CIMM Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION

COMITÉ PERMANENT DE LA CITOYENNETÉ ET DE L'IMMIGRATION

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Wednesday, November 17, 1999

• 1534

[English]

The Chair (Mr. Joe Fontana (London North Centre, Lib.)): Good afternoon, colleagues. This is the fourth meeting of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration.

Before we commence with our witnesses in the continuation of our study into all aspects of the refugee determination system and illegal migrants, I just want to point something out for the benefit of the committee. At this very moment that we're sitting here, the minister is issuing a news release on the appointment of the Immigration and Refugee Board chair. I just wanted to tell the committee that Mr. Peter Showler has been appointed chair of the Immigration and Refugee Board for a period of three years. I have the news release in both English and French if anybody's interested.

The timing of the announcement is appropriate because I'm sure we would want to meet with Mr. Showler at the earliest possible moment. I believe he has been a member of the refugee board since 1994.

• 1535

So we'll discuss that later when we get into discussing our future agenda.

Yes, Bernard?

[Translation]

Mr. Bernard Bigras (Rosemont, BQ): Mr. Chairman, I'd like to know whether you received Mr. Showler's curriculum vitae along with the other information.

[English]

The Chair: Bernard, I'm sorry. I don't have the biographical data, but we will get it. In fact, I'm sure all of the members will be getting the CV and everything else. If it's not in by the end of the day, we'll make sure you get it.

Anyway, let's get back to the order of the day. I want to again thank the department for coming in today, and for providing us with some of the information we asked for. We have with us Martha Nixon, assistant deputy minister, operations; Gerry Van Kessel, director general, refugees; Dick Graham, acting director, legislative review, enforcement; Daniel Therrien, senior counsel, legal services; and George Varnai, regional manager, citizenship and immigration programs, British Columbia, prairies, and territories.

Welcome, Ms. Nixon and all. I believe you're going to take us through some of the paperwork that you've been able to provide with an opening statement, and then we'll go to questions.

Ms. Martha Nixon (Assistant Deputy Minister, Operations, Department of Citizenship and Immigration): Thank you, Mr. Chair. We are happy to be back with what is hopefully a lot more information for you to chew on today. We wanted to not take up too much time, because you didn't have this information beforehand. We're not going to expect you to speed-read all of these things. Maybe we can just do a very brief introduction on the three pieces we have in hand now and one that we hope we will be able to deliver perhaps before the session is over. We were just trying to spruce up the translation on the comparative table we've been working on for the different countries and their refugee systems. We hope to have that before the end of the meeting, but it may be delayed until tomorrow morning.

The first piece we would like to turn your attention to is what we're calling a focus paper. It's something we've put together to try to delineate some of the key issues and to just give you perhaps a little bit of a charting through the things we've been concerned with. I'd like Gerry Van Kessel to just very briefly give you an overview of what is in that paper.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel (Director General, Refugees, Office of the Assistant Deputy Minister, Policy and Program Development, Department of Citizenship and Immigration): Thank you.

The purpose of this paper is to outline for you some of the principal challenges that we feel the refugee determination system faces. We do not pretend for a moment that this is an exhaustive list, but it is among those that we've been taking a look at and are concerned about. It is really in three groups, and these groups are not mutually exclusive at all.

The first question is how we deal with persons who make refugee claims but are really applying for reasons other than a need for protection. A second one of great concern to all of us is how we become more efficient or how we make the system go faster. And the final one is somewhat linked to the first, and that's what we do about economic migrants, who are people who are applying for economic reasons even though they say they need protection.

I'll run through the issues we are looking at very quickly. They include issues like people who are undocumented; people who might or should be excluded from the entire process; people who abandon their claims; and those people who make repeat claims—and you may have seen the story on that in the Globe and Mail a week ago. With respect to efficiency, we're looking at things that we're doing within the system itself and at the kind of information we provide to decision-makers. Finally, and very importantly, there is the whole issue of removing unsuccessful refugee claimants. The final issue on economic migration is people-smuggling of the kind we saw this summer.

That's all I think I need to say at this time. Thank you.

The Chair: Ms. Nixon, did you have some—

Ms. Martha Nixon: It's entirely up to you, but that was certainly a delineation of the key questions. You may well want to come back to those questions, but people haven't had a chance to read the paper yet. If you agree, we can just briefly outline what we have in the other two papers, and then people can proceed with questions.

The Chair: Okay.

Ms. Martha Nixon: The next piece you requested was a bit more of a position paper on the issues relating to marine law and how we handle those issues. Daniel Therrien is going to just give us a brief overview on that paper.

• 1540

[Translation]

Mr. Daniel Therrien (Counsel, Legal Services, Department of Citizenship and Immigration): The document in question first sets out the principles of international law in this area. It then goes on to explain the principles of Canadian law and the relevant Canadian policy, followed by the American policy and certain considerations of a practical operational nature.

I should point out that the options available when intercepting a ship depend largely on where the ship is being intercepted. There are three main areas: Canadian waters, which extend 12 miles from the land boundary; the contiguous zone, which stretches from 12 to 24 miles out; and the high seas. Powers are very limited on the high seas. In Canadian waters, we can act as though we were in Canada: all the provisions of Canadian legislation apply, including the provision on the right to claim refugee status and to have one's claim examined by the IRB. In the contiguous zone, which is not in Canada, certain powers of enforcement or interception provided for in legislation may be exercised.

[English]

Ms. Martha Nixon: We can go into much more detail, but people might want to ask questions.

The Chair: We do have a little bit of time, Ms. Nixon. Perhaps we can start with the first document. Rather than reading all of it, maybe you could just give us a helpful capsule comment on each one of those areas that Mr. Van Kessel and Mr. Therrien took us through. By that time, I think we will be all up to speed.

Ms. Martha Nixon: Do you want us to go through it in more detail? Is that what you're asking?

The Chair: Sure.

Ms. Martha Nixon: Okay.

The Chair: And we'll keep our questions until afterwards.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: Thank you.

When we deal with the issue of undocumented claimants, as the paper indicates, some of the reasons for why people destroy documents include: to assist them at trying to make it more difficult for us to figure out who exactly they are and to therefore frustrate our processes in some sense. There are cases in which people legitimately have to use fraudulent documents or in which they have no documents when they're fleeing. Most of the people we see without documents are ones who had documents when they first got on the aircraft, though, even if they were fraudulent documents. The destruction of the document in these cases occurred subsequent to the boarding of the aircraft.

The paper itself indicates six items in terms of what we are doing to try to counter that, and we'll be interested in any comments by the committee with respect to the adequacy of those provisions or any other provisions there might be in terms of how to deal with that. This is not a uniquely Canadian phenomenon. It is a phenomenon that all, shall I say, asylum-granting countries have. It is quite a serious problem for all of us.

The question is how to deal with persons who seek to access the refugee determination system not because they have need of protection, but because they simply want a better life—and that's a very common phenomenon. Part of the question there is who those people are that we can deny from accessing the system at all. There are those people who already have protection. There's the question of something like safe third. Do we impose a regime of safe third, which I think we've spoken about at past sessions of the standing committee? Once people get into the process itself, are there things we can do to rush them through the system faster?

Part of the challenge we face with all of this is to try to make quick decisions. The people who need protection want quick decisions. For the people who have applied for reasons other than protection, what they are really doing is trying to find reasons to stay here as long as possible. They do that so that at the end of their stay they can argue that they've been here so long that we should let them stay in any event.

Withdrawn and abandoned cases are a particular problem in that they relate particularly to those people who apply for refugee status. Under our policy, which we've had in the vast majority of cases, we do not keep people in detention. We allow them to go through the country freely, and they then use that opportunity to disappear on us, whether it is to enter the labour market in Canada or use Canada as a transit and cross the border into the United States. This is a particularly serious issue for us because it means we really don't know where people are. Not knowing who they are is one thing; not knowing where they are is a further difficulty.

• 1545

With respect to repeat claims, the current law is if you are outside the country for 90 days and return, you can submit a new refugee claim. In the January 6 white paper, the government proposed a permanent ban on a second claim once you had been unsuccessful. In further discussions we had with various groups subsequent to January, some practical problems with this were pointed out in terms of people's real protection needs. So the issue is, do we draw the line somewhere other than a permanent ban?

