CIMM Committee Meeting

STANDING COMMITTEE ON CITIZENSHIP AND IMMIGRATION

COMITÉ PERMANENT DE LA CITOYENNETÉ ET DE L'IMMIGRATION

EVIDENCE

[Recorded by Electronic Apparatus]

Wednesday, May 3, 2000

• 1534

[English]

The Chair (Mr. Joe Fontana (London North Centre, Lib.)): Good afternoon, colleagues. Our order of reference from the House of Commons, dated February 29, 2000, reads as follows:

That votes 1, 5, 10, and 15 under Citizenship and Immigration be referred to the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration.

• 1535

Today we shall consider the main estimates for 2000-2001, vote 15, Immigration and Refugee Board, under Citizenship and Immigration, part III, report on plans and priorities. We have the chair of the Immigration and Refugee Board, Peter Showler, with us again.

Welcome, Peter. Perhaps you could informally introduce Glen and Phil.

We know of you. You've been here many times to help us along with some of our stuff. Before we get into estimates, let me thank you formally, on behalf of the committee, for some of your insight when we did our refugee determination report as well as the new bill that has been introduced. Thank you for your excellent input in guiding us through those issues.

Thank you very much, Peter.

Mr. Peter Showler (Chairperson, Immigration and Refugee Board): Thank you.

Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee.

[Translation]

Good afternoon everyone.

[English]

First of all, I would like to introduce the two gentlemen who are with me. Mr. Philip Palmer has appeared before you before. Mr. Palmer is the legal counsel for the Immigration and Refugee Board. Mr. Glen Bailey is the director general for policy, planning, and research with the board. His role here today is to replace Madame Nicole Senécal, who is the executive director of the board. Madame Senécal unfortunately is ill and is on a two-week medical leave, so she sends her regrets that she could not attend today before you.

The Chair: You will, of course, convey our best wishes to her, if you could, Mr. Showler.

Mr. Peter Showler: I certainly will.

I've already provided you with speaking notes today. I note that the last time I appeared before you, Mr. Chairman, you generously allotted me 15 minutes, although it was well over time. Today I intend to repay that generosity by being extremely brief in terms of my remarks, simply so that it will allow you a maximum amount of time to ask questions.

The Chair: Thank you.

Mr. Peter Showler: The appearance here today, of course, is to respond to your questions and concerns in regard to the Immigration and Refugee Board's report on plans and priorities for the years 2000 and 2001. I'm just going to briefly highlight the salient points from the written notes you've been given.

The board has had an extremely busy year. Between the three divisions, we have made more than 50,000 quasi-judicial decisions. Those break down as follows: first of all, the CRDD, the refugee determination division, heard and finalized more than 27,000 claims; the immigration and appeal division heard 4,400 appeals; and our adjudication division heard 4,000 inquiries as well as more than 15,000 detention reviews.

The three priorities of the board have been and continue to be: to reduce processing time; to improve quality and consistency in the decisions; and thirdly, to increase productivity and reduce inventory. Clearly there's a connection between goals one and three.

For each division of the board, standards were set. In great part, the divisions met those goals and standards for this year. Primarily the focus was on efficiency.

I most note, however, that all three of the board's divisions experienced significant increases in caseload. The appeal division heard 10% more appeals than forecast. For the adjudication division, they heard more than 75% more detention reviews than anticipated, and, as you may well guess, the majority of that increase came from the marine arrivals on the west coast.

However, most significantly and of greatest concern, the convention refugee division had an increase of 23% in its claim load. We had forecasted and had expected to hear approximately 25,000 claims. That is the approximate number we've been hearing for the past few years. Instead, we received more than 31,000 claims. That's an excess of slightly more than 6,000, and it is quite relevant, as you will note from my written notes.

• 1540

I want to refer specifically to processing time, because certainly for this committee, for Parliament, for the board, and for the Canadian public, processing time within the convention refugee division has been a primary concern. We managed to lower processing time from 11.9 months down to 9.8 months, so with effort and efficiencies we had more than a two-month decrease. Unfortunately the forecast and the goal had been to come down to 8 months' processing time by the end of this past fiscal year. We did not meet that goal.

I must say the primary reason for that—not the only reason, but the primary reason—is simply the increase in caseload. As a result of the 6,000 claims, instead of lowering inventory, which we'd planned to do, from approximately 23,000 claims, our caseload inventory actually rose by 3,000. We were not able to absorb all of that 6,000 increase, so our current inventory is approximately 26,000 claims. However, there is a basic principle we must consider: larger inventory causes delay in hearing refugee claims. If you have more inventory, you have longer processing times. It's an inevitable result.

