bill C-86. The revisions to that came into effect in February 1993.

The most curious thing about Bill C-86 was the rather dubious way it took effect in February 1993. However, it was retroactively applied to those previously classified as convention refugees, and no explanation was given.

.1730

The Immigration and Refugee Board itself has created a backlog by delaying notice of hearings and notice of decisions, and unnecessarily sending cases to full hearings, which always require additional time for rescheduling, not to mention added costs.

Wherever you look at the immigration system there is a crisis, whether it is a backlog at visa offices abroad, Canada Immigration Centres, borders, airports or the Immigration and Refugee Board. Worst of all, statistics provided by Mr. Jeff Le Bane, the director for refugee affairs, show that 6,700 to 7,000 Somalis have not yet been landed. Your officials have asked why 3,200 of these people have not landed, and where are they? We share the concern. Working together we would find an answer to those questions, and we believe that under this new regulation, these numbers will prove to be invalid. We believe the number of Somalis to be landed will be less than predicted under the new regulation.

Furthermore, according to Immigration, 40% of those caught in this dilemma are single parents and children. The Somali community feels it has been singled out from other refugees. They were forced into counter-claims with legal aid funding diminishing, fewer lawyers willing to take cases, even to respond adequately to immigration centres, and boards' increased demands. Hearings became increasingly unbalanced as claimants simply were not able to address the various demands placed on them.

Given that Somalis had a high asylum approval rate, their cases did not involve complex legal or factual issues and presented no problems of credibility or inconsistency with known country conditions. One only needed to watch the evening news to know the reason for the exodus.

All indications were that the government was wavering from its commitment to ensure the continued protection of persons found to be convention refugees. It looked as though the government was limiting its responsibility towards Somali refugees by providing only a safe haven. This worried most of the refugees, who faced many years of uncertainty and constant fear of repatriation. Many felt Canada was receiving them temporarily on condition they would one day return to Somalia.

How can an individual get on with life when they find themselves in the position of being unable to be reunited with their families, or without access to loans to further their education? This makes them less likely to get jobs and makes international travel impossible, even in circumstances of family emergencies. This does not come close to describing the human toll this policy is having on people. We have seen marriages break down, mental health problems develop due to stress, self-esteem plummet, and youth have no future and no chance for advancement.

The Chair: Thank you very much. We appreciate your written brief and the fact that you were brief.

From the Somali Centre for Youth, Women and Community Development, I believe it'sMr. Hashi.

Mr. Hashi: First, I want to thank the committee for providing us an opportunity to speak out and present our case.

I would like to present our conditions and the problems of convention refugees. First of all, a large number of Somali immigrants are living in Canada without hope of permanent resident status. As a result of this new regulation, thousands of convention refugees will remain without status. The same people who have been affected by these new regulations are considered by the Immigration and Refugee Board to be genuine convention refugees.

Without landed status, refugees cannot be reunited with family members left behind. The families of these refugees are living in desperate and often dangerous conditions. It's almost impossible to get a job because employers do not hire someone who does not have permanent resident status in Canada. Without status it's extremely difficult to pursue higher education. You cannot start a small business because financial institutions do not grant loans to people with no permanent resident status. Without status it is impossible for non-resident Somalis to properly integrate and contribute to the larger Canadian society. Without status you cannot be qualified for the different training programs that are available. Lack of employment forces many people to depend on welfare, and this will have a great impact on Canadian taxpayers and on the economy in general.

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The proposed new regulations are ineffective for existing problems. Lack of consultation with the affected community - the new regulations do not address existing problems such as family reunification and integration into Canadian society.

The new regulations contradict Canada's fundamental values and commitments to international obligations regarding family reunification. The new regulations have only addressed the so-called undocumented people, but there have been a lot of cases where people with documents have been rejected. We have a list of names available.

During the five-year period suggested by the new regulations, the criminality and security checks required could expire, and renewal of documents could create further delays for people. We feel we have been singled out by these new regulations as potential criminals. Stigmatizing and criminalizing whole communities would certainly have a lasting negative impact for generations to come. These new regulations cause additional hardships to people who are in vulnerable situations and who have already suffered much in their lives. It's unconstitutional and outright discrimination to apply these new regulations to our community. We believe it's a violation of human rights.

Since the immigration department is already removing people with permanent resident status who commit or are party to a crime, there's no apparent use for these new regulations. Our recommendation is that the government grant permanent resident status, amend the Immigration Act to remove the ID requirements, grant permanent resident status to all convention refugees with medical, security and criminal clearances, and request and accept convention refugees to come up with an affidavit.

Thank you for the opportunity.

The Chair: I thank all the witnesses for being brief, and I thank you for your written brief to the members.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez, ten minutes.

Mr. Nunez: First of all, I'd like to offer my greetings to the representatives of the Afghan and Somali communities in Canada. Unfortunately, it would appear there is no one from Quebec. I'm very sensitive to the problems you have experienced and the dramatic situation caused by the civil wars in your countries of origin.

My first question deals with the consultation process. Officials told us that they consulted a great many organizations, including the Somali and the Afghan communities. To date, no other organization has come forward to defend these regulations.

Normally, when consultations take place, consideration is given to the views expressed by the persons or organizations consulted. A number of Somalis in Ottawa told me that they were not involved in such consultations and they have been consistently turned down in their attempts to meet the minister.

How were you consulted? Have you attempted to contact the government, and particularly the minister, to present these situations?

[English]

The Chair: Who would like to answer this? Do you want to begin? Each one of you can answer the question.

Mr. Alekozai: Thank you for your comments.

On November 13 we met the representative of the Minister of Immigration at 4900 Yonge Street in Toronto. I think most of our friends who are sitting here have been there. Nobody was expecting such an announcement - the five-year terms and all those other problems.

We are facing the problems first. We are dealing with refugee claimants; we're dealing with the community members. We know their problems. When the announcement was published and the representative of the Minister of Immigration read it to the audience, we were shocked and surprised.

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We never asked the government or gave any consultation that five-year terms should be given to refugee claimants because there are too many problems in this. That is one side of the issue, and another is preventing people from full participation in Canadian society. That was our clear position and we told them that.

Mr. Nunez: Okay, yes.

Mr. Hashi: Madam Chair, with regard to the process of consultations, as was suggested by the immigration officials who were here another day... As far as the Somali community is concerned, there were two meetings in Toronto - one on April 15, and the second one sometime in August.

We have the minutes of the meetings and the list of those who were present: Mohamed Tabit, who is here, Samanther, Ron Shacter, Kevin Sack, Jeff Le Bane, John Butt, Linda Read,Nancy Worsfold, Tanya Lena and so on.

It seems that the Somalis are the community most affected by Bill C-86 and the new regulations. We expected the immigration department to go to Ottawa, Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto, sit down with the Somali community and consult with them - not necessarily take their points, but at least sit down with them and consult with them.

In the minutes of the April 15 meeting, a solution is proposed by Jeff Le Bane, who appeared before this committee. Changing existing legislation, making existing legislation compatible with affidavits, a council of elders working in a timeframe, i.e. no criminality, no accusations... Without addressing the front end, the status quo remains.

Here it says solutions proposed by the immigration department's representative. When we talk about consultation, we do not necessarily mean that our ideas should be implemented, but that the process should be open and all-inclusive, and that did not happen. Thank you.

The Chair: Is their anything you want to add, Dr. Ulusso?

Dr. Ulusso: Madam Chair, from time to time we meet with government officials, but they do not necessarily listen to what you tell them. So we write to them and they write back, but we already knew the five-year period was in the works. We said this was not acceptable, but they went ahead with it anyway.

The Chair: I hope you realize that this is also a consultation, and that the published regulations in the gazette are also the beginning of a consultation process. I want to make sure our audience out there knows that this too is a consultation by government and opposition members.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez, do you have any more questions?

Mr. Nunez: This present consultation process is being carried out by Parliament, and not by the government. I asked them whether they had been consulted by the government.

Officials tell us that the aim of this regulation is to protect Canada from criminal immigrants, including members of your communities.

Is it a fact that war criminals involved in violating human rights in your countries of origin have come to Canada? If so, what is your attitude toward these war criminals? Have you offered to collaborate with the Canadian authorities in identifying these criminals? When a claim is made about the presence of criminals, this affects the entire community. It's probably to your advantage to say that they are not all criminals. I don't know. I'm asking you the question.

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Is this a serious phenomenon? Is it just a few people? Can you tell us whether it is a serious problem?

The Chair: Mr. Hashi.

[English]

Mr. Hashi: Thank you, Madam Chair.

With regard to the issue of criminals in a given community who come to Canada, Immigration officials accepted the fact that 80% of the people affected by these regulations and by Bill C-86 are women and children - 40% are women and 40% are children. In talking about criminality within a community, when you have 40% of women who are single mothers, whose husbands are not here, and 40% who are children, kids, we must give the benefit of the doubt to the women and children. That's one point.

On the other point as to whether or not the community - the Somali community in particular - has cooperated with Immigration, yes, we have cooperated. The immigration department did not identify any single perpetrator or violator of human rights in Somalia. They let them in here.

We were the guys who told them, ``No, I don't want to have that guy as my neighbour, because I know he has a criminal record in Somalia. He has violated human rights by virtue of his position.''

But on the other hand, we must be very clear about this. In every community there are a very small number of bad apples. You don't victimize the whole community for the few bad apples. Let's get them, but as for the 80% - the kids and women - let's give them peace.

Thank you.

The Chair: Does any other member want to make a comment?

Mr. Alekozai: Yes, though he already explained most of the answer.

The Afghan community was established in 1982 and recognized in 1984. Since that time, we have had regular cooperation with the government and Immigration.

As he said, we pointed out criminals who committed crimes in Afghanistan under the communist regime. They killed two million people and then came to Canada and claimed refugee status. When we got the news, we went to the public, to the media, and also to the immigration authority and to the government and told them this guy killed all these people, yet he was given convention refugee status.

Mr. Nunez: With documents?