I'd just like to say something also about the numbers. We've indicated in the paper that in 1998 there were 300 cases of repeat claims. But we know it is an increasing phenomenon, and in the first six months of this fiscal year, the ports of entry in Niagara alone had 252. So it's happening more and more. These are people who are going to the United States, staying for the 90 days, and then coming back. This brings the system into disrepute because only in rare cases have circumstances actually changed after 90 days.

Improving the efficiency of the system—what we've indicated there is some of the timelines that currently exist that can lead up to a period of up to two, two and a half years for people being here. We've been criticized for this rather frequently, and so we point out some of the measures we're proposing that should at least streamline some of these measures.

Then, with respect to information, ensuring there's complete information for decision-makers, this is very important, first, because without proper information the right decisions may not be made. Secondly, also, if the right decisions are not made, that may act as a draw factor for some groups, and that is something we're concerned about.

At the same time it is the way information is provided. For example, while information is normally provided in written form, we also know that just as when the IRB wants to hear people in person, it's different from only reading it on paper. So there's some question about what times we in fact should have expert witnesses available to ensure the decision-making is based on all the information that's there and a proper understanding of that information.

The final point is combatting people-smuggling. A lot of that issue has to deal with penalties and what we can do to deter it. But related to all of that is, what is it that we can do to the process itself so as to make people-smuggling unprofitable, and also in the context of the money that's advanced to the persons who are being smuggled and the repayment of those moneys for being smuggled? Thank you.

The Chair: That was very good.

Ms. Nixon, or...can we have Daniel now, perhaps—

Ms. Martha Nixon: Could we go through the green paper in a little more detail?

The Chair: Sure.

Mr. Daniel Therrien: I'll focus on the three geographic areas I described in my earlier comments because that's the gist of the law here. If a ship were to be intercepted in Canadian waters, then the ship would be considered to be in Canada and the persons on the ship who would claim refugee status would have access to the IRB refugee determination system as though they had actually set foot on Canadian soil. On the high seas the powers are quite limited, both in international law and because there is no Canadian domestic law that extends to that territory. So currently there is no possibility of doing anything in terms of refugee claimants on the high seas.

The only area where there could be more perhaps would be in the contiguous zone, the zone that extends from 12 to 24 miles from Canadian territory. In that area this is not Canada per se, but in international law, countries are authorized to take enforcement action to enforce certain laws, including immigration laws. So it would be possible in that zone to intercept a ship.

• 1550

The next question is whether it would be possible to simply turn away the ship or whether you have to do something with somebody who would claim refugee status. Here would come into play two legal documents—the Canadian charter, which applies to all actions of Canadian officials, wherever located. Even though this would not be Canada per se, the charter would apply, including some form of refugee determination, before the ship was turned away to the country of origin of the individual. That's the first instrument.

The second instrument would be our international obligations, including our obligation under the refugee convention, which requires Canada not to return or refoule, as it is said in the convention, refugees to their country of origin if they are in fear of persecution.

The long and short of all this is that it would be possible to turn away a ship, but only after there would be some kind of refugee determination—not necessarily an IRB-like determination; it could be a simpler process, but there would have to be some process to assess a refugee claim.

The Chair: Thank you.

Does anybody else have anything to add? Then we'll go to questions.

Ms. Martha Nixon: Can we add just one more paper, Mr. Chairman?

The Chair: Yes, of course. Oh, yes, there is one more.

Ms. Martha Nixon: We had one additional paper that we left for you on your desks, and that is to outline a little bit more clearly the detention policies and detention practices, which you had requested us to do.

The Chair: Yes.

Ms. Martha Nixon: If you would give us just a few more minutes, Dick Graham will very quickly walk us through that paper.

The Chair: Sorry, I only had two on my desk.

Mr. Dick Graham (Acting Director, Legislative Review Enforcement, Department of Citizenship and Immigration): The paper on detention was largely designed to answer questions that arose at the last session with us that dealt with the tension and the problem as to why we don't detain people more and how the charter and other laws interact when we decide to detain somebody.

The paper we put together begins with the charter; it refers to section 9 of the charter, that everyone has a right not to be arbitrarily detained or imprisoned, and section 7 of the charter, that everyone has a right to life, liberty, and security of person and a right not to be deprived thereof, except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice.

Fundamental justice here basically requires that a fair balance be struck between the rights to the person and the interests of the state.

Next we go on to general grounds for detention. The Immigration Act gives two general grounds initially. Were there grounds to believe that the person poses a danger? Secondly, were there grounds to believe that the person is unlikely to appear for immigration proceedings? If we think somebody isn't going to show up, we can detain them, but we have to have some sort of reasonable grounds.

Once we have detained somebody, they have a right of review. That's basically where fundamental justice comes in, that somebody has to look at it and decide. This is the same whether the person is in immigration detention or whether they've been charged with a criminal offence. The adjudicators of the IRB are the ones who hear these reviews. Basically they're looking at the detention under the same grounds as the Immigration Act.

Additional grounds we have that apply only at the ports of entry are where a person is unable to satisfy an immigration officer with respect to their identity. That's one place. The other one is where the deputy minister or a delegate suspects a person is a member of certain inadmissible classes. These are ones basically referring to people who are security risks to Canada—war criminals, or people like that.

Detention reviews are applicable in identity and security cases at ports of entry, so again the adjudicator will review these cases. At the detention reviews, CIC officials will present their reasons why they think the person should be continued in their detention, if we still believe that. On the other side, the person or the person's representative will present their case as to why the person should be released and why they don't fit the grounds we're putting forward.

• 1555

We have to justify our grounds, and it's the same with the individual. The courts have established certain rules that should be followed by adjudicators. The first is that there's a stronger case for justifying detention for someone considered to be a danger to the public. In other words, there's less of an onus once we can show that we've decided somebody is a danger. The chances of continuing detention are a little better.

The second concern is the length of the future detention. In other words, if we're saying we're holding somebody for removal from Canada, but we can't point to some time in the future when we think...or we can justify it and say the person will be removed by a certain date, the adjudicator is more likely to let that person go.

The third is who is responsible for any delay. Again, for a removal case, if we're having trouble getting documentation and we're not doing anything to get documentation from the other country, then the person is more likely to be released. If, on the other hand, the person is being uncooperative and we can't get enough information, then the person is more likely to be detained.

The fourth is the availability, effectiveness, and appropriateness of alternatives such as release, bail bonds, or reporting to immigration officials. It's very much as in the criminal justice system, where there are alternatives to holding somebody while they're awaiting their trial.

We give brief reference to detention policy here, and basically our policy is that we won't detain people, except where necessary. As we noted at the last session, it's expensive to detain somebody. So we won't do it unless we feel there's absolute necessity to do so. The guidelines to the officers are to use detention in a way that is effective, but not to use it too much.

And finally, we refer to the boat arrivals, and I won't go into that too much, because I think we can give you up-to-date information on that as the session goes on today, as you require.

Ms. Martha Nixon: That covers then the three papers we have in hand, and we have promised you the comparative paper, which we're very anxious to give you, but we are waiting for the translation to be improved. We hope it will be available shortly, and if not, for sure tomorrow morning.

The Chair: Thank you. Thank you to you and your officials for providing us this information in a timely fashion and putting down in writing some of our questions. I'm sure there are going to be more.

We'll go right to questions, and I have Leon.

Mr. Leon E. Benoit (Lakeland, Ref.): Thank you, Joe, and good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

I'd like to start my questioning by getting to the detention area, which was the last one that was talked about here. You mentioned that detention has to be for a reasonable length of time. I'd like you to talk about that a little more, in terms of what you consider a reasonable length of time, and whether that requirement could actually mandate that our process, especially the appeals process, be sped up to meet what could be judged in any reasonable way as a reasonable detention period.