In the past few years the board has become more efficient and there has been progress. There's still room for improvement. New initiatives are underway. Some of them are renewals of last year's initiatives; some of them are somewhat new. I'd be delighted to talk to you about them in detail. But I must say these added efficiencies cannot compensate for a 23% increase in workload.

The board will continue its mission to make well-reasoned decisions as efficiently and as fairly as possible, but if case inventories continue to rise or continue to sustain a level of 31,000 or in that range, the message to you is quite direct: the board cannot sustain that level of caseload without having longer processing times unless we have added resources. There is a very fundamental equation there, and it's simply that if you have too much work to handle, and at that point if you have added inventory, you have longer processing times. So in addition to added efficiencies, with caseloads in the range of 31,000, we are going to need more resources. That's the direct and simple message to you.

I'm sure you have lots of questions arising out of the report, and my colleagues and I will be glad to respond to them.

The Chair: Thank you, Mr. Showler.

Leon.

Mr. Leon E. Benoit (Lakeland, Canadian Alliance): Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Good afternoon, gentlemen. My first question has to do with exactly what you've mentioned: the processing times. The minister—actually I believe both the current minister and the past minister, but the past minister certainly—has said she would like processing time to be six months and would instruct the IRB to achieve that time. What is the date that is to be achieved? And are you saying that because of the increased caseload, or anticipated increased caseload, you will not be able to meet that goal?

Mr. Peter Showler: The anticipated time and the planned time to go down to six months had been at the end of this fiscal year, March 31 of the following year. And the answer is yes, we are not going to be able to do it given these increases.

Mr. Leon Benoit: That's an incredible difference, between eleven months, due to an increased caseload of about 3,000 or so, and six months, which was the task given to you by the minister, and I think one that was accepted as achievable. That's an incredible difference.

Mr. Peter Showler: Perhaps I can explain in some detail. We forecast 25,000 claims in the past year. If we had had that number of claims, we expect we would have been very close to our eight months by the fiscal year. You may ask, what's the relationship between them? Why is it so much? It's the difference between having a caseload that's now at 26,000 and rising and having a caseload that would have been down around 20,000. It's because of the aging of the inventory.

I can tell you we were actually down to 9.3 months when our timeline started to turn around, once we really started to experience delays from the added cases coming in.

• 1545

Mr. Leon Benoit: Could I ask you about that inventory?

Mr. Peter Showler: Certainly.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Why has the inventory been increasing? I'd like a little more information on that to really allow us to understand that.

Secondly, why is the caseload increasing? You're manager of the department. You must have a pretty good feel for why the caseload is increasing. I'd like you to give us some detail on that, because these are underpinning issues that really determine a lot of what else goes on in the IRB.

Mr. Peter Showler: Let me address the question of the intake, because certainly it was a question of tremendous concern to us. I must tell you when we had the additional cases, they really started to come in around the middle of the year, last July, so there was a sudden, very large surge. Right away we started to ask ourselves, why is this happening?

I can tell you about some of the characteristics of that intake. First of all, it's across all of our major countries. Of our twenty major source countries, for fifteen we experienced increases. So we couldn't narrow it down to one or two countries. Sometimes you have the occasion where all of a sudden, because of a civil war or because perhaps a visa restriction is removed, you suddenly get a huge inflow from one particular country. That does not account for it.

Secondly, I can tell you that intake is across the board. All five of our regions have experienced increases. It's varied; the highest is in Toronto, at around 26%, and the lowest is in Vancouver. So this is not to be confused with the marine arrivals issue, which is actually quite different. It's in terms of the source countries, and it's the traditional source countries that have increased—countries such as Pakistan, India, and Sri Lanka. There is the odd anomalous country. For example, Angola was fairly low, and now it's had significant increases, but we know of course there's been tremendous civil unrest in that country. But we cannot point at any one source.

The other thing that is important to understand and think about is that Canada is not anomalous. In actuality the global trend in the last three years has been towards an increase in refugee flows. Over the past three years there has been a 53% increase in refugee flows into Europe. If anything, we're somewhat of an anomaly, in that it's only very recently that we've experienced it.

I must say there are two exceptions—

Mr. Leon Benoit: Europe is rejecting more and accepting a lower percentage than before. How many of the claimants we have in fact came via Europe, partly because of their high rejection rate compared to ours?