Mr. Alekozai: Yes. If you look, for example, at the records of the RCMP, you'll see we cooperated in that regard and were helpful.

As he said, we all suffered. We did not come here as visitors or for pleasure. We left the country due to fear of persecution and due to the oppression of the communist regime in Afghanistan. We all have experienced much violence and also have seen terrible stories.

We don't want anyone like that to have the privilege of Canadian law and regulations for refugees. That person shouldn't be here. He will give a bad name to Canadian society. We don't want that.

Also, if you look at the record of our association, we did cooperate in that regard. It's quite simple to distinguish criminals from legitimate convention refugees.

Also, as I said, there is the human side of the issue. A person cannot sponsor his spouse or his children until he's been a landed immigrant for five years. It's hard. If I were in that position, for example, it would be very difficult for me to not see my wife and my children for five years plus one more year, when I was here claiming refugee status. It's quite difficult for the community to accept that.

Thank you.

The Chair: You have one minute, Mr. Nunez.

[Translation]

Mr. Nunez: As far as documents are concerned, there are probably lots of your compatriots who arrive without a passport. Most of them probably arrive by plane. What types of documents do they have with them?

Normally airlines require certain identity documents. What is the seriousness of the problem? Are there many who don't have a passport? Are there many who arrive with other documents? What are the documents required by the airlines you travel with?

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[English]

Mr. Alekozai: Thank you.

As I said in my brief statement, for people leaving Afghanistan, it's a critical situation. There is gas, fighting, bombing and looting; there has been an ongoing war for 18 years. They don't have the chance to take their children, for example. They leave their children and go to a safer place.

When they cross the border to a neighbouring country, they don't think anything about ID, their national identification or their passport, because there is no government to issue them those documents. They just think of being alive, first.

Secondly, when they get over there, there is no legal status for them in neighbouring countries. There's the same persecution, because those groups are armed and powerful in those countries. Again, the person is in trouble.

Whatever he has... We have examples of people who sold their jewellery. It's the custom in Afghanistan and other countries for women to have jewellery, and they just give it to people to take them from that hell. Again, there's another problem for them. From the misery of some people, other people make business. They take them in a plane or whatever and send them to a country where they can claim refugee status.

For them, the matter is to survive, to be alive. First they think about that.

When they come here and say they're Afghan, it's quite easy for us. Neither the association nor I will ever issue a letter for someone who is not Afghan, because as I say, this is a matter of credibility and honesty. It's quite simple for us to distinguish if a person is from Afghanistan or not.

We do cooperate with the IRB, the Immigration and Refugee Board, to tell them we interviewed this person and he speaks this language, which is an official language in Afghanistan. He is related to that tribe, and it is not possible for someone from a neighbouring country to speak with the same accent or whatever. We confirm this person is an Afghan national.

For some time they accepted that. It's quite easy for someone to be recognized as Afghan.

As I say, they don't bring anything with them, because it's a matter of survival.

The Chair: Mr. Hashi, very quickly.

Mr. Hashi: Very quickly, yes.

On the question of documents, I hope members of this committee will appreciate the cultural background that we Somalis come from. Our language was written as recently as 1972. Before that we were an oral society.

We were colonized by the British, the French and the Italians, so we had French Somaliland, Italian Somaliland and British Somaliland. I come from the British sector; some of my friends come from the Italian sector.

We don't very much relate to documentation. When we come to Canada we are asked to give proof of our age. Honestly speaking, I think I am 54 years old or maybe 56 years old. I can't in all honesty tell you how old I am, nor could my mother. Many people share this view. We don't very much relate to documents.

Yet for those without documents, Immigration does not accept them, many of them. We have cases of Somalis working in Arab countries who get educated in Europe or in North America. If the only ID you can give to Immigration is your university degree, which is written in Italian, Immigration officials say no, this is not an acceptable document, because it's written in Italian and it was not issued in Somalia. But the photo is on that certificate for academic qualification. They won't accept that.

The other thing relating to documentation is the case of the Somali doctor who studied in Romania. When Immigration refused to accept that document, he went to the Romanian embassy. He had it attested after being verified by the embassy. That doctor is not landed yet, because Immigration would not accept that document. His photo is there and it's he himself. They agree with that, but they say this was not issued in Somalia.

What do we do? When you have documents, you are not accepted, and when you don't have them, you are in a greater limbo.

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On the question of how we travel, we are human beings. When you are running for your life... We experienced that. I experienced it. With my eight kids, I had to run. It took me one month to go from Mogadishu to a place called Kismayu.

Sometimes you have to choose between your own children. If it comes to leaving some because you run out of space, you leave the elder ones. We did that. I did that. I left two of my eldest kids back in Somalia. Likely they are somewhere in Europe. I had to make a choice whether to take the smaller ones, who are vulnerable, or the grown ones. These are very difficult choices.

The Chair: We appreciate the stories you have, but if we're going to get through this today we have to get to the question. Thank you very much for the information.

Mr. Hashi: But we are talking about human beings here.

The Chair: And so are we. Thank you.

Ms Meredith.

Ms Meredith: I thank you for explaining to me the difficulty with documentation. Living in a Canadian society, we take it for granted that the minute our children are born, they're registered with a government agency and the government is very much involved in our lives whether we like it or not. I appreciate your explaining, not only to me but to the people who are listening to this, the difficulty with documentation.

What I have heard over the last couple of days is the concern of recognizing some documentation but not other documentation. I understand from what you are saying that this is your concern as well, that there isn't consistency in the department in recognizing documents. So when they say that people are arriving without any documentation, they're really saying that people are arriving with documentation they don't think is valid or they're not willing to accept.

My concern, and I don't know if it's shared by other committee members - and you brought this up when you said you find this is a prejudice against the Somali community because it's singling you out - the reason given to us was that it's because of the numbers with the Afghan community and the Somali community. This has forced the government to deal with it, because the numbers are so large. They haven't experienced that with any other community yet.

That's my concern. I see that this change in legislation might be sending a message to the international community that Canada will no longer require documentation to land. Although I can understand it in your situation, I look at it from where I come from, which is the Vancouver area. We're telling the Chinese community, with a communist regime, with a very bad record on human rights, that for 1.2 billion people the door is open on documentation. My concern is what message this might give.

I don't have a problem with the government saying that with your communities we have a problem, the numbers are there, we've recognized your refugee claim, and we need to deal with this. I don't understand why they say five years, and I haven't had a reason given to me why it's five years. But I do have a problem with them creating a whole new classification that opens the door for other kinds of messages to be sent.

Do you feel you could justify it to the rest of the immigrant and refugee communities in the country if the government were to say that for the Afghan community and the Somali community, we are giving landed status to you, to you alone, tomorrow, and that's the end of it? Could you justify that position to your colleagues in the Iranian community, the Iraqi community and so forth?

Mr. Hashi: This is a very interesting question. We appreciate where you are coming from, and we are glad that you appreciate where we are coming from.

The thing is that we have a specific situation to deal with. The situation you are dealing with is the so-called undocumented refugees. If they had documentation, they would provide it. They don't have it. On the other hand, the majority of Somali refugees who came to Canada did have one type of documentation or another.

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The Somali community in Canada is estimated at about between 80,000 to 100,000; it's in Vancouver, Toronto and Ottawa mostly, and in Quebec. According to Citizenship and Immigration Canada, only 7,000 Somalis are affected by Bill C-86. The overwhelming majority of us who came to Canada came with documentation. The message is there that Canada wants people to produce some sort of document. In the absence of documentation, we propose that people swear an affidavit establishing their identity or, alternately, accept the refugee determination process that identifies the person - Abdul Hakkim is Abdul Hakim, or Mohammed Ali comes from Somalia and that's his date of birth. That's the process to determine this.

The Chair: Does anyone else want to answer? Yes, Dr. Ulusso.

Dr. Ulusso: Ms Meredith, we're not suggesting that Canada should actually allow everybody in without any documents. I don't want to allow everybody to come in without showing any proper ID, but that's not the whole point, actually.

One should ask who created this problem anyway. It's not us; it's the immigration officer at your centres, or the Immigration and Refugee Board itself. As this gentleman said, most of the people have documents, one sort of ID or another, but because of the discretionary powers given to the immigration officer... That is human nature. If you don't know anything about it, it's easy to say this is fake. This is what's happening. That's the whole... We have summer students who work at the immigration centres denying people, saying no, this is not a valid document. There's nothing you can do about it. There's no recourse. That's the whole dilemma.

I can testify in terms of the people of the Somali or Afghan community being affected by this, that they are the most ill-affected, because we don't have a government. Even if we had a government, they would not be able to issue any documents at all. But the reason we have been in this limbo for ten years now...it's really unacceptable. It's time that the government should move and at least do something about it so that these people can get on with their lives. That's all we are suggesting.

The Chair: I think somebody wanted to add something.

Mr. Alekozai: We never said that all Afghan refugees should be given the right to be landed right away, or to be recognized as convention refugees right away, without any proper, acceptable or fair procedure. As I said, there's the IRB, the Immigration and Refugee Board. There's one officer at the board. First they interview the person and they take their notes. Then the person has already gone into the procedure. How can an IRB member determine the credibility of this person in ID matters?

They rely on two issues: credibility and identity. They are already satisfied, with the ID and credibility of this person, that based on this story or this claim the person should be a convention refugee from Afghanistan. It's quite simple.

For landing status, again they say... To me it means the government does not respect the IRB decision. I don't know. Am I right or wrong? Or the ID documents that are prepared for the IRB are not sufficient for the processing centres in Canada. I don't know which one it is.

Ms Meredith: I can't remember which witness brought it up, but the Canadian government, for whatever reasons - and I won't say whether I agree with them or not - has decided that there will be a paper trail; there will be a paper application. They're not going to need to have interviews; they're not going to need to have the person-to-person contact. If the department is making that kind of a change in direction...if you think you have a problem now, it's going to get worse, because the only consideration will be what kinds of papers you can provide to verify...

You didn't really answer my question, which was, how are you going to justify to the other communities that you should be given landed status without documentation when they will not be given the same consideration?