Mr. Dick Graham: Yes, that is something we are looking at—trying to find ways to decrease the time things take. It's one of the considerations that goes on in the refugee process. We're trying to speed things up to some extent. One of the reasons for that is so that we're not detaining people, and we're trying to cut our detention costs by doing do.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Most of the people who came by boat, after the first boat, have been detained. After they have their hearings, if they are rejected as refugee claimants and they decide to appeal to the federal court, what is likely to happen with those cases? Maybe you can tell us what has happened so far. I think the cases that have been dealt with so far have been situations where people weren't detained initially, then were denied and are going to appeal.

• 1600

Have there been cases dealt with where the person was detained, there was a ruling made against accepting the refugee claim, and that person decided to appeal? If so, what's happened in those cases, and if not, what do you anticipate will happen when that time comes?

Ms. Martha Nixon: I'll refer that to George Varnai, who we brought in from British Columbia, because he's been very, very close to the whole British Columbia situation.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I met with him on a couple of occasions.

Ms. Martha Nixon: You've met with him, I'm sure. He's a famous person now. He's been on television probably even more than some members of Parliament.

Mr. Steve Mahoney (Mississauga West, Lib.): We don't like that.

Mr. George Varnai (Regional Manager, Citizenship and Immigration Programs, British Columbia, Prairies, and Territories, Department of Citizenship and Immigration): And I certainly appreciated the opportunity.

I think your question has two parts, if I understood you correctly. You asked if there were any cases where a negative decision has come down from the board for people who were in detention, and if so, what did we do with them. The first part of your question was what might happen to such cases.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Yes, that's right.

Mr. George Varnai: We have, as of this morning, 32 negative decisions from the board, and my understanding is that nine of those are from boat two. So whereas our current tracking system, at least the tracking system I have at my fingertips, is probably not sophisticated enough to tie in each individual decision, I would think that the overwhelming majority, if not the entire nine, are in fact in detention, because, as you pointed out, from boat two we did not release any adults initially.

So it would be our intent to continue to argue for continued detention in those cases on the same grounds that we have been arguing on up until now: that we have a reasonable probability of expectation that should they be released, they would not appear for the next processes.

Mr. Leon Benoit: After you argue for the continued detention initially, how often then...? Is that once every month after that?

Mr. George Varnai: In these particular cases, where it's a question of failure to appear, or expectation of failure to appear after the initial 48 hours, and so on, it would be every 30 days.

Mr. Leon Benoit: So how are these decisions made to have that reviewed every 30 days in that case, or every seven days initially?

Mr. George Varnai: That's a legislative requirement. The legislation specifies, depending on the grounds for detention, the frequency and the time period at which—

Mr. Leon Benoit: Have the experts you must consult, or the policy people you must consult, in dealing with these issues given any indication that the charter actually requires that you have these hearings every seven days, or is that just a figure...? That number must have been put there to meet the requirements of the charter after the Singh decision and subsequent decisions. No?

Mr. Daniel Therrien: The legislation was drafted with the charter in mind, and that's where the frequency of reviews originates. Of course, there is nothing magical in these numbers, but there is a requirement under the charter not to have unreasonable detention. There is some analogy to the criminal law process, where people must appear within a very short time period and then at regular intervals thereafter.

So these general considerations were in our mind when the legislation was drafted. Actually a review every 30 days is a relatively long period for detention, but it was never really challenged, and we're proceeding on that basis.

Mr. Leon Benoit: The seven days initially, though, sounds like an awfully short time period.

Mr. Daniel Therrien: Yes.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Is there any serious thought about lengthening that period?

Mr. Daniel Therrien: Consideration is being given to amend these time periods, but the seven-day period, again, comes a little bit from analogy to the criminal law process, where people who are arrested must be brought before a judge within a matter of a day or two, and then relatively frequently after that.

So the frequency was an attempt to have detention review sufficiently frequently, so that people are not detained unreasonably. But again, there's nothing magical as such in the seven-day period or the 30-day period. All that can be looked at, keeping in mind that courts will expect under the charter that there are regular reviews.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Now, one of you may have explained to me, maybe more than once, why detention is being used for people who came by the second, third, and fourth boats, but the people who arrive at airports, who are coming to our country illegally as well, are in fact treated quite differently. The reason given to me is that when they come by boat they're not trying to avoid our system or our officials. That's really a questionable statement, I would suggest. So I'd just like an explanation of why the different treatment.

• 1605

Ms. Martha Nixon: We're breaking, in a sense, new ground here because this phenomena of the boats is unusual. We've had one-of boats before, and that was it. We had the boats on the east coast some years back. When we were looking at boat one we were thinking of it at that time as, in a sense, an unusual occurrence and one that was to us a fairly unusual phenomenon. Given that, we followed our usual procedure for boat one, which is as we do at airports most often now, because we have not been in the business of large-scale detention.

Mr. Leon Benoit: When 30% of the people who arrive at our airports disappear if they're not detained as well, that's an awfully high percentage. People coming by airport often have documents when they arrive on the plane. They don't when they're checked or when they arrive before the officials. It seems to me they're trying to avoid a proper process under our system as well. I'm wondering why there isn't a general detention.

Ms. Martha Nixon: This is indeed one of the policy debates that has to be had around this question. If you look at our white paper, given the phenomena of increasing numbers, around 60%, of the refugee claimants who are not possessing documents when we encounter them, one of the things we have to ask ourselves is whether or not what we are doing currently should be continued. We have stated in the white paper that if they are undocumented and uncooperative in trying to help us find out who they are, perhaps we should be looking at an increased use of detention. To do this is a serious thing, because as Mr. Anders noted in the last session, it is costly to detain people and it does get us into a lot of difficult and very delicate human rights issues.

Mr. Leon Benoit: If we speed up the process, certainly, that changes things. If you can process people much faster than we are now, then the detention is much shorter.

Ms. Martha Nixon: Indeed, and that would be our desired objective.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Okay, Mr. Chairman.

The Chair: Thank you, Leon.

John.

Mr. John McKay (Scarborough East, Lib.): Thank you, witnesses, for engaging the committee in a discussion on these papers, because the papers are quite thoughtful and I particularly appreciate them.

I want to address this first paper that you gave us. It doesn't really have a title, but it's on page 2. It's about the use of the officer who is the first point of contact, and I question whether that officer could in fact be more useful. Presently, he or she has a very limited role and processes 98% of the people who just simply move right on.

I would think that after a while an individual officer develops some level of expertise in the assessment of individuals. I'm wondering, knowing full well that 40% of the claims are going to be accepted as refugee claims and there are some that will be quite obvious, whether the officer could make a recommendation to the department to either have the department land this individual in a sponsor-like process or simply appear before the IRB and say we have no objection to a finding that this individual is a convention refugee within the meaning of the act. That seems to me to address a pool of at least 20% or 30% of your claimants.

• 1610

Is there any compelling reason why that area of the process could not be expanded to deal with the most obvious of the refugee claimants?

Ms. Martha Nixon: This is a really good area of exploration that we've been looking at a lot. I'm going to ask Gerry to take the question because he's been looking into where we can make improvements here. And I think you're quite right that the first contact is very important and we need to be able to deal with that a whole lot better.

Gerry.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: In our examination of the refugee determination system itself over the last couple of years we have thought a fair bit about the question of how we collect information and what we do with that information. Let me just tell you some of the things we want to do.

One of the things we want to do, very clearly, is to use the port-of-entry officer, the first contact, in a way that we do not now do, to get some basic information onto the record. And you're right, experienced people should know fairly quickly. It's easy to tell that a certain group are yeses and another group are nos. And there's always that middle group that you spend a lot of time on. You also spend a lot of time on the nos because of the process. That's one element.

The question I've asked and never really had an answer to is whether we could have a member of the refugee board, who are the experts, at the port of entry to deal with that. This may be something to ask them if you're seeing them again, because we've talked about it, but we haven't gotten that far.

Mr. John McKay: Just on that point, do you actually need a person from the board to make that determination?

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: At the present time, yes, our refugee determination system in Canada is very much designed to ensure that the decision-maker is totally independent of government, that there will be no political influence whatsoever in the decision-making. It's the facts and only the facts that will determine this.