Mr. Peter Showler: I can't answer that question off the top, but I can certainly provide you with an answer to that number.

Would you like to try, Glen?

Mr. Glen Bailey (Director General, Policy, Planning and Research, Immigration and Refugee Board): I don't think there is actually an answer in terms of knowing exactly how many are coming. What's clear, though, is there is a considerable fluctuation from year to year and from country to country, and it's very hard to be able to predict those.

If you take a look at the international statistics from the IGC on a country-by-country basis, you can see, for example, that from 1996 to 1999, European countries were having an increase. Our figures were stagnant. We were within 1,000 of 25,000. That's what we put in the RPP for last year, because that had been our historical pattern. All of a sudden, this past year in September, we jumped up, and it literally started effectively about 1 July. That then took us into historical quarter-on-quarter levels we had not seen since 1992.

So in terms of what we can use to be able to predict that, if you look at international patterns or trends in refugee source countries, you can't say this or that event led to a flow to Canada. At the same time, you can't even say our pattern is terribly analogous in any given year. It is analogous over a period of time in a group of countries, the increase of the IGC countries averaging 14% from 1996 to 1999 and our increase averaging 18% over that time period.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Predicting might be difficult, but what about analysing what's happened? Surely through the hearings that take place before the IRB, some statistics are kept as to the claimants and their country of origin and the country they've come through to come to Canada. So from those statistics, you would think we could get the information from you that so many claimants came to Canada via Europe, or any other country for that matter.

• 1550

Mr. Peter Showler: In our regular statistics, of course, in terms of source countries, that's something we maintain. We don't ordinarily maintain the statistics in terms of our general indicators of which countries they came through. We can try to trace back and give you some generalities, but that's something we'd actually need assistance from the Department of Citizenship and Immigration on.

Mr. Leon Benoit: Well, you must be in close touch over there. Surely you would be speaking with departmental officials.

Mr. Peter Showler: Oh, yes.

Mr. Leon Benoit: When I'm asking these questions, I'm not particularly concerned about whether you have the figures or the department has the figures. It relates directly to this area, and I would assume you would have them if the department kept them. I'm just asking these questions to try to get that information from you.

Mr. Glen Bailey: I don't have any specific information. We can try to obtain some information that would be more general.

The difficulty is that even in just collecting the pattern and information as to which country they came from, it might be that they transited three, four, or five countries before they eventually arrived in Canada. So it's very difficult to try to make a causal link—as you're looking for, and I understand why—between a particular policy in country X in Europe and an overflow into Canada. It's very difficult.

Mr. Peter Showler: That is the issue partially of transit. Sometimes there would be a distinction between somebody who's just been in the in-transit lounge, for example coming from Africa through Belgium to Montreal, and someone who's come there and stayed in Belgium for a period of two or three months. We'd have to start looking at those kinds of distinctions, which doesn't mean we can't do it, but...

Mr. Leon Benoit: Those are numbers I would be very interested in, and I think other committee members would be as well.

The Chair: I wonder if I could be helpful. The minister will be here next week on exactly the same topic, along with the governmental officials. Maybe between now and then we can ascertain whether or not that information or any information Mr. Benoit was asking for is available. If you could be helpful on that basis, Mr. Showler, I'm sure—

Mr. Philip Palmer (General Counsel, Immigration and Refugee Board): We can alert Citizenship and Immigration that you're interested in what information they might be able to obtain.

The Chair: I'm sure they're here and they're already listening to our discussion, but that's fine.

John McKay isn't here, so we'll go to Jean Augustine.

Ms. Jean Augustine (Etobicoke—Lakeshore, Lib.): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I want to ask a couple of questions.

One, I remember a discussion last year that you were going towards oral decisions and that oral decisions were to be delivered directly at the end of the hearing. I just want to know how often you've done that, how that is being done, what direction is given, and how appropriate you find that process to be.

Mr. Peter Showler: Currently approximately 35% of the CRDD decisions are being delivered orally. I can tell you it's an area of great concern to me, and we're in the process of revising our oral reasons policy right now. The concern is to ensure the quality of the decisions and at the same time to increase the number of oral reasons.

When we're talking about processing times, ordinarily we have a standard that if it's to be a written reason, it's to be delivered 60 days after the completion of the decision. If an oral decision is issued, that of course obviously can save a tremendous amount of processing time. So we want to focus on it.