.1805

Mr. Hashi: It is because we are the only two communities that cannot provide the required identification.

We can justify it because it's wrong, from our perspective, to ask for an identification when you come from a culture that doesn't recognize identifications. When you run from a civil war situation, we can justify that a wrong has been righted by the good Canadian government.

Ms Meredith: Okay, thank you.

The Chair: Mr. Cullen.

Mr. Cullen: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I would like to be on record also as congratulating you, Madam Chair, for taking the initiative to have these consultations, which I think are part of the process.

I'd like to welcome the group and thank you for your presentations. I offer a particular welcome to Dr. Ulusso, who is in my riding and who I know very well.

In terms of consultation, I think Dr. Ulusso alluded to the fact that over a long period of time, certainly in Etobicoke North, there has been dialogue between the Somali community, the parliamentary secretary, the minister involved, and myself and others. This is not to say the policy or the pronouncements that come out are always acceptable to all, but I think there has been a fair bit of consultation.

I would like to get to your brief, Dr. Ulusso, and I'd like you to perhaps expand on a couple of points. There are many more Somali refugees in the United States, as we all know. You alluded to the treatment that Somalis are offered there. Perhaps you could expand on that.

Dr. Ulusso: The fact is that the United States of America is receiving nowadays large numbers of Somalis - I would say planeloads actually - who are coming in from neighbouring countries like Kenya, Ethiopia, and what not.

If I was in the U.S. and I had a green card, or even if I didn't have a green card but actually made an application, I could still be allowed to bring my family. Here, in Canada, I have to go through a lot of requirements, and sometimes I will not be able to meet those requirements because of the financial status I might be in at the time.

It's sad to say, but the U.S. seems to be a little bit more humane with respect to the Somali community. There is no need for identification. People are accepted.

Whenever you talk to them, you have to accept them at face value. You don't question them. If they tell you they are Mr. Joe, you accept that they are Mr. Joe, or she is Janet. If you say, prove to me that you are Janet, it creates the whole problem. This is why we are actually finding ourselves in distress.

Mr. Cullen: I'm going to focus on Dr. Ulusso's brief. I'm more familiar with the Somali dilemma than the Afghan one, but I'll apologize for that in advance.

In your paper, Dr. Ulusso, you mention, with regard to the numbers the department has been discussing, 7,000 or so, that you feel it may be significantly less than this. Could you expand on that?

Dr. Ulusso: Actually, when Madam Robillard made the announcement and then subsequently when we attended the briefing, they were saying about 7,600, including the Afghans, who would be landed within this timeframe, which will go into the year 2000 anyway. This is also unacceptable. Some of them will not be even eligible to vote in the second federal elections in the year 2000.

That means it will take ten years for a Somali or Afghan just to become a citizen, which is also unacceptable, while in the U.S. it is only six years of residence, plus the five-year requirement to become a citizen.

What I was alluding to in these numbers was that, as one of the Somali members mentioned, on April 15, Jeff Le Bane said there were 3,200 Somalis who never submitted their application. When we went to the briefing on that day they never mentioned the 3,200.

We are asking whether the 7,000 they mentioned would include the 3,000. If it includes the 3,000, then the number of Somalis that would be landed would not even be close to 6,000. Maybe half of that would be landed in this five-year period, and that's really unacceptable.

We want to know exactly where these 3,200 people went. Where are their applications?

Mr. Cullen: Maybe we could take that on advisement and have a look at that.

.1810

Dr. Ulusso, you mentioned the high asylum approval rate for Somali refugees. What are the implications of that in terms of where we're at now with this issue?

Dr. Ulusso: Knowing the country's conditions, families from Somalia basically have no country to go back to. Canada is known to accept refugees, and if they seek refuge in Canada and are from Somalia, they should be given the benefit of the doubt that they're telling the truth.

The actual numbers are not too high. I wonder if they even come close and that within three months there are that number of people coming to Canada.

We enjoy a high level of acceptance in Canada. We are very grateful to this country and its people. As long as we have a problem, we'd like this trend to continue. That's basically what I'm trying to say.

Mr. Cullen: Dr. Ulusso, you mention that the regulations require submission of a personal information form, and you have some concerns about this. I wonder if you could expand on that.

Dr. Ulusso: This came out of the briefing we had in the afternoon with them when they said we have to bring two forms. There is the first one and then you also have to give your personal information when you make the application as a convention refugee.

The issue of establishing a relationship between me and my family, who will be making claims as refugees and saying they are related to me, is fine. But it is a fishing expedition by the immigration officer to say someone lied on their immigration papers and to ask if it is true that someone has been raped, flogged or jailed. We don't like to revisit what we have already told to the refugee board, or whoever it is. I don't think they are in a position to do that. To establish a relation between me and my family is fine and I can relate to that, but not to other than that.

Mr. Cullen: You mention also, Dr. Ulusso, that the government should do away with inland claims. Would you please elaborate on that.

Dr. Ulusso: This is the situation. If this whole regulation, or the UCRCC, was prompted to deal with front-end issues and that's their main concern, then it can be done more simply than that. People are coming on visas anyway and making claims as refugees. It would be simpler to do away with it, so they don't have to make claims within the country. That's basically what I was referring to.

The Chair: Dr. Hashi.

Mr. Hashi: Yes, but with regard to the last question, I think to do away with inland claims would be contrary to the Geneva Convention on Refugees. When a refugee comes to a country that ratified that convention, you just can't throw that refugee out.

The Chair: Dr. Ulusso.

Dr. Ulusso: We're not talking about the port of entry. We're talking about people who are coming on visas, just flying into the country through Pearson International Airport, or somewhere in Montreal, and then two or three days later going to the immigration office and saying they don't have documents and want to make claims as refugees. Those are the people I'm talking about.

The Chair: I don't want a debate, just a question or the answer. If you want to add one thing, go ahead. Dr. Hashi.

Mr. Hashi: I want to add one thing. With respect to these inland claims, it's not the same. If you come to Ottawa, to Canada, and Somalia is in good shape and then all hell breaks loose, what do you do? If you come out and seek asylum or you are working for the embassy, the regime that's violating the human rights, and you live in Ottawa and the Canadian authorities tell you they won't accept you, that's in contravention of the Geneva Convention.

Thank you.

The Chair: Mr. Cullen.

Mr. Cullen: Dr. Ulusso might want to add to that.

Dr. Ulusso: Naturally, I wasn't talking about high-profile cases. If I'm running away from China and I'm in sports, or whatever, that's fine because I have documents. I'm concerned about that someone who doesn't have documents or who has made a claim in other countries anyway. I'm not just talking about anybody.

The Chair: Do you want a point of order, Ms Meredith?

Ms Meredith: I just want to support that it does happen on a fairly regular basis where people come on visitors' permits. A similar thing happened to a Russian family in the Vancouver area. They came on visitors' permits, claimed refugee status in the interim, and the Soviet Union was no longer... They are being deported because they have found no legitimate claim to refugee status. So it does happen. Decisions are made based on things that do happen that are outside their control.

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The Chair: Thank you, Ms Meredith.

Mr. Cullen, you still have two minutes.

Mr. Cullen: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I refer to the point made by Dr. Barekzai of the Afghan Association. It has always puzzled me, so maybe you could expand on the question about the kind of documentation or the lack of documentation that is needed to get through the IRB.

I think the question you posed about the test of documentation was a good one, as to whether it is the documentation that's required from the point of view of a refugee claimant determination or the documentation required from the point of view of determining landed immigrant status. I've often wondered if it is ever going to get any better. As Dr. Hashi said, if you've run from a very violent situation, how is the documentation getting any better? I think that's the issue we're dealing with. Maybe you could expand on that.

Mr. Alekozai: As I said, the requirement for the Immigration and Refugee Board is that a person should be from Afghanistan, for example, and there is the ID issue and credibility. Some may already by chance have ID, like a national identification document that they brought with them. Possibly it was issued ten years ago and they were afraid to bring their original documents and be caught somewhere in Europe or in other countries. It will then be very hard for them to come to Canada.

If someone doesn't have any ID and the IRB determines that person is a convention refugee, I have found from my experience of eight or nine years that normally the lawyers will call for witnesses. They will ask if anyone from back home knows them, such as a classmate or neighbour, who can say they met him ten years ago. That person is brought as a witness. The refugee hearing officer asks questions about the credibility of this person, how they are related and whether they know that person, or whatever. If she or he is satisfied with the witness as a witness for ID, then that's one matter.

The second is that they will ask for an affidavit from the lawyer for that applicant. That is their practice, and they do that all the time. They will say they are Mr. Y, or whatever, from Afghanistan, related to a certain tribe, and came to Canada as a refugee claimant. Plus, fortunately, they want a letter from the Afghan Association.

As I said, we were established in 1984 and we write letters for people on our letterhead. The writer will say, for example, that they are the president and that they interviewed a person. They will give their name and be a witness from that association, saying the person speaks one of the two official languages in our country, is related to a certain tribe. They will say they have interviewed him and have concluded the person is an Afghan or the family is Afghan. Those are the witnesses, or it might be an immediate family member. If that person has an immediate family member in Canada, that person will be a witness.

In my experience, the IRB does its job. That's proper and it's acceptable for me. If someone doesn't have any ID, that person will be in trouble. Once it's determined that person is a convention refugee based on his story, credibility and ID issue, I think that's enough. Why should the immigration officer or the case person ask them to provide additional ID? That person cannot provide extra ID. If you force them to provide ID, it might, for example, be fake or forged or something, which is not good for a person trying to save his or her life.

The Chair: Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Cullen.

Mr. Sauvageau,

[Translation]

do you have a question?

Mr. Sauvageau (Terrebonne): I'd like to apologize for my late arrival. I'm substituting for Mr. Nunez. I hope that this question has not already been asked. If so, just tell me.

.1820

To help me understand the issue involved here, perhaps you could tell me whether Canada, compared to similar countries like the US, France and Belgium, to name only a few, is more or less permissive, more or less tolerant? What is your view? How would you rate Canada in that particular respect?