Mr. John McKay: If you're dealing with an individual who can only make a positive decision, presumably that's charter-proof, it complies with the act, and reduces your timeline and your in-loading into the determination system.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: I agree with you, but not being a legal expert, what I always find in dealing with those issues is that you really do need the legal advice because the question then becomes, what do you do with the nos?

Mr. John McKay: You deal with them in the same way you presently deal with them.

Mr. Daniel Therrien: Under the charter it is possible to have a decision-maker, we feel, other than the Immigration and Refugee Board, but you need somebody sufficiently independent of the enforcement arm of the immigration department who can assess the refugee claim properly.

Mr. John McKay: Is the person who's presently meeting them at the port of entry part of the enforcement arm?

Mr. Daniel Therrien: Yes, but it would be possible to devise a system that would shield these persons from the enforcement arm. So the charter is not an obstacle to a departmental official deciding a refugee claim, but the current act of course requires that the IRB make the determinations.

Mr. John McKay: So in principle then, at least, that's an area that you could give very serious exploration to?

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: Yes, we could. As you're probably aware, the refugee board already has an expedited process for, if I may call it that, the easy yeses, the obvious yeses, the ones that move through the system fairly quickly. The question is, what happens from the time they arrive until they get to the board?

Mr. John McKay: Let me go to the second part of the thinking here. If you've done with the easy yeses by some sort of administered process, and you know where the easy nos are going to go, then you go to the problematic ones. These ones sound like they have good capability, but why couldn't you go to the expedited process and link to the expedited process your PDRCC and your agency simultaneously?

• 1615

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: The latter part of your recommendation is one that is in the January 6 white paper, and that is the idea of moving all protection and what we call protection-related decisions into one decision-making body, the refugee board. It is a public recommendation we want to go forward with.

Mr. John McKay: Let me just stop you there. If in fact you move the PDRCC and H and C into the refugee board, obviously the department loses control over that process. The minister loses control over that process. What are the implications of that?

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: We don't happen to think there's a lot of implications for that with respect to the consolidation of decision-making in that way. In a sense, the approval rate right now at the PDRCC is around 5%. So in most cases it is one of going through a process where the outcome is often known, at least statistically, ahead of time. So there's not much of a negative.

This gets more technical. What do you do about those cases excluded from the convention refugee process because they already have protection or because they are serious criminals and so on? How do you deal with them in an environment like that?

It's my personal judgment that while we can save some time here, the time saving is not as great as would appear at first glance, for two reasons. Remember that the PDRCC process is parallel with the Federal Court process and normally takes no longer than the Federal Court process. So as long as the Federal Court process is there, the timelines remain the same. You will save somewhat on resources and so on, and so that's the benefit.

For those people who say it has now been a while since the negative decision and circumstances have changed, under court rulings we are now required to take a look at those changed circumstances to see whether in fact that is the case. The real issue of offering protection is when the rubber hits the road, when the person leaves the country, not when the person actually has a decision made—because of the time lag there can be between the decision and the actual departure from the country.

So we have to have a process there. If we take away the PDRCC process, there will be quite a number of people who will, for their own reasons, take advantage of that pre-removal process, simply because, again, it stretches out the process.

The Chair: Thank you.

Bernard, you have five minutes.

[Translation]

Mr. Bernard Bigras: Mr. Chairman, I have a short question to ask.

You discuss undocumented refugee claimants in your document. This is a systemic problem. Some interesting suggestions have been put forward. However, we're now seeing something new, which is that many citizens are crossing the border with papers, but papers that were not authorized by our foreign offices. If they had been, one might often wonder about certain officers who supposedly issued certain visas. This summer, there were some fairly revealing cases in certain offices abroad.

Since I do not see any proposed measures in your document, I'd like to know whether, for the short term, you've taken any steps and whether, for the long term, you intend to correct the situation.

[English]

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: We proposed a number of measures in the January white paper with respect to undocumented.... In light of recent situations a fair question to ask is whether they go far enough or whether they are adequate.

The first measure is whether or not we enhance the kind of checking we do abroad to stop people from getting on the planes with fraudulent documents at all.

• 1620

The second one is the kinds of checks we do with people getting off the plane to try to make sure they don't destroy their documents before they get into the transit area or hand them back to the smugglers or the traffickers and so on.

Another one is, as we've already mentioned, detention. The concern we have around documentation relates to identity. We don't know who you are. So the question is, as the January proposal suggested, even though we understand why people in some circumstances have improper documents or no documents, what we do ask is that you tell us who you are so we can make a check and satisfy ourselves that you are who you say you are and that you're not hiding something that is relevant to, for example, public order in this country. That's where the detention proposal comes in.

Those are some of the measures we've proposed. One of the things we found with boat two that I think is worthwhile pointing out is that when we detained people on the grounds that we didn't know who they were, after three or four days, and I think George can confirm this, they started telling us who they were. Well, I think we have a right to know who people are when they ask us for protection.

So those are among the things we have to deal with.

The problem is truly serious. It's serious outside refugee determination because it's one of the principal reasons why we have difficulty removing. If you don't know who people are and you can't tell, or they keep changing their identity, and then you go to a country where you think they're from, it's not too surprising that some of these countries may ask, well, are they really ours? Part of it is deliberate, I think, to make our larger job, aside from the refugee protection job, more difficult. I don't know how adequately you feel that answers your question.

[Translation]

Mr. Bernard Bigras: I would say that you have half-answered it. Some people did obtain fraudulent documents illegally, on the black market. That's one thing. There were also documents authorized by visa officers in foreign offices. That's a fact. I'd like to know whether corrective measures were taken in the summer to ensure that the government does not support illegal acts. When a person obtains a travel document or a visa on the black market, that's one thing, but it's another kettle of fish when employees at foreign offices provide support for such documents through internal buying and selling.

[English]

Ms. Martha Nixon: If I understand correctly, you're asking if we have agents in our employ who are giving out documents that you consider to be fraudulent.

[Translation]

Mr. Bernard Bigras: I'm telling you that, at the end of the summer, in certain Asian offices, it was suspected that certain officers were issuing illegal visas to citizens. Was there an investigation? Was corrective action taken?

[English]

Ms. Martha Nixon: If we are aware of a situation where there is malfeasance in one of our overseas offices, then as soon as we become aware of it we do have an investigation. We usually involve the RCMP, and we try very much to prevent that through various checks and balances. But if you are talking about a specific office or some specific cases, then I can't answer unless you tell me which office you are referring to.

The Chair: Thank you, Ms. Nixon.

Rob.

Mr. Rob Anders (Calgary West, Ref.): Thank you.

There was a reference earlier in the presentation by Mr. Van Kessel with regard to people-smuggling. I remember previously when you appeared I asked about what the penalties were and as well when those had been applied and when some of the cases had actually been prosecuted and somebody had been convicted. I was informed that the last time that had happened was in 1995 and there had been a fine applied of $5,000. I guess this is kind of a follow-up question on that and the response I got that day.

Is there a reason why that is the case, why there are so few prosecutions or charges with regard to people-smuggling, or do you have more information to provide for me on that?

• 1625

Mr. Dick Graham: Generally speaking, the RCMP is responsible for laying charges under the Immigration Act. There is no policy that would suggest they shouldn't be laying charges or prosecuting people. In fact, we know they do carry on a large number of investigations into this area. They do lay charges against people.

I think Ms. Nixon has something on that.

Ms. Martha Nixon: I think generally one of the suggestions we would make, Mr. Chair, is that you invite the RCMP to come and discuss their experience and their practice, because they're probably better than we are to give you some details on this.

I think, generally speaking, as we talked last week in terms of, for instance, some of the situations we face, it's often difficult to find witnesses and to bring forward proof. We have been trying to pull together information across the department. We're able to determine that, for instance, if you take a place like Vancouver International Airport, there have been indeed, in relation to people-smuggling through that airport as a result of gate checks and then involvement with our staff.... Since 1995, up to 1998, we have had 178 charges laid for a variety of offences, which include illegal importing and exporting of travel documents related to people-smuggling, misrepresentation and fraud, and those sorts of things. We are checking with our other major airports to try to see if there is additional documentation of that nature, but generally speaking it's the RCMP who have to give us that information, and it is they who do of course make these investigative actions. So although we work closely with them, we don't always have all of the information they have.

Mr. Rob Anders: You mentioned it was difficult to provide witnesses and determine proof. I'm just going off on a tangent thinking about this for a second. Is it because some of these people are not within Canadian boundaries that it's difficult to get the proof you require, or witnesses? Or is it a case of—

Ms. Martha Nixon: Again, the RCMP are the experts in this area. Our experience and knowledge is really only anecdotal, and often it's more related, as far as we understand it, to—

Mr. Rob Anders: Just to cut in for a second, I'll take your anecdotal stuff because I don't have an RCMP officer in front of me, and your anecdotes are going to be far better than anything that I personally know. So I'll take anecdotes for now.

Ms. Martha Nixon: Well, what we understand, certainly in the case of the migrant boats, is that people are afraid of reprisals from the smugglers, who seem to be terribly organized and know exactly what's happening at any given moment. So I think for most people it would probably be that there is some fear of actual danger to them by coming forward with information.

Mr. Dick Graham: Perhaps I could add a few things to that.

In terms of what goes on, you mentioned, for instance, the problem of people being overseas and not being able to get information. Well, often smugglers themselves are overseas and it makes it very difficult for us to get them from certain countries.

Along those lines, the RCMP and Citizenship and Immigration are establishing more contacts with other countries, and particularly the countries these people are coming out of, and trying to work with local authorities there and trying to work in joint operations. The RCMP have signed memoranda of understanding with other police forces so they can make these cases, carry them over. We have certain information here and they can find other information there, and in certain cases people could be charged in other countries with smuggling people into Canada.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Graham. That's fine for now.

Ms. Martha Nixon: Could Mr. Varnai just add something?

The Chair: Sure.

Mr. George Varnai: It's just on the anecdotal aspect. In the case of the boats, it is well known, and we have said this to the RCMP, that right from the arrival of the first boat we have done our best to identify those people who are actually on board the vessels who were probably not in the highest echelons of the smugglers, but certainly thugs and enforcers and other individuals. We would try to identify them. We segregated them from the general population, retained them in custody, and so forth.

• 1630

The RCMP, of course, began a criminal investigation, again from day one, primarily focusing on those people, amongst others. The RCMP stated publicly that the reason they were having a difficult time is because none of the migrants were willing to testify in a court of law and to actually finger the person by saying this is the guy who was the enforcer and this is the person who did such and such on the boat. So it is a known thing in British Columbia that this is what happened on the four boats. But even though there is a high level of understanding that some of these people may well have been on board the vessel, there is no evidence that would stand up in a court of law.

The Chair: Thank you.

I'd like clarification. Ms. Nixon, I think you said that from 1995 to 1998 there were about 190 charges.

Ms. Martha Nixon: There were 178.

The Chair: But there was only one conviction. Do you track convictions?

Ms. Martha Nixon: We haven't tracked convictions.

The Chair: Okay. We might want to get that information.

Next is John Bryden.

Mr. John Bryden (Wentworth—Burlington, Lib.): In the case of refugee claimants who refuse to cooperate or refugee claimants with forged documents where the intent obviously is to deceive the Canadian authorities, why don't you just turn them around on the spot? Why do you even bother with detention?

Ms. Martha Nixon: It's because of the charter, sir.

Mr. John Bryden: You smile at that. But has anyone asked for a reference to the Supreme Court or asked whether a person is a person for the purposes of the charter if they refuse to identify themselves and if indeed they deliberately try to deceive the Government of Canada as to their identity? Is that really a person who is embraced by the charter? Has anyone ever asked that question?

Mr. Daniel Therrien: Not in those precise terms. We have looked a number of times at ways to determine whether or not the IRB process was required under the charter, and part of the answer I gave earlier was that it would be possible to devise a system where a departmental official would determine refugee status.

When you're in the area of excluding certain persons completely from refugee determination, whoever the decision-maker is, you're more directly in conflict with what the Supreme Court said in the famous Singh decision, which is essentially that a person who is on Canadian soil and claims refugee status has a right to a determination of his or her claim and in most cases following a personal interview. That determination—

Mr. John Bryden: I have to interject because I only have so much time, so you'll forgive me.

The Chair: The chairman is fair, though. I'm very interested.

Mr. John Bryden: Yes.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but in the Singh case, Mr. Singh was identified.

Mr. Daniel Therrien: That's right.

Mr. John Bryden: I'm talking about people who refuse to identify themselves or who deliberately misrepresent their identity for the purpose of illegal entry into Canada. Has anyone asked the Supreme Court, or has anyone even considered, whether that type of person would be a person under the charter?

Mr. Daniel Therrien: We have not sought advice from the Supreme Court on that question. My view, and I think the view of a number of my colleagues in the Department of Justice who have looked at similar questions, though not directly at that question, is that under the charter it is preferable to have a quick process to deal with individuals whose claim appears unmeritorious than to have no process at all.

Mr. John Bryden: I submit to you, with great respect, that between detaining people indefinitely because they refuse to cooperate and putting them back on the same plane they arrived in and sending them back, it would be far more merciful to send them back than to detain them at the expense of the state. I won't pursue that, but I hope the committee will take note that this is something we maybe could suggest be explored.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: Perhaps I might add something about the European experience with this. The Europeans are trying to do two things. In some cases where they get someone who is undocumented and refuses to cooperate, they do look at the possibility—with, I think, limited success—of keeping them entirely out of the system itself. The second thing they do is they have an accelerated process for what they call manifestly unfounded. It's a quick process, and the presumption made is what we would call a negative, rebuttable presumption; that is, we think what you're saying is untrue unless you can satisfy us that it isn't. That's the European approach.

We've done some looking into that, but again there are some limitations around something like that.

• 1635

The Chair: That's why the committee wanted a comparative study, and I'm sure that's covered off.

On John's behalf could I ask that that specific question be given to the people in Justice for an opinion for us?

Mr. John Bryden: Mr. Van Kessel, I thank you for your intervention, because I don't mean to suggest that because these people wouldn't be deemed to be persons under the charter that we would act in an arbitrary and unfair fashion. It's just that it might give you opportunities you might not be considering at this time.

Do I have any more time, Mr. Chairman?

The Chair: I took 15 seconds of your time, so you now have 45 seconds.

Mr. John Bryden: Thank you very much.

Thank you for your papers, incidentally. They are excellent, and it's very handy to have something like this to work from.

You mentioned that Canada's powers on the high seas are very limited because there's no international or domestic law you have access to. Then you describe the U.S. practice, which is to intercept unflagged vessels on the high seas and do what they do. Do the Americans have specific legislation that permits them to do that, which perhaps you would like to acquire?

Mr. Daniel Therrien: There is a presidential directive that is equivalent to legislation that authorizes U.S. INS officers to interdict and also to screen. There is some form of refugee determination. That's on the legal side. On the practical side, the Americans have territories outside of the U.S. mainland where this screening can occur, which we don't.

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Benoit.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I'm looking for some numbers, but I'm going to follow through in the line of questioning in order to get some more information about the process.

I'll start with the total number of refugee claims made inside Canada in the most recent year you have and then from those the total number of claims withdrawn and the total number of claims abandoned, along with the number of negative decisions reached.

I'll just give the information to you and then we can go through it.

Next is the number of refugee claimants who have received negative decisions or who have abandoned their claims or who have withdrawn their claims and who have been left in the country and are not known to have actually been removed. What I'm looking for really is to try to determine just what percentage of the people who claim refugee status actually are allowed to stay or are not known with some certainty to have been removed.

The Chair: That sounds like a complicated mathematical equation. I don't know if you want them to do that right now.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I'll go one question at a time.

A witness: I can answer that.

Mr. Leon Benoit: They should be able to. We've brought this up several times before.

The Chair: Okay. You had it typed up there, and I thought maybe you might give us a quiz.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I will give it to you afterwards.

The Chair: Gerry, go ahead.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: I don't have everything, but I have almost everything you've requested. Up to October 15, 1999, the total number of refugee claims made was 21,318.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Could you work maybe from last year's number where there's more certainty. There is that lag time in terms of removal orders that have been made and whether they've actually been acted on.