If the Chair allows, I'd like to ask some other questions.

The Chair: We are really pressed for time.

[English]

Dr. Hashi, a quick answer, please. Did you understand the question?

Mr. Hashi: Yes. It's a very interesting question.

There are two images of Canada. When you are outside Canada, you have a very good and very pleasant image of Canada: a country with compassion, a rich country, a humanitarian country, and a country that welcomes refugees. That's why many refugees prefer Canada to any other country in the world.

Once you are in and cross the border and deal with Immigration, you are stuck with all those systemic obstacles that are regulatory through Bill C-86, where the regulation is met thereunder or whatever, and you simply cannot go on with your life because your life is being tied foot and hand by different legislation. You get a different perspective when you come in, but still it remains the best country in the world.

The Chair: Is there anyone else? Dr. Barekzai.

[Translation]

Mr. Sauvageau: And what about the regulations?

The Chair: I think he did mention the regulations in his answer.

[English]

This is in terms of the regulations we were talking about, just to be clear.

Dr. Barekzai: Okay. As a Canadian citizen living in this country for nine or ten years, I considered Canada to be the country that respected human rights and defended human rights internationally and nationally. Unfortunately, if this regulation is passed or it sets a law, the problems under Bill C-86 will prevent people from integrating into Canadian society. It's a national problem and it will give a bad reputation to Canada internationally.

We are complaining that in Germany refugees are kicked out. They are detained for four or five years. Why should we compare ourselves to that?

Before it was pointed out how the United States deals with Somalians, but we should not compare ourselves with them. Why should we compare Canada with what's going on in Afghanistan, for example? There are human rights abuses and persecution there. We should not compare Canada with bad things in other countries.

We said Canada is the best country. Canada is the country that we expect to be obliged to follow international law on humanitarian grounds. For example, five million Afghans left their homelands. If you see the record before 1980, nobody was here except for three or four students. Due to the problems, which are international problems and not national problems, the people can't claim refugee status. We expect the Canadian government to give help to the people who left their countries for fear of persecution.

So far, it's a good country that respects human rights, but with these regulations...I doubt it.

The Chair: Ms Meredith, you wanted to add something and then that's it for the group.

Ms Meredith: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I just want to add that I hate defending the government, but in defence of what they're trying to do, there are hundreds of millions of mobile individuals seeking a different life worldwide - people in movement looking for a better life. Canada cannot possibly take all the people who would like a better economic situation.

Canada has to determine who legitimately has a claim under refugee conditions and sort them out from the economic migrants. It may not be seen to be fair to some people and they may not like the decisions that are being made, but decisions have to made as to who is legitimately being persecuted and who just wants a better economic situation for their families.

There have to be regulations. There have to be some controls so that the people most in need of protection are given that protection. Unfortunately, that means a lot of people who would like a chance at a better life in a country that has lots of opportunities are going to have to be denied.

.1825

The Chair: That was a point of order, I gather, Ms Meredith?

Ms Meredith: It was a point of clarification. Thank you.

[Translation]

The Chair: Let me clarify the matter. I gave you extra time because Mr. Nunez had already asked some questions. I'm sorry. In the next turn we'll give you ten minutes.

[English]

Thank you very much.

We'll now call forward the other two groups that are here: the Iranian Community Association and the Eelam Tamil Society.

Would you begin by introducing yourselves for our listening audience and for the members of the committee, please?

The Reverend Francis Xavier (Member, Board of Directors, Tamil Eelam Society of Canada): My name is Francis Xavier, and I am a priest in the Anglican Church of Canada. I am also a member of the board of the Tamil Eelam association in Toronto.

Mr. K. Sivasegaran (Settlement Worker, Tamil Eelam Society of Canada): My name is Sivasegaran. I work for the Tamil Eelam Society of Canada as a settlement worker.

The Chair: Thank you.

Who is here from the Iranian Community Association?

Mr. Mohammed Shams (Vice-President, Iranian Community Association of Ontario): My name is Mohammed Shams. I am vice-president of the Iranian Community Association of Ontario.

Ms Saghi Sadighi (Settlement Officer, Iranian Community Association of Ontario): My name is Saghi Sadighi. I am a settlement officer at the Iranian Community Association of Ontario.

The Chair: You have jointly five minutes each, which will make a total of ten minutes. I would like you to please focus your comments on proposals for change to improve the regulations. That was the purpose of us inviting you before the committee.

We'll begin with the Iranian Community Association. Is Mr. Shams going to start, or is Ms -

Ms Sadighi: I'll do it.

The Chair: Please go ahead.

Ms Sadighi: There is one thing that we would emphasize here. This legislation should not be for a designated class only, or designated groups. It should be for everyone if it should pass.

The other thing that we would like to emphasize here is that by asking for proper ID from convention refugees, basically the Canadian government is asking them to go to the Iranian consulate to ask for proper ID. This means going to the same country that they fled and from which they fear persecution. According to the 1951 Convention on Refugees, no convention refugee should be forced to go back to his or her country. As the Iranian embassy is considered the territory of the Iranian government, we don't think it's right to force the refugees to go there to ask for ID.

These are the main points I wanted to make. Besides those, there is just one more thing. This regulation places a lot of pressure on the community. The community will become marginalized. It's hard to integrate into mainstream society, and we think this will be problematic in the long term.

The Chair: Do you want to add anything, Mr. Shams?

Mr. Shams: Actually, I just wanted to add, along the same line, that families or members of families wait here for four or five years. They basically cannot do anything. They will stay here without getting proper Canadian ID. They cannot go on with their lives. They cannot start a business. They cannot start schooling. They cannot bring their families here. This will add both financial problems and psychological problems to the ones already faced by the person, and that also places a burden on Canadian society.

The Chair: From the Eelam Tamil Society, Reverend Xavier.

.1830

Rev. Xavier: The Tamil community has begun to develop deep and profound fears about what has happened to our brothers and sisters in the Somali and Afghan communities. This law might proceed...because of that terrible, heinous war that is going on behind closed doors. Hundreds and thousands of Tamils are moving by sea into India, and without any identity. The same situation might come up again over here; therefore we want to express that fear to you. We also want to express our solidarity with them - with the Afghans and with the Iranians - and particularly with the proposals made by the CCR and the Canadian Bar Association.

One thing I would like to emphasize here is the idea that each case has to be studied in different situations. Given what has happened to our Somali brothers and sisters, they do not deserve to be treated in the way in which the Canadian immigration system has treated them. That is a special situation, thus to have fear that there is news spreading all over the world that no documentation is needed and that people are therefore going to come is, I think, kind of an attempt at pre-empting something that doesn't exist in one way.

The other thing is the whole question of what will happen to a people in such large numbers - and perhaps to us in the future - if we are going to be marginalized like that and be kept in a way that we cannot bring our families in, especially if that five-year period can be extended for longer periods. What we are doing is destroying the very values for which we stand - the family values, the youth values - while we tell the children of today that they have to look after the future and build up Canada - Toronto, Ottawa and all these places. We are all immigrants. Only the time is different, isn't it? Therefore, we should build a place where there is confidence created among the people.

I do not want this to be seen as a sort of motherhood argument, but the other last point I'd like to make is the same as the one the honourable MP made about image. It's something that we had in the previous years about Canada, but it is now going down the tube. Why? We don't know.

At the same time, Canada is reaching out all over to increase trade, even in East Timor. I can't understand that. If we are going to feel in Sri Lanka, in India, and among the Tamils, that what Canada is doing here is pulling the carpet out from under our peoples feet, how on earth can you have a good image when you go for trade? I therefore appeal, on behalf of all those people with whom we stand in solidarity and on behalf of all the Canadian people who in conscience feel we are welcoming people, that you do what the first nations did to the Europeans when they first came: welcome them.

Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you.

I believe Canada is still a country that welcomes and has open borders, but I will put that on record as my opinion.

We will begin with Mr. Sauvageau.

I'm sorry. Did you want to add anything, Mr. Sivarsegaran? You have two minutes.

Mr. Sivarsegaran: I want to say something that is very new. So far, it is something not one of these people has talked about. The purpose of asking for identification is to restrict immigrants. That's very clear. Before 1993, landed immigrant status was issued without proper identification.

Another thing they are asking for is pre-dated identity documents. I don't know whether all of you know that, but they say the identity documents we submit should pre-date our claim. I am asking why we can't submit post-dated identity documents. If people don't carry identity documents when they leave their country, but come to Canada through their relatives and friends living in Sri Lanka, it is still possible for some people to obtain their birth certificates. They will post-date the claim, however, because the date of application comes after they claim refugee status in Canada. The emphasis on pre-dated documents is something that is ridiculous. It's very clear they are putting up some barriers to prevent immigrants from coming from other countries. This asking for pre-dated documents must be stopped forthwith.

.1835

I can tell you one case where, when I attended a meeting, they said, if we are satisfied with the documents they produce, we may issue landing for a family. The husband produced everything. His wife didn't have a pre-dated document, but was able to give a marriage registration certificate. Two children were born in Canada and both the father's and mother's names appeared on their birth certificates. I also sent some photographs - wedding photographs, their birthday photographs, and things like that. After six months, they said they wrote to the national headquarters, which refused, saying these pieces of identification were not sufficient. Therefore I am very concerned about this asking for pre-dated documents.

The Chair: I appreciate your comments, and thank you. I would like to just ask a question before we begin, because it is something that has come up in the inquiries we had with the officials. Does either group know how many undocumented cases there are in your communities? Do you have any idea?

Ms Sadighi: No data.

The Chair: Any guess? Are there 500, 1,000? What are we talking about?

Ms Sadighi: No idea - sorry.

Mr. Sivasegaran: Our target is between 4,000 and 5,000.

The Chair: Undocumented.

Mr. Sivasegaran: Yes.

The Chair: Refugee.

Mr. Sivasegaran: Who are not landed because of identity documents, yes.

The Chair: Okay. Do you have any documents in that respect for the committee?

Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

Mr. Sivasegaran: They are mostly children. The children born after 1986 are the problem in our community, because they are unable to produce identity documents for those people, as they were not registered with the registrar general's regional office and in central government.

The Chair: What are you basing the figure on?

Mr. Sivasegaran: As it is now, Etobicoke is the controlling office for CIC - they issue the landing. There are, according to our records, 4,000 to 5,000 who are not landed for three years for not submitting identity documents - for their children, mostly.

The Chair: Thank you very much. It gives us a good idea.

[Translation]

Mr. Sauvageau: What you say is very interesting but it is a very thin line, I think. I was listening earlier to the Somali group. Of course I feel a lot of compassion there is really little leeway in the case of undocumented immigrants.

You say that you are putting your trust in us. I'm sure that the great majority of these people are acting in good faith and are making only fair and legitimate claims when they come here.

Nonetheless, we all know that unfortunately, there are some who are taking advantage of the gaps in our system. You would all like to benefit from this exception even though you realize that there could be abuse.

Where can we draw the line in grey areas and still give the greatest benefit of the doubt? You are partly right but I think that we have to be careful.

[English]

Ms Sadighi: Lots of people may abuse the system, but that doesn't have anything to do with IDs. If a person doesn't have the proper ID, it doesn't mean he's abusing the system, and vice versa.

[Translation]

Mr. Sauvageau: No, no.

[English]

Ms Sadighi: That's it; I don't think they are mutually exclusive. It's like criminality. You can be a convention refugee and submit proper ID to become a landed immigrant, and you still may be a criminal. It doesn't have anything to do with that. I don't think one depends on the other.

.1840

The Chair: Ms Shams.

Ms Shams: I would like to respond to the other part of your question, which was how someone could be identified as a criminal when he comes to this country.

I think, Mr. Sauvageau - you arrived after we'd talked a little bit here - the community actually knows who comes to the country and who goes. The community can recognize, can help Immigration, can help the refugee board, can help the government - in fact, the investigators - determine who is the real refugee and who is not; who has come here to take advantage of the system; who is the potential criminal who has done crime in that country. The community knows whether they are actual refugees or not. It knows which part of the country they come from. It can cooperate with the government, and has done so.

Our Afghan friends, before we came here, were explaining that. They have helped the IRB, the officers. They have helped their government in that way and they have recognized and identified people - that they were criminals.

The Chair: Does anybody want to add anything?

Mr. Sivasegaran: Yes. As far as Sri Lankans are concerned, before 1983 nobody wanted to come to Canada, because we were well off and there was not much of a problem. Even if the problem is solved tomorrow, I can assure you 90% of us will go back, including me. That means we are real refugees, and we are not interested in living here. We have some difficult problems, and we have not come here to earn anything, to make some profit, or to get financial benefit.

When I came in 1984, when I said I was from Sri Lanka, many Canadians asked me where it was. Nobody knew where it was. Now it's popular, because of the problem. Even if the problem is solved tomorrow, many of us will go back. That is to say, we have come here as real refugees.

Rev Xavier: My brief comment is that in a general way, I think if people are going to come in large numbers, we'll know why they are coming off like that and from where. In other words, the whole environment will tell us that.

The second point is, I think Canada is a multicultural community, and it cuts closest to the bone of Canada. Canada is becoming more and more multicultural. That phenomenon cannot be made positive until all groups begin to have confidence - deeper and deeper confidence - in the communities in which we are living. I think that confidence will eventually fructify in helping in situations like that - with the Canadian immigration...or the Canadian government. What we have found is cooperation and changes, and if people are making a push towards that, then we will work harder on that.

[Translation]

The Chair: Mr. Sauvageau.

Mr. Sauvageau: Could you quickly describe to me the difficulties you encounter in your respective country in obtaining documents enabling you to reach the border with relevant information to legalize or facilitate your entry?

For example, in Iran, what are the main problems you face?

[English]

Ms Sadighi: Can I start?

The Chair: Yes, please, go ahead, Ms Sadighi.

Ms Sadighi: Whoever wants to leave Iran should obtain a passport, and it's hard for people who are in conflict with the government politically to obtain a proper document. Even if they do obtain a passport, even if they had a passport previously, at the port of entry or exit they get caught, and the passport usually gets confiscated right away, and who knows what's going to happen later?

.1845

That's the difficulty, basically. You can get a passport, or you may have a passport, but you cannot use it. Lots of times people leave Iran illegally, from the mountains, by foot, by bus, without having any proper documentation. Sometimes, unfortunately, they can bribe and get false documentation. Sometimes the government becomes corrupted.

Mr. Shams: It's also difficult when they come here and they claim refugee status if they don't have proper documentation and the Canadian officials ask for their documentation. They cannot go back to their embassy - to the embassy of Iran, let's say - and ask for the documentation, because they fled from that country and they are therefore against that country. They are stepping back into their territory, which is the embassy. They cannot do that. They cannot obtain their passport or any documentation from the country they fled from.

The Chair: Are there any comments from the Tamil community?

Mr. Sivasegaran: I would like to explain how the registration of birth takes place in Sri Lanka.

There will be a local registrar for each village. When a child is born in the hospital or at home in a village, the parents register the birth with a registrar of the village. He takes this registration and registers it again at the provincial level. Then the provincial level goes to the central level. So there are three stages.

About 500,000 people moved from the northern province to other places, and the newspapers said most of the babies were delivered under the trees. The mothers were just hidden with saris so that other people could not see. There were no hospitals functioning.

Under these circumstances it's not possible for those people to go in search of the registrar and do the registration, because he doesn't have an office anywhere.

For the young generation, especially for children born after 1986, it's not possible in some cases to submit any sort of document, because they have not gone to school. For these young people it is impossible, and the only documents their parents can produce is the affidavit. If they had gone to school...of course, the school-leaving certificate is accepted by Immigration.

Some of the other people are in a position to obtain their post-dated documents. These post-dated documents must be accepted by Immigration as a valid identity document.

The Chair: Thank you.

[Translation]

Mr. Sauvageau, do you have another question? You have the time.

Mr. Sauvageau: My question is addressed to the representatives of the Iranian community. Sir, following your last intervention, the Ambassador of Iran in Canada organized the visit of a Canadian delegation to Iran in November. A number of parliamentarians and one senator were invited, if I'm not mistaken. I haven't received any report on this trip but it would seem their visit was a fairly friendly and open one.

Could you comment on the attitude of the Ambassador from Iran inviting Canadian delegations? What is his purpose? Why does he do this and how?

[English]

The Chair: If you can't answer, you can say so. You can have no comment.

Mr. Shams: I can actually make a comment about that.

Is your question on whether there is a political connection between Iran and Canada now, and why are Iranian people still asking for refugee status?

[Translation]

Mr. Sauvageau: Perhaps I wasn't clear enough. Do you think it's a public relations exercise or is there a real desire to facilitate relations between the two countries?

The Chair: Mr. Sauvageau, I don't see what relevance your question has to the subject we are discussing here.

Mr. Sauvageau: I see. Excuse me, Madam Chair.

.1850

[English]

Ms Meredith.

Ms Meredith: Thank you, Madam Chair.

Mr. Shams, you made a comment that without landed status you cannot start school and you cannot start a business. I've heard this before, but I don't understand it. What does landed status have to do with starting a business or with children starting school?

Mr. Shams: First of all, I will start with schooling. If you are not a landed immigrant, you can do your schooling up to grade 12 or grade 13 in Ontario and finish this. Further than that, you will be considered a visa student. You cannot pay the tuition fees the way a Canadian can. Therefore, you can find it hard to get into university, even though you are a talented person and you have the ability to continue your education.

Ms Meredith: My understanding from the department officials is that under Ontario law you pay the same as you would if you were a Canadian student. You cannot be charged international fees if you are considered to be a genuine conventional refugee. You must be charged only Canadian fees. From the discussion, I understand student loans, bursaries and scholarships are different.

What about a business? Where are the prohibitions to starting a business?

Mr. Shams: If you are a conventional refugee and you don't know what your status is, whether you will be accepted as a landed immigrant or not, you cannot psychologically start anything. You think you are not established. That's the psychological part of it.

Another actual part of it is that when you go to the bank, the bank will ask you for a passport. Usually they ask for some proper Canadian ID. You don't have that. You cannot show them just a minister's permit or something that shows you are a refugee claimant or you are a conventional refugee. They do not accept that.

Ms Meredith: So getting financing to start a business and that sort of thing is where you would run into difficulty.

Mr. Shams: That's right. It's not honoured in the same way as it would be honoured if you would have that proper Canadian landed immigrant ID.

The Chair: Mr. Sivasegaran wanted to add something.

Mr. Sivasegaran: He has missed one thing. The bank grants loans for landed immigrants only. A person who starts a business would naturally like to obtain a loan from a bank. The convention refugee is not entitled to obtain the loan.

Ms Meredith: I find that interesting.

There is another area I am interested in. I know in Vancouver refugee claimants from both of your communities get landed status and then they go back to their country of origin. Why would they do that, and how would they do that if there is this persecution? If they can't go into an embassy for documentation, how can they go back to the country of origin once they get landed status?

Mr. Shams: It's not a case that can apply to everybody. Perhaps some people are actually doing that at their own risk. I will give you an example. Let's say my country is a prison. I'm a prisoner and I have committed a crime. By successfully digging a hole through the ground I flee from the prison and go out. It is my choice to go back and have a cup of tea or coffee with the prison officer. Perhaps he would recognize my face: You were here before; you haven't been here for ten months or so.

Do you appreciate what I am saying?

Ms Meredith: The reason I ask that is because it doesn't happen once or twice. It's quite a common occurrence for people to flee persecution, get refugee status, get landed status, and then travel back and forth to the country they have fled from.

Is there some protection to having a landed status, or is it just as you said, that some people are willing to take risks?

.1855

Mr. Shams: Not everybody, actually. In the cases you have heard of...we tend, of course, to exaggerate some things. I would say that the cases are very minimal, and perhaps when you hear there is one bad apple, you probably think all the apples in the basket are bad. But they do that at their own risk, of course.