The Chair: I'll tell you what, Gerry. Why don't you do what you were starting to do and then we'll go back and I'll let Leon ask the question on the 1998 stuff. Give us what you have on 1999.

• 1640

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: In 1998 there were 23,838—and I apologize, because I'm sure I had more complete information, but I can't lay my hands on it. I will confirm those numbers later on, but you'll get the sense. In 1998 there were 23,838 cases made in 1998.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Claims inside Canada.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: I'm not sure what you mean by “inside Canada”. Do you mean at port of entry, whether airport, land border, or from within the country itself?

Mr. Leon Benoit: That's right, not from overseas.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: Then so far this year, to October 15, there have been 21,318. Our guess is that we're going to be somewhat higher this year than we were last year.

The next question, the total number of withdrawn and abandoned claims: last year the total number was 6,210; so far this year, of the withdrawn, there were 1,511, and abandoned, 2815, which is 4,326.

Then you've asked for the total number of negative decisions.

Mr. Leon Benoit: That's right.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: Last year there were 10,231; so far this year, to October 15, there have been 7,317.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Now we get into the actual information I'm looking for here. You had a little over 6,000 withdrawn and abandoned and 10,000 negative decisions. How many of those do you actually know have left the country? In other words, they've been escorted to the border or to an airplane—whatever.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: I would like to turn to my colleague in enforcement for that one.

Ms. Martha Nixon: He brings them in and he sends them out.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: Yes. I'm the good guy.

Mr. Dick Graham: Actually, some of that information was going to be part of the removals document we were going to bring you today, but unfortunately we had trouble getting some of the statistics and so we're not bringing it today and you'll be getting it shortly. The paper was delayed because we were trying to gather statistics from the regions.

The Chair: Dick, while you're looking for that, I have to move on. And I'll get back to you if you need to, Leon, for a second round.

Mr. Dick Graham: I do have some numbers.

The Chair: Sophia.

Ms. Sophia Leung (Vancouver Kingsway, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank all the witnesses for their fine presentations. I have a couple of questions.

The first question is on the detentions. How many refugee claimants are in detention in Canada now, and what is the length of the detentions? There's a third part. What eventually do you intend to do with them?

Mr. Dick Graham: On the first question, how many refugee claims there are in detention—

Ms. Sophia Leung: In Canada.

Mr. Dick Graham: —quite honestly, we can't tell you. We don't have a breakdown as to refugee claimants in detention. We don't keep statistics that way.

Right now the largest is in B.C., but we don't—

Ms. Sophia Leung: The reason I ask is that last year I visited a detention centre in Toronto—it's a huge body there. I wondered how many there are across Canada. Maybe you can find the answer for me later.

Also, what's the average length of time in detention? If you don't know the number, you will know the average length.

Mr. Dick Graham: We don't know the average length.

The Chair: To be helpful to the committee, because I think there might have been some startled looks around here, can I ask—when you say there is no way of tracking or no one is tracking how many refugees are in detention—who would track those numbers if you don't?

Mr. Dick Graham: At the moment, nobody. It's one of the things we're working on; we're trying to come up with a system that will track that information for us, amongst other things. Right now we have a number of systems that keep track of things across the country. What we don't have is a cohesive system that keeps track of who's in detention and who they are, whether or not they are a criminal or a refugee claimant, or for what reason they are being detained at any specific time. We just don't keep it.

It isn't something that we couldn't keep. There is some overlap, of course, between people who are in there as criminals and also refugee claimants, but it's something we could do if we had a system to do it, and we are working on creating such a system. But at the moment we don't have one.

Ms. Martha Nixon: Each region would in fact have that data region by region, but we have not been collecting it nationally. At the moment it's probably fair to say that the majority of refugee claimants who are in detention would be the Chinese migrants. Detention would be used sparingly for refugee claimants in most other places.

• 1645

The last time I was here I mentioned a group of 22 who came in through Pearson International Airport and detained. I would imagine there would be some additional ones in Montreal, where you would find there was a fear of flight or we didn't know who they were. There's probably not a large number of refugee claimants, other than the Chinese migrants, who would be in detention at the moment.

Mr. Dick Graham: The information I can give you, for example, is that in 1998-99 there were 7,968 persons who were detained for some time across Canada. That was for a total of 118,197 days. So it gives an average length of detention of 14.83 days.

Ms. Sophia Leung: The second part of my question is in regard to the removal. Perhaps George can answer that.

I understand for some of them the consulate has to issue a document so they will be able to return. Do you have any difficulty obtaining those documents? So far, are there any removals from these four ships?

Mr. George Varnai: First of all, in all cases when a country wishes to remove to another country we have to have some travel documents that would be acceptable to that country. Otherwise, if we show up with this body in a foreign land, there is no guarantee they'll accept it. Even prior to that issue, most airlines in the world would not carry someone without adequate travel documents.

So yes, those people we're deporting or otherwise removing from Canada, whether they are refugee claimants or others, have to have some travel documents. If they don't have them, then we do need their cooperation and certainly that of the country we say they're coming from.

In the case of Canada and most other countries, we have cooperation from countries to get travel documents of different sorts. If you're specifically referring to our four boat groups, to answer your last question first, none has been removed from Canada as of yet. There are a variety of reasons for that.

For one thing the large majority of them are still undergoing refugee claim processes. Even those who have negative decisions already on them still have various potential approaches to judicial review and other steps they haven't exhausted. In addition to that, none of those people has a travel document at this moment.

In those cases where there would be no refugee claims and so forth, we have talked to the Chinese authorities and given them the information. At this moment I cannot tell you how soon it will be before we'll get a positive response. We do need some cooperation in the area of issuance of travel documents.

Ms. Sophia Leung: What kind of prevention measures are you thinking about? There are a lot of possibilities in the future when a refugee ship comes. Are there any measures you have already done? I understand the navy was involved at Esquimalt.

Ms. Martha Nixon: It's fair to say that the whole discussion of legislative changes is one big part of planning for additional ships or additional people coming in who are trying, in a sense, to abuse the refugee system. In terms of Vancouver and the B.C. boat situation, it could be that it won't just be B.C. in the future. If you look at the trends in other countries right now, it's certainly clear that many countries are facing a large number of boat arrivals.

So we are in fact undergoing planning in British Columbia and on the east coast. We are trying to determine our plans here in terms of being able to deal with the situation, of having a faster determination system, of being able to determine what our detention policy is, of working internationally, both in terms of the Chinese policies and in terms of trying to build on the visits that have already been made to China.

• 1650

Madame Robillard, as you recall, your own visit of parliamentarians, the visit of officials we had just recently...and the continuing discussion we have through our ambassador there and the Chinese ambassador here. We are also working very hard with many other countries to have joint interdiction exercises, to look at sharing of information, to look at having common practices so that we attack this problem jointly. We are working on many things.

The Chair: Steve.

Mr. Steve Mahoney: I was out of the room for so long that my questions were probably asked by John.

The Chair: Why don't you try them on for size and I'll tell you whether or not they were?

Mr. Steve Mahoney: I was actually interested in the discussion around the ID and the concept of a scanner. Was that discussed at all?

The Chair: Not that specific question...in terms of documents.

Mr. Steve Mahoney: We made recommendations in the last session of this committee that we take a look at installing scanners with the idea that you'd at least have proof of the documentation. Even false or fraudulent documentation is at least a place to start, as opposed to having nothing whatsoever.

It's very frustrating, particularly for people at the municipal level in my community, because these people come in and they wind up having to pick up 20% of the welfare costs or the housing costs or whatever is involved. In fact, out of that frustration, they continually send the bill to every minister who's been in the job for the last several years, and it's up to several million dollars. They know they're not going to get paid, but they are just trying to make a point. It's frustrating that they get saddled with this on their property tax.

We don't seem to be able to do anything about the ID problem. I've been told we've tried the scanners and they're not working. I don't know if that's true. Can you tell me?