Ms Sadighi: I just wanted to add that lots of times either the husband or the wife is a conventional refugee and the rest of the family gets landed status because of this, so sometimes there's no risk for the wife to go back. That usually happens, and I think it's a personal choice.

I'm a Canadian citizen. I was a refugee once, but I don't dare to go close to my embassy even just to get the application forms. Somebody does it; somebody doesn't do it.

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Cullen.

Mr. Cullen: Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, lady and gentlemen.

I had a question on the issue of jobs. We talked about business and other things. Someone who has refugee status is trying to become landed but is looking for a job. I've heard different things and have some difficulties with that. Could you comment on this?

Ms Sadighi: My job, for example, is funded through the federal government. If I'm not a landed immigrant, I cannot obtain that job. It's as easy as that. Conventional refugees get social insurance numbers that start with 9, and not 4 or 5 as the others. So when they go to apply for a job, unfortunately, not knowing the rules, they get discriminated against. That's very routine actually. You see it every day, but you can't do anything about it. You can just educate people to say they can't discriminate against you.

It's tough for the businesses when you don't have a status to rent a place, to start your own business, or to get the finances, as we said before, and even to get the proper partners to start the business.

The Chair: Mr. Sivasegaran, did you want to add anything?

Mr. Sivasegaran: It is marked actually in the citizenship question book that funds are to be given for a landed immigrant or citizen for a federal government job. It's written, and therefore a convention refugee doesn't deal with this. However, he updates his qualifications, and if he's clever he can find a job for some time. If he also has this identity issue, he'll be very frustrated waiting for five or six years to become a landed immigrant or a citizen. In fact, especially for federal government jobs they are stressing that matter, and that's a bad sign actually.

The Chair: I would like a point of clarification from the Sri Lankan community. The subject today was supposed to be on the regulations, and the Iranian community asked that the regulations be expanded to include the Iranian community. Are you asking for the same thing, or do you have recommendations for the committee?

Rev. Xavier: Yes, we ask that it be extended to the Sri Lankan community too.

We would also like to thank you very much for giving us this opportunity to appear before you.

The Chair: I thank you for coming.

Did you have a comment, Ms Sadighi?

Ms Sadighi: I just didn't say the Iranian community in particular...I would expand it to everyone.

The Chair: To everyone who has no documents?

Ms Sadighi: All the communities or future communities that might have the same characteristics as the Somalian or the African or the Iranian...

The Chair: With no waiting period.

Ms Sadighi: No, I wouldn't say that. I would say just extend it to include everyone in order not to have the designated group. That's it.

The Chair: Thank you very much for coming before the committee.

I invite now the Table de concertation de Montréal pour les réfugiés. Come forward, please.

We have with us today Ms Rivka Augenfeld, president, and Jean-François Goyette,

[Translation]

lawyer. Welcome. You may begin.

.1900

Ms Rivka Augenfeld (Chair, Table de concertation de Montréal pour les réfugiés): I'd like to thank you for giving us this opportunity to appear in spite of such a short notice. I intend to make my presentation partly in French and partly in English. French is my third language and I hope you will be indulgent. At certain points I'd like to be as precise as possible.

The Table de concertation de Montréal pour les réfugiés is an umbrella organization with a present membership of 84 organizations. It has been in existence since 1979 and has taken part in a number of consultations and various types of meetings of this committee. On several occasions we have unfortunately foreseen problems that later materialized.

So we do have a long experience in this field. We provide assistance to organizations active in this area and deal with problems as they come up but we also have an overall view of the situation and can claim to have predicted a number of problems. I hope that this time you will listen to us.

The Chair: That is one of the reasons why we invited you.

Ms Augenfeld: I hope that the committee will be able to bring some common sense, humanity and morality to bear on this difficult situation.

In theory we agree with the proposal of the CCR and the Canadian Bar. I don't want to repeat what others have already said, I'll attempt to add to their point of view.

It is important to emphasize that the committee does have the possibility today to rectify the mistake committed in Bill C-86, which came into effect in 1993. It is the former government that passed this bill.

A number of members of the government at the time were opposed to Bill C-86 as well as members of the then opposition, who now form the government, for the reasons we now understand and because of all the problems that are not occurring. We wonder why nothing has been done to correct these mistakes.

We wonder whether there might be a disagreement between Immigration Canada and ICSI. We note that Immigration Canada does not accept the fact that ICSI has given acceptance to people as refugees.

Over several years of discussions with officials, discussions in which I participated with other members of my coalition, we seemed close to an agreement or a reasonable solution to this problem. But suddenly, without any advance notice, in spite of all sorts of formal and informal meetings, both public and private, we find ourselves facing draft regulations adopting an extreme approach and giving rise to a new problem.

[English]

I feel this regulation is unnecessary. You don't need a new regulation and you don't need a new class. All you need to do is revisit Bill C-86 and amend the sections that presented the problem in the first place. The officers can have discretion and they can use it positively.

Why do the same types of documents get accepted from some countries but not from others? We keep talking about undocumented people. They are not undocumented. Most of them have some kind of document; it's just a question of whether they get accepted or not.

I don't want to go into a country-by-country analysis here, but in our practice we see people from various countries who seem to have these problems with documentation. It seems to be arbitrary and it seems to be a problem. I don't have statistics. Immigration has the statistics.

There's always a possibility for discretion, and instead of a solution we're creating a new problem. What will be the result? Innocent people will suffer. The families of these people will suffer.

Is this committee ready to go to Kenya or to other countries to tell the families of the people who are here why they have to wait? If the committee adopts this regulation, I think you should be ready to get on a plane and tell those families why they have to wait. They surely can't believe what they've been told by their families.

These families feel abandoned. They can't believe their family member in Canada can't fix it. This creates stress and guilt for the family members here. You have women and children and others sitting in camps, whose lives are on hold. Some of them are in danger - not all, but many - and you are telling them too bad for you.

It's always the victim who suffers. Over and over again the victims suffer, because we're so concerned about a few potential abusers. You always make everyone suffer, and it's always the refugee who suffers more than anybody else.

.1905

[Translation]

Our Table de concertation has just concluded a scientific research project conducted according to methodology approved by sociologists. This research document is entitled "The Impact of Secondary Family Separation on Immigration Policies Relating to the Mental Health of Refugees". It will soon be published.

I do not intend to discuss all the research that was done but one of the main points deals with our sampling of persons interviewed. A high proportion of these persons had undergone traumatic events in their country of origin. They were victims of torture, imprisonment or threats and had witnessed violent acts. It was discovered that the refugees who were most vulnerable to the effect of separation from their family were those who had gone through difficult or traumatising events in their country of origin.

Our findings demonstrate that the negative impact of the interaction between separation and mental health trauma tends to disappear when people are reunited with their family.

Unfortunately we cannot provide you immediately with the results of this research. However, it does show that the greater the amount of suffering in one's country of origin, the greater the suffering caused by separation from one's family. Refugees are the ones that will suffer the most as a result of the new situation we are creating. I do not see how this can be justified.

[English]

False documents don't make false people. In Casablanca we all think it's so romantic when Humphrey Bogart gives Ingrid Bergman the papers so that she and her husband can escape from Casablanca. I don't know what we would do with those people once they got to our gates.

Raoul Wallenberg is a hero. He gave thousands of people false identities to escape from Hungary. There are statues in his name in Montreal and even in Budapest. What would have happened to the people to whom he gave those identity documents if they came to our doors and couldn't provide birth certificates from places that were burned to the ground?

Let's think about that as well. It is an emotional subject for us, but I don't think it's just emotion that's reigning here. We have to look at who is suffering and who is paying for this totally unnecessary regulation.

I'm going to stop now.

[Translation]

I'll now turn the floor over to my colleague Jean-François Goyette who will make a few additional points relating to other aspects of this regulation.

Mr. Jean-François Goyette (lawyer, Table de concertation de Montréal pour les réfugiés): I'll be brief. I'm Jean-François Goyette and I am a lawyer. I've been practising immigration law for 16 years now. I've already been a member of the executive of the Canadian Bar Association and I have already appeared before your committee in this capacity.

I find the logic of this bill quite appalling, both in its construction and the way in which it attempts to achieve certain objectives. It's important to note that the draft regulations refer to enhanced security at Canadian borders over a period of five years. I think that this is a way of creating a false sense of security.

This draft regulation contains misconceptions which I find to be quite inappropriate. First of all, the identity document is no proof that the person is not or has not been a criminal or will not engage in criminal activities.

It merely indicates that the person has an identity and this identity must be researched. It's perfectly normal for a country like Canada to attempt to find out who the person arriving in Canada is but the identity document does not provide us with any guarantee of the person's good behaviour. That is what the summary of the impact study supporting the draft regulation would appear to suggest.

I personally am amazed to see the following statement on page 32.56.

The evaluation of their behaviour during these five years in Canada would replace the background check normally carried out for all immigrants, including refugees, in view of the fact that the efficiency of this type of check is limited if the person's name and personal information concerning him or her cannot be confirmed by official records.

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I consider this to be absurd. Why? If a person, either documented or undocumented, claims to be John Doe, Immigration must make an attempt to verify this if it is possible.

Whether there are documents or not, such inquiries must be made. In my view, the implementation of a criterion relating to the possession of valid documents cannot be considered sufficient assurance or guarantee of the fact that these people are who they claim to be. There are other ways of verifying this and I hope that the Department of Immigration will do what is required.

Furthermore, as far as documents are concerned, there is a basic area which has not been assessed in the impact study as a whole, namely family reunification. It is totally against Canada's interest to bring about the continued separation of families through the application of this strict regulation relating to identity papers.

I personally have had a good many refugees as clients. I have seen situations where families were separated. Even with identity papers, reunification was often difficult. I must say that this did give rise to important problems of all types. You must also realize that such problems entail costs.

I have a client who had to wait for four and half years before his three children, living in totally unacceptable conditions, were able to come to Canada. At the present time, when clients have families who will be coming after a long separation, I always advise them to consult social workers in order to lessen the shock of being together again.

Generally, claimants who want to have their children and dependents come make promises of the type: "I consulted my lawyer and you'll be able to come next year or in six months or a year from now". This waiting period creates a good deal of tension for people who are living in conditions that are often far more difficult than when the refugee left.

Many children have suffered from this kind of separation. They've experienced trauma and have ended up becoming delinquents. There is a centre for delinquents in Quebec in Shawbridge where the abominable effect of this kind of separation and reunification can be seen. It has given rise to a special class of delinquents. I think that this is an aspect that should be studied. It is important because we are creating more problems than we are dealing with.

Now let's turn to the five-year period. This is a figure that's been drawn out of a hat and has no relationship either with the DROC, as was noted by Mr. Matas, or the Citizenship Act. You know as well as I that a three-year period is required to obtain Canadian citizenship.

In other words, Canada gives immigrants the chance to become canadian citizens after only three years. We offer the thing that is most valuable, Canadian citizenship, after three years but we require five years to verify whether certain people are considered to be reasonably acceptable, I think that that is absurd.

I'll limit my comments to that. Let me simply make one last point relating to other countries. Two countries were mentioned. Having studied the situation in different countries, I know that as a result of some incongruous situations prevailing in certain countries, documents cannot be obtained.

You have seen people from the Iranian community. I have Iranian clients. There are cities in Iran, I'm thinking of Abadan which was completely destroyed during the Iran-Irak war and other Kurdish towns in Irak that were completely destroyed during the Gulf War - there are cities there that were razed. I have a photograph of Abadan. It looks like Hiroshima after the bomb.

.1915

It is impossible to have identity documents and the State of Iran provides very little assistance. If you were born in Abadan or in the kurdish region of Iran, you will not have any ID documents. That is the case in Iran. We could look at countries throughout the world. There are many countries where it is quite impossible to obtain ID documents. The fact that these two countries are singled out does create a situation of inequality.

I maintain that no only should we scrap this regulation but we should also remove the provision that was put into effect as a result of Bill C-86.

The Chairman: Thank you.

Ms Augenfeld: I have one last point to add.

[English]

The Chair: A very short one.

Ms Augenfeld: Very short.

I want to mention another example and the terrible irony. We have cases in Montreal - just a few of many others from Zaire - of families that have been separated since 1993 because of this regulation. In the best of times, family reunification from some countries is very difficult. We don't have immigration officers everywhere.

How are you supposed to get anything done in Zaire? The country's about to explode. Even our delegates abroad - the other day Raymond Chrétien said the country's about to explode. The Canadian government can't even get Zairois documents for those people it is trying to deport to Zaire, so it is sending people back with Canadian single-journey forms. If the Canadian government can't get a document for a person they're trying to deport, a refugee who doesn't have documents that satisfy Immigration - what are they supposed to do? It just doesn't make any sense.

The Chair: Thank you.

As a note of clarification, we will be studying the Immigration Act. The minister recently announced that there will be a task force studying all aspects of the Immigration Act. I just want to put that on the record.

[Translation]

Mr. Sauvageau: You mentioned, Ms Augenfeld, in your presentation that you were very close to a reasonable resolution before the adoption of the law in 1986 but that things later changed and we find ourselves in the present situation. What was this reasonable solution and what amendments or corrective steps would you suggest to us?

Ms Augenfeld: It seems to me that we did have a system that worked fairly well before 1993. We are not talking about prehistory. We seem to have a very short memory across the board. We forget that three and half years ago we did have a system that did not settle all cases but did deal with most of them. Mr. Goyette can bear witness to this.

We were successful in satisfactorily identifying people. I challenge the government to ask Immigration Canada how many people were given permanent residence before 1993. How many of these people later ended up becoming problem cases?

I'd like to have the statistics. I don't have them. How many people later on proved to be problem cases?

Since the adoption of bills C-86 and C-44 we have all the provisions we need to deport people. We have more than what is required. We don't need any more difficulties. It seems to me that if we went back to the situation before the implementation of C-86, that would be the solution.

These endless discussions with officials are very difficult. We held meetings with the communities and representatives of the larger coalition. There seemed to be an agreement in favour of verification, affidavits, clan lines, etc.

I come from a family who arrived in Canada in 1948. I was two years old. I was born in a camp for displaced persons. My parents had no documents. It is not said here, but I think that none is too many. We know the history and we are proud of the fact that we have evolved since then. We have learned from our mistakes. We will not do that anymore. We will no longer be racists, we will no longer be anti-semitic, we will no longer do any of that, but I hope that, in a few years' time, there will not be another book which will be the None is too many of this time. Which will prove how we committed new injustices on behalf of I do not know what group.

.1920

Despite of the difficulties, my parents arrived here, with the help... they had to prove their identities, but they certainly didn't do this with the help of documents from Warsaw, my father's city, where everything had been destroyed.

[English]

People vouched for each other. People gave affidavits and identities were established.

[Translation]

We can do this now. We cannot keep repeating the same mistakes ad infinitum, we cannot keep creating new tragedies and say, a few years later,

[English]

oh well, we made a mistake. This mistake is going to cost people their lives and their health.

[Translation]

As Mr. Goyette said, this comes as a cost to society. Everyday we see people whose mental health is fragile, people who become ill, people who cannot work to their full potential and who must rely on welfare benefits and, finally, children who cannot go to school. All of this costs us money. We are creating new problems for ourselves. Why? We have nothing. The Department has given us nothing to show that this was necessary.

The Chair: Mr. Goyette.

Mr. Goyette: I would like to add an important point. In the impact study, in the Canada Gazette, one of the solutions being given consideration was to repeal the current legislative provision. Among other things, it was said that this was not being given any consideration, because that would not encourage those people who could in fact produce identity papers to do so.

Bill C-86 has changed the rules for those seeking permanent residence and for those applying for refugee status.

Since C-86, it is systematic: identity documents must be presented. It is mandatory to produce these documents and they are examined, not only by the Board, through hearing officers, but also by ministerial representatives.

When a administerial representative is suspicious about the identity, documents or whatever is presented and a cross-examination is conducted. In my opinion, this is the best place for questioning somebody's identity. I am not saying that we should question the identity documents, I am saying that we should question an individual's identity.

I agree with David Matas who said that it was quite reasonable, under the circumstances, to leave it up to the status section, as is the case now, to check the identity of a person with or without documents. I think that it is clear, however, this has been excluded from the document. Quite simply, no mention has been made of this.

The Chair: Thank you.

[English]

Ms Meredith.

Ms Meredith: Thank you, Madam Chair.

I hope to draw on your legal background here.

I have to assume that the five-year timeframe the department has put into this regulation is their attempt to protect Canada. They have a job to protect Canada from whatever, and I assume this is their attempt to do that.

If the department were to give conditional landed status on the condition that they uphold or respect the laws of Canada, or whatever the terminology was in the agreement, would that, from a legal perspective, provide the same protection that this five-year...if you show us that you respect the laws and norms of Canada for the five-year period of time?

If tomorrow they said we give you landed status on condition that you respect the laws of Canada and abide by the norms of society, would that be legal enough protection for the country?

Mr. Goyette: I think that's exactly the case. When we land somebody, he has the right to remain in Canada, but he can be removed from Canada if he does not abide by the law - by any criminal act, if he has been sentenced to six months in jail or anything like that. So it is implicitly conditional.

Do you have in mind something additional in terms of conditions or -

Ms Meredith: Not necessarily, but I think the government is finding out now that Bill C-44 didn't work so well, that it's quite difficult to remove criminals. We just noticed the Federal Court of Appeal upholding the appeal of somebody who was convicted of trafficking in narcotics.

It's not easy to remove somebody from Canada for criminal activity. Perhaps that's their fear, that if they don't give the landed status, the legal status prior to... If it's a contractual arrangement between the individual applying and the government, is it easier to say you broke the contract; therefore you don't have any legal right to stay?

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Mr. Goyette: I don't think there is a basic difference. As David Matas explained earlier, there is no additional advantage for somebody who is not landed but a convention refugee than for somebody who is landed who is a permanent resident. I would say they both have the same access, and also the same restrictions, to the appeal section of the IRB.

Ms Meredith: So there's no advantage really to this five-year -

Mr. Goyette: I fail to see any kind of advantage. For example, somebody who has committed a crime against humanity in another country would have his permanent residency removed. He would even have his citizenship removed if he gained citizenship, because he has to say that he has not committed any crimes against humanity. Even if he has not been convicted of any crimes against humanity, if there is sufficient proof that he has committed those crimes, he will be stripped of his citizenship and of his permanent residency. There is no legal advantage at any point.

Ms Meredith: Thank you.

Ms Augenfeld: I'm going to go back a step. It's very ironic that when somebody who comes here and claims refugee status has a document or a passport, sometimes that becomes a question against their credibility. If you have a passport it means your government gave you a passport. Are you a real refugee? If they don't have a document or they had to get a false document, that plays against them, because they're asked why they can't get a real document. So you're caught between a rock and hard place when you're a refugee.

On the other hand, we've created a false problem. One of the things we're saying is we want to be satisfied as to the person's identity, because we want to check their antecedents. Were they a criminal in their home? Then we're saying we can't really prove that one way or another, so instead we're going to wait for five years and see how they behave in Canada.

We already have, as we've said, many rules and regulations that allow us to deal with people who behave badly in Canada, who commit criminal acts in Canada. It doesn't take us any further in dealing with their antecedents, what they did or didn't do before they got here. Again, as David Matas has pointed out, what we have found is that people who have committed crimes against humanity, whether they were during the Nazi era or more recently the people who have been brought to justice, they're the ones who are the best behaved, the quietest; it's your ``quiet neighbour'' syndrome. They're not going to get into trouble here because they're trying to stay as low as possible and as quiet as possible.

Instead, what we are setting up is some young person from a family who's frustrated, who feels like he's being treated badly, who can't get on with his education, who can't find a job, who may act out one day and do something rash that he regrets. He's the one, or she's the one, who's going to have to deal with the consequences more than anybody else.