Ms. Martha Nixon: There have been many discussions, and perhaps Dick may know more about this than I do at this point. We have had a great deal of discussion about one particular model of the scanner. We've been discussing this amongst our own people and with the Americans and some European countries. We think it would be advantageous to have a number of countries doing experiments on this at the same time we're trying it out.

I know we did have a fair amount to do with a company that could offer this kind of technology. We were at the point where we were trying to include this in a number of measures we would have to go forward with, in terms of trying to find money for it. We would have to have bids from different companies coming in. The idea is still under active discussion. We have not made a final decision about what technology would work here.

Mr. Dick Graham: In addition, we have actually been planning to run a pilot test. We've done some research. We're looking into what kind of equipment will most fit our needs. We're having a certain amount of difficulty in locating technology that will do what we want it to do, which is to scan the document and take down the electronic data and also take pictures and such so that we can really know when the person gets to the other end by matching them up with the document. We are working on that. It's on our list.

Mr. Steve Mahoney: I was going to ask if you'd considered a pilot project. Rather than going into some big competitive bid for a system that you're not convinced of, if you called it a pilot project, it seems to me you'd be able to negotiate something on an interim basis for one set at one port.

Mr. Dick Graham: Even the pilot project is going to be relatively expensive, but it is something we intend to pursue.

Mr. Steve Mahoney: You say it's on the list. How long is the list?

Mr. Dick Graham: When I say it's on the list, I mean we're actively working on it. It's not just something we want to work on.

Ms. Martha Nixon: It's advantageous to us if we can have partners such as the Americans. Generally speaking, if they contribute to the project, it becomes a little less costly for all of us. It's also something that Customs is very interested in, in terms of how we're working on border issues. Customs and Immigration together would be very interested in advanced passenger information of different sorts.

Mr. Steve Mahoney: Can we expect to hear something more in this millennium?

Mr. Dick Graham: No, it will be in the next one.

• 1655

Mr. Steve Mahoney: I'd really be eager to see a follow-up report on that. Maybe for the purposes of the committee, you could even base it on this, because I think this is excellent. In fact, I don't recall in the last two years getting this detailed a response to questions that were put so quickly. So that's great.

[Technical difficulty—Editor]

The Chair: Rob.

Mr. Rob Anders: I just want to pick up on the discussion of joint interdiction exercises with other countries, which Martha Nixon discussed. What types of activities are we involved in with the United States on these types of things? Could you provide me with some background, even if it's anecdotal?

The Chair: You like that word—

Mr. Rob Anders: That's what I'm getting, so I'm happy with that. That's what I have to accept.

Ms. Martha Nixon: We're currently working fairly intensively with the United States, particularly in relation to some of the problems we both face at the border. One of the areas we're interested in is how to increase our ability to have interdiction of people who we know we don't want on the North American continent.

We've been looking at a variety of efforts we could pursue to try to get better at this. One of the things that became obvious, to begin with, was sharing information, with both of us collecting information on people who are undesirable, whether they are terrorists or criminals. We have now signed a formal agreement with the United States to share information.

We have sat down and looked at where we have our control resources—our investigative resources and our control officers. Where do the Americans have them overseas and where are ours? We have mapped that against the routes we know most people-smugglers normally use, to try to figure out where the gaps are. We want to do that with other countries as well.

In addition, we have traditionally—and we're trying to increase our efforts—been involved in joint interdiction exercises, and there's one going on this month. It's probably not a good idea to give you a whole lot of detail about that—

The Chair: Not if we don't want it to get out.

Ms. Martha Nixon: —but we have four countries working together. We work in terms of where we think the smuggling routes are. We work with airlines to try to target a particular route. We jointly work that route to see whether we can learn more about what's going on, to prevent some of the people being smuggled through that particular route. So there's a variety of things happening with the United States, but those are a few of them.

Mr. Rob Anders: There was a fellow I met this summer at the American consul general's on July 4 who deals with similar issues to what you deal with—a very frustrated guy. You talked about how some people cross from Canada into the United States for a period of 90 days or more and then come back to the Canadian side and reapply. There was a discussion about repeat cases and whatnot.

Ms. Martha Nixon: In the paper.

Mr. Rob Anders: Yes. So when you speak of joint exercises, I have a sense that it is with regard to people coming from afar, whether it be via boat or plane. What about these situations of zipping back and forth across borders to try to reapply, and that type of thing?

Ms. Martha Nixon: We do a number of things, probably none of them sufficient, but in cases of smuggling, for instance, and Akwesasne, we work together in joint exercises. Operation Rainbow was one that was publicized a year or so ago, where we worked jointly with them to try to have a particular exercise around that smuggling route.

• 1700

In addition, we are talking to them very much about visa policies and how they impact on flows of people. If, for instance, the United States has given a lot of visas to people from a country such as Ethiopia and those people seem to be making a strong move to come to our country and make refugee claims, we will talk to the Americans about that phenomena, having noticed there's a trend there. We'll work with them to try to figure out whether they can alter their visa policies or practices in order to assist us to stop that movement. So we do those kinds of things when there are trends of that nature.

There is probably more that we can do, but at the moment we are having regular meetings. We have a number of joint working groups and we're working at different levels. There are also things we aren't involved in as much, and you would probably want to talk to the Solicitor General about organized crime efforts. There are many joint efforts working from that department, and there might be interest in bringing them forward to talk about those efforts.

The Chair: We'll hear from John, quickly, and then Leon. Then I think we'll call it a day. I would ask all of you to stay here because we need to have a quick steering committee meeting.

Mr. John McKay: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I'm looking at subsection 19(1) of the act and would ask just a fairly simple question here. Would it be useful to amend paragraph 19(1)(g) to expand reasonable grounds to include smuggling or people suspected of it? The way it reads presently is:

persons who there are reasonable grounds to believe will engage in acts of violence that would or might endanger lives or safety of persons in Canada or are members of or are likely to participate in the unlawful activities of an organization that is likely to engage in such acts of violence;

Would it be useful to explore the notion of expanding that or putting in a separate section for smuggling?

Mr. Dick Graham: What we're looking at here in section 19 are reasons for inadmissibility and the inadmissible classes. We have discussed adding something about smugglers, to ensure smugglers are an inadmissible group to Canada. It is one of the proposals we have put forward. On the other hand, if somebody were convicted of smuggling now, we could make them inadmissible to Canada.

Mr. John McKay: That's easy when you're convicted. The reasonable grounds to believe—

Mr. Dick Graham: That's why we want to put it in.

Mr. John McKay: As I was reading it I was thinking, does it mean reasonable grounds to believe that this person might commit violence? That's a pretty vague ground for inadmissibility. If that is a “charter proof” ground for being inadmissible, why could we not also have the phrase “have reasonable grounds to believe will engage in people-smuggling”—or pick your legal definition.

Mr. Dick Graham: There's no reason why not.

Mr. John McKay: So that's on the table as well.

Mr. Dick Graham: Yes.

The Chair: It's in the white paper. We're going to review that. We're taking all these excellent suggestions that are coming from both sides here—your side too, of course—into consideration.

Leon.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I'd just like to follow up a little bit on Rob's questions on interdiction. You've said we could do more in the contiguous zone—the 12-mile to 24-mile limit—in terms of interdiction. Rob was asking about work with other countries.

I'm just wondering if Canada is working with the United States or maybe other countries on that now, even beyond the 24-mile limit. While Canada can't itself do anything, if they have information on a suspicious ship coming, are they giving it to the Americans or someone else who may turn this boat away?

• 1705

Mr. Dick Graham: As mentioned earlier, we do have information-sharing agreements with the U.S. We would share with the Americans any information such as this that comes to our attention

Mr. Leon Benoit: So even if Canada itself can't turn ships around, they can give information to other countries that would allow them to turn ships around.

Mr. Dick Graham: Should they so desire, yes.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Yes. Okay.

Ms. Martha Nixon: In turning ships around, too, you really have to...I don't know if there are really that many actual instances of turning ships around, because one really does have to risk-assess.

Mr. Leon Benoit: I used the term very loosely.

Ms. Martha Nixon: Okay.

Mr. Leon Benoit: That answers that question.