We're setting up different classes of refugees. We're saying that some refugees are from countries where we accept a certain piece of paper, and other refugees are from another country we like less so we're not going to accept that piece of paper. Some people are from countries where, as people pointed out, the community can vouch for each other - and the community has no interest in allowing people who have committed crimes against humanity to stay here.

So there are all kinds of checks and balances, to get back to your question. There are ways to verify people's identity in a reasonable way. We don't need to create a new subclass. You have everything you need and more than you need. You're always going to have certain guarantees under the charter, and I hope we're not saying that the charter should only apply to some people and not to others.

The Chair: Mr. Cullen.

[Translation]

Mr. Cullen: Thank you very much, Ms Augenfeld and Mr. Goyette.

[English]

Madam Augenfeld, you mentioned the fact that from time to time we have a lapse of memory. Maybe I will take a little moment to remind you of something. In my riding, Etobicoke North, there's a large Somali community based in Dixon Road. Most of them, the vast majority of them, arrived in Canada in 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, so there have been opportunities by many governments to address this issue. It's our government that is trying to come up with a solution.

What I heard from both of you was a good critique perhaps of what we have in front of us, but I didn't hear many proposed solutions. My friend opposite noted that you had indicated in your presentation that at one point there was some compromise solution that may have been floating around. I'm wondering what solution you see. Maybe you could comment on the solution that was being discussed before the minister came out with this proposal.

.1930

Ms Augenfeld: Mr. Cullen, I think we said that our solution would be that this regulation is unnecessary. It creates a useless new class that will create new problems. Our solution would be to go back to Bill C-86, look at what your party said when it was in opposition, look at some of the solutions that were recommended at the time, and amend that part of Bill C-86 that created the problem.

If we go back to the way we were looking at identity before February 1993, I think we would find a satisfactory way of dealing with it. Immigration was still looking at identity. They were still making determinations and applying their discretion to the identity of people. There were cases that we contested, but we didn't have this problem, so I think our solution would be to go back to that situation.

When the first Minister of Immigration in this government was in opposition, he agreed with the objections to Bill C-86. When he first came in as a minister, he had certain interesting ideas about how to deal with the problem. I don't understand why there has been this retreat from a reasonable solution. I think we should ask ourselves why the officials who have been trying to propose certain things over the years - why you suddenly agree with them now when you didn't agree with them three years ago.

I think we have to examine what has happened. What is the new evidence that has come forward? If there is new evidence that is being looked at somewhere in camera, if this committee is hearing evidence that we don't know about as to why there's suddenly such a problem and why they're so convinced that there are lots of people who may be problematic - I think we have the right to hear that evidence.

However, I would suggest that what has happened is that the communiqué the minister issued when she announced this new class - the language of the communiqué implies to any Canadian who reads it that here are communities that are potentially riddled with criminals, terrorists and people who committed crimes against humanity. It implies that the whole community is under watch, the whole community has to be surveyed closely, and this whole community cannot settle. In addition, it doesn't solve the problem for people from other communities who are not even named in the regulations.

Mr. Cullen: If I went to the members of the Somali community in my riding and said let's go back to the way it was... With respect, the issue of documentation has been around for some time. I don't think going back to the way it was is going to provide any magic solutions. I think we have to deal with -

Ms Augenfeld: But your other question was... As I said, there were solutions about affidavits. There were solutions that looked at other ways of identifying people.

Mr. Cullen: If you'd just let me finish, perhaps -

Ms Augenfeld: I'm sorry.

Mr. Cullen: What we need to do is come up with some kind of constructive ideas. As I say, many of the refugees from Somalia have been in Canada - in Toronto, Ottawa, Vancouver and all over - for some time. What we're looking for is a proposal on the table, and for your critique and constructive proposals on how we can make it work.

Ms Augenfeld: I would suggest that we look at what was discussed at some of the previous meetings. Look at some of what was put forward on the table. There were all kinds of proposals on the table. We don't have time to look at all of them now. If we really want to do this properly, I would suggest that this committee recommend not passing this regulation into law or put into effect on December 30. We've waited this long, so we can wait a little bit longer to do the right thing. We could sit down in good faith at the table with the officials and perhaps with some members of the committee and look at what the problem is, what the statistics are, what we are afraid of, and what we can reasonably do.

I would put it to you that the people in this room now, the people who were earlier, and people who are not here today, have all kinds of potential ideas. I would put it to you - even though they won't say so in public - that a number of the officials also had reasonable ideas and were prepared to listen to reasonable solutions. Suddenly in the last few months the whole tone has changed, and the people who came forward to tell you why this was such a good idea were saying something else to us in private. I can't prove this to you, but that's my problem. I don't have recordings or verbatims of those conversations.

I think we tried to come up with a reasonable solution, and suddenly we're in another climate. I don't understand what has happened.

Mr. Cullen: Thank you.

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The Chair: I have a very direct question based on what we were supposed to be analysing today. I would like to know if there is a period in which it would be acceptable.

[Translation]

Mr. Goyette, you talked about the three years required to obtain citizenship. Would it be acceptable to make this a three-year period, or, as the Canadian Bar suggested, a two-year period from the person's date of arrival?

Ms Augenfeld: Perhaps. I had not seen the Bar's proposal before today.

The Chair: We have copies of it.

Ms Augenfeld: What I would ask you to do, is to refrain from restricting this to the Somali and Afghan communities. I know that the government feels that there is a social problem here, but I would submit that there are other countries where there are other serious problems. We have named but a few, our list is not exhaustive.

[English]

Mr. Cullen, the Canadian Council for Refugees tabled a proposal with the government last April. It's quite extensive, it took a lot of work, and it's on the record. We could go back to that proposal, which was done in collaboration and consultation with affected communities. We didn't just dream it up somewhere in a back room.

We can start from there and see if it is acceptable, not acceptable, what's wrong with it and what's right with it. We're not starting from zero. We have been discussing this for several years.

The Chair: Thank you, Ms Augenfeld.

[Translation]

Mr. Goyette, thank you very much.

[English]

I've had a special request from a gentleman from the Catholic Immigration Centre who's been sitting here. He would like to make a statement, if you all agree.

Please come forward. It's Mr. Mayaliwa.

[Translation]

Mr. Ililo Mayaliwa (Settlement Counselor, Catholic Immigration Centre, Ottawa): Thank you, madam Chair, for giving me this opportunity to close the meeting.

I am no expert and I cannot go into details, because I have very little time. I would like to talk about certain things, without repeating what has already been said here.

The Chair: We don't have time to do this.

Mr. Mayaliwa: I work at the Catholic Immigration Centre. I see these refugees on a daily basis. I work with them, I know what is going on in their lives and it is terrible. One could say that the people who preceded me have said it all. However, as far as family reunification is concerned, I come from Zaire and the images that everyone sees on the television screen right now are horrendous?

I would like to talk about family reunification, about the opportunity that we should give these people to be together, to lead a normal life. The waiting period is too long and this is most unfortunate. Those of us who work with refugees are now seeing case of suicide, something which had never occurred in my community.

In 1994, we lost a member of our family, a father of two children who, while waiting for his case to be settled, threw himself in front of a bus. He died because of that.

Another aspect of family reunification concerns culture. It is true that Canada has its own culture and that new immigrants, once here, respect it. However, it would be good if Canada could see the flip side of the coin. I am sorry that Canadians do not recognize traditional marriages. This is a reality in Africa.

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Today, when I speak to you, I look at your eyes and you do the same. In Canadian culture, this means that you are listening to me and that you believe what I am saying, that I am honest.

However, in my culture, you are showing a sign of aggression if you look at someone's face while talking to them. You see the difference. Therefore, it is important that we look at both sides of the coin and that we try to reach a fair decision.

To conclude, when we talk about the requirement for documents and the residence period today, we are alluding to the Somali and Afghan communities. However, tomorrow people will be talking about my country and then there will be others.

You have heard people talk to you openly. They had made an effort to denounce people who may be criminals. This must be taken into consideration. I know that we always forget that these people are refugees. They did not want to be refugees, but something occurred which forced them into becoming refugees. You do not know what war is like.

You ask people to get their documents when the guns are there, behind them, destroying their neighbours' houses and they don't even have the time to see whether their child is inside. Try to imagine whether, under these circumstances, you would have enough time to go back in to get your wallet or your documents.

I would like this committee to try to look at these things and to reconsider this decision which I feel does not make any sense, because it focuses more attention on refugees and makes it very difficult for them to integrate.

The Chair: Thank you very much.

[English]

We will meet again on Tuesday at 3:30 p.m. to study a draft report.

Ms Meredith.

Ms Meredith: I have real difficulty with trying to make any kind of decision or write a report without the department officials coming back and explaining the documentation situation to us - why some are accepted, why some aren't, and how these decisions are made. I think that's a critical part of this discussion, and I'm not satisfied that we've received any answers.

The Chair: I hope we're going to have an answer from the department, but the question we posed, just to be clear, was what type of documents are accepted as legitimate or certified documents. I don't want to call it legitimate, because I'm interested in what type of documents are used for identity purposes.

Ms Meredith: But I gather it's not -

The Chair: Do you want to go further than that, Ms Meredith? Is that what you're saying?

Ms Meredith: I gather it's not just the type of document; it's the discretion and how the discretion is used. In what circumstances would they deny the documents?

The Chair: I'm not sure that question would be answered by the two representatives who come before -

Ms Meredith: That's why I'm wondering if we can't have immigration officers or people who make those kinds of decisions explain to us on what basis they would accept or not accept a document.

The Chair: But it is discretionary, and that was very clearly stated. I think that would be very difficult, because one officer may decide to accept one and another... I think enough witnesses today made the point that one officer would accept a document while another would not.

I would find it very difficult to say which officer I would bring before this committee. I think that will be part of our report, but we will obviously have occasion on Tuesday to discuss that fact. I think that's an important fact that has to be put into the report. That is discretion and it's not objective; it's subjective.

Ms Meredith: Thank you.

The Chair: Thank you very much, everyone.

This meeting is adjourned.

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