Now I want to go back to the line of questioning I had before. I think there are some numbers you owed me. I'm going to carry on a little bit more with that.

Mr. Dick Graham: I've done some quick math here. You were asking how many people are removed out of that group. This is a rough number because I don't have the breakdown on this. As I say, the larger paper on removals, which you will be receiving shortly, will give you that information. Approximately 5,200 refugee claimants were removed last year.

Mr. Leon Benoit: These are claims, 5,200. Refugee...?

Mr. Dick Graham: Yes, failed refugee claimants—

Mr. Leon Benoit: That were actually removed. So what does that mean?

Mr. Dick Graham: It means they left Canada and that we have some of form of acknowledgement that these people are outside of Canada.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Okay. How many of that 5,200 were to the United States?

Mr. Dick Graham: That I can't tell you at this point.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Approximately, just the best you have right now?

Mr. Dick Graham: That would be a wild guess.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Well, I would even appreciate that. Is it half? Is it three-quarters?

Mr. Dick Graham: I would suspect that of the total number, it's probably a very small percentage, but I really can't speak to it in terms of even an educated guess. That's something I would have to get back to you with.

Mr. Leon Benoit: That's interesting. I've heard that people who are deported to the United States often just turn around and come right back in again; it's a very common occurrence. I have some sources that tell me that is in fact very common.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: I don't recall if you were here when I mentioned our numbers from 1998, when there were 300 of those kinds of cases of people who had been removed to the United States and who, after 90 days, returned. I also indicated that in the period from April 1 to the end of September, that number just in Niagara Falls almost equalled that. It's becoming an increasing occurrence.

But I think it's also fair to say when you take an actual look at the number of people who apply for refugee status in Canada...if we return them to the States, they have to have come through the States, and that number—I have it here somewhere—is not that large in the overall context.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Okay. There are about 300 that return within 90 days, claiming again.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: Yes.

Mr. Leon Benoit: What about those who have been rejected, know that, know they're not likely to be successful applying again, and just come back in? That's the category I've been told about. I know you'd never know for sure, but you must have a feeling, a pretty good idea, as to whether it's very substantial or not.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: I don't think our data systems would tell us that right off the bat, but it just seems to me that if they've been here once, they're in our data system. If they come here again, they're in our data system a second time. I don't know if a crossmatching can be done.

The sense of the street is exactly as you've indicated: that the numbers of repeat claims are larger than the numbers I've provided. This is in an area in which officers often get so frustrated because they see the same people back again. As well, some of them repeat more than once. It's really hard for me to tell whether the street sense and the numbers are legitimately at odds or not. I really can't tell.

Ms. Martha Nixon: I think it's important to point out too that this is a concern to us. We have addressed this in the white paper. We have made a proposal, which is still under discussion. When we went out and consulted on the white paper, this was one of the topics where there was a lot of concern about denying people who really need protection the ability to come back and make a repeat claim, however—

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: Forever.

Ms. Martha Nixon: Forever. And I guess there probably is room here to try to determine what is the judicious time in which it's reasonable to expect circumstances might indeed have changed and somebody could in fact have a second refugee claim that would be different from the first.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Of course, the more cases we can eliminate very quickly, for one reason or the other—you either accept quickly or reject quickly and deal with...or if you can speed up the hearings. Obviously there are people applying who we want to give refuge to, people we've targeted the system at, and it's going to work out an awful lot better for them. That's why I think we're all working for it.

• 1710

The chairman has indicated that I only have time for one more question.

Based on what you've given me today, and I guess on information I've had before, there were, in 1998, roughly 23,000 refugee claims made inside the country. Only 5,200 of those people are known to have left the country. That then gives you a number—my math isn't all that good—of close to 80% for people who claim refugee status in Canada or at the borders and who are probably still in our country. Is that fairly safe to say?

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: To say “probably” is, I believe, too strong. Some of them, whether it's through the PDRCC process or the humanitarian and compassionate processes they have access to, will in fact be allowed to stay permanently. There's a certain falling out of that total number of rejections in regard to people who find other means and other legal means in order to be able to stay.

There will also be a number who just simply say the game is up and they're going home and don't tell us. In some cases, we keep passports; in other cases we don't. There will be other people who simply depart voluntarily. We really don't know. How it all breaks down is, I think, a good question, but it's one that I find really difficult to answer.

George, I don't know if you have some—

The Chair: Leon, I know these are good questions in terms of numbers. I know you were reading from the hard research of your staff person. Perhaps you could give us all a copy and give a copy to the administration so that they will have a little more time to flesh out some additional numbers. If you have additional questions, give them to them. I'm sure they'll be able to provide that to us.

I wonder, then, if I could be permitted just two clarifications or two questions of my own. I'll be very quick.

You were saying that you talked to the Americans quite a lot about common problems. They accuse us, of course, of sending back a number of their people over there. Of course, they were coming through Canada, through New York, but in fact they're going back, and in terms of that, they're talking about some of their illegal hiring practices they have. Therefore, if in fact the American employers weren't doing some of that, obviously that would stop their concerns or our concerns with regard to those people headed that way.

Ms. Martha Nixon: Are you suggesting that if the Americans were using proper hiring practices there wouldn't be so much of a draw for people to go there?

The Chair: Sure.

Ms. Martha Nixon: It's fair to say that we probably haven't had conversations specifically in that area. We've talked a lot about NAFTA practices and those sorts of things, but that may be a very interesting issue to bring up with them.

The Chair: Okay.

Mr. Dick Graham: It's an issue that's actually very hot in the U.S. It has been for a number of years.

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. Dick Graham: They have increasingly strengthened their legislation and their means of dealing with employers because it is such a big problem there. It's a phenomenon in the U.S. It doesn't exist here to the same degree at all. It's a big thing.

The Chair: Secondly, just to follow up on Sophia's question with regard to the Chinese, do I understand that the Chinese government has indicated to someone that they're prepared to accept all of the people from the boat or none? I mean, they want them back totally; they're not going to take one or two or three or 20 or 40. They want them all, right? Do you have the clarification?

Ms. Martha Nixon: That is the position they have been consistently conveying to us since Madame Robillard went there around Easter. They reiterated that to us when we were there just recently. We know this is the same message they have given to other countries as well.

I think it's probably clear that they're coming from a place that says if you find people to be refugees, this is not something they would consider to be appropriate. They have suggested to us that it would make it difficult for them then to take some as opposed to all. We continue to hope that there will be ongoing dialogue and that we may be able to work with them on this issue.

The Chair: Well, as Steve says, how would they know? Obviously we must be providing them with numbers and/or some documentation and/or seeking their advice, right?

• 1715

Ms. Martha Nixon: We have been transparent about the numbers—

The Chair: Or they read our papers—

Ms. Martha Nixon: —just because that's the nature of communication in this country. We haven't been feeding the numbers to them directly, but, yes, they would probably get it from the newspapers.

The Chair: Okay.

On behalf of the committee, let me thank you very much for these issues papers. I think you've done a very fine job. We appreciate it. In this kind of format, it obviously gives us an opportunity to ask much more intelligent questions, and we obviously get much more intelligent answers when we do that. I want to thank you very much for putting in the effort. I know that if we have any particular questions on the fourth paper, which you will send to us, perhaps we—

Ms. Martha Nixon: There'll be the two papers to come, one on removals and one on the comparison. On the comparison table, I think we really need to say that we probably will need to walk you through it, because it's fairly complex.

The Chair: We don't mind having you back. That's not a problem.

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: Or, alternatively, we could speak to Margaret around some of the larger issues. If you thought it wasn't complex, you will afterwards.

The Chair: Listen, as we learn more and more, the only thing I'm saying.... Right after you leave—

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: Okay.

The Chair: —we're going to go into session and we want to talk about other possible witnesses. As we learn more from these witnesses, obviously, we might want you back—

Mr. Gerry Van Kessel: We'd be glad to.

The Chair: —in order to have you answer some additional questions. Thank you again, very much.

Colleagues, I'm going to adjourn this part of the meeting, of course, because we are going to go in camera as a steering committee to discuss the future agenda. Thank you.

[Proceedings continue in camera—Editor]