At the same time, I must tell you there have been certain problems, in that if you're going to give an oral decision at the conclusion of a hearing, it means all of the submissions of counsel, the observations of the refugee claim officer, and time to think about the decision all have to be built into that three-hour hearing period. What happens frequently is you lose a lot of hearing-room time.

We are currently proposing a policy—we've just completed the draft; it will come in very quickly—so that we're actually allowing a seven-day period after the conclusion of the hearing to still issue the reasons orally. So what we're going to do is preserve our three hours' hearing time and at the same time, in many cases, get oral reasons, rather than having to wait for written reasons over a much longer period of time.

So we're hoping to dramatically increase the number of oral reasons while sustaining quality within the next year.

Ms. Jean Augustine: Thank you.

Mr. Chairman, do I have some more time?

The Chair: Oh, yes.

Ms. Jean Augustine: Connected with that is the whole issue of the process you use in order to make sure there is flexibility, transparency, etc., in the system. I know you have a protocol put in place, and I wondered if you could speak to that protocol and give us some idea as to the complaints that are made, whether they're about board members or about the whole process. What do you have in terms of a complaint process and how do you deal with this? How does this happen, in light of what we hear in our constituency offices about the process?

• 1555

Mr. Peter Showler: Perhaps I'll first ask the legal counsel, Mr. Palmer, to address the basic requirements of the complaint protocol.

Mr. Philip Palmer: The complaint protocol was revised about a year ago. It basically encourages the local resolution of disputes or complaints by more informal mechanisms, but if a person feels they are not getting satisfaction, then it is referred to senior levels of the board at the national level—normally the deputy chairs—who determine the method in which a complaint would be investigated.

Sometimes those complaints will be investigated internally, using internal resources of the board, and on a number of occasions we have obtained outside investigators, normally lawyers from private practice, to investigate. They look into the issues. They make a report to the senior person responsible within the board, who then, on the basis of that and their own independent judgment of the situation, will respond to the complaint.

They may decide that appropriate action on the part of a member is warranted, for instance an apology and perhaps some targeted training in areas of weakness that may have led to the perception that gave rise to the complaint. In other instances, of course, the proper response will be that the complaint was unfounded, with perhaps an explanation of how the procedure worked and how it was in fact in accordance with the obligations of the members.

Ms. Jean Augustine: Mr. Chairman, I want to know how many complaints you would have dealt with over the year—an approximate number. Were there many? Ten, twenty?

Mr. Philip Palmer: I would say it would be in the vicinity of ten to twenty, and that would include the ones that were dealt with purely locally.

Mr. Peter Showler: Are we talking about internal complaints, external complaints, or the two combined?

Ms. Jean Augustine: Internal—

Mr. Philip Palmer: The protocols that would be external—

Mr. Peter Showler: Yes, but I just wanted to clarify it.

Mr. Philip Palmer: I take it you're interested just in those that relate to so-called member conduct.

Ms. Jean Augustine: Yes.

Mr. Philip Palmer: As I say, it would be in that ballpark. I don't have the statistic with me. I can get it for you if you would like me to provide that.

Ms. Jean Augustine: I would imagine the committee, Mr. Chairman, might also be interested in a copy of the protocol. I haven't seen it. I just know you have a protocol.

Mr. Philip Palmer: We'd be happy to provide that to you.

Mr. Peter Showler: We'll come back with the number of complaints for the last year. Mr. Palmer's figure is approximately correct. That's the range of the complaints.

Ms. Jean Augustine: Thank you, sir.

The Chair: Do you have anything additional, Jean? If not, your remaining time will go to John.

John.

Mr. John McKay (Scarborough East, Lib.): Thank you for your presentation, the essence of which is that you can't keep on going on the resources you have.

Now, you're probably quite intimately familiar with Bill C-31. In the anticipation that Bill C-31 will become law, one of the major and significant aspects is that the refugee hearing, humanitarian and compassionate, and risk review will all be done at one sitting.

The second aspect is that you'll be shrinking from two-member panels to one panel as a matter of course, with an internalized paper review by two panel members.

I would think that is a pretty substantial redeployment of resources. Have you given thought to how Bill C-31 will impact on your present budgetary situation, and how do you see that as processing cases more expeditiously?

• 1600

Mr. Peter Showler: I can first of all respond in generalities. I can tell you that in terms of the single-member panel provision, we expect a great deal of added efficiencies from it. It's not simply a matter of having, if you want, twice as many people to do the same work. I do want to remind you that when you have two-member panels, only one of them has to write the decision—half the time you're sitting as a single member. So there is an added burden if you're sitting solely as a single member.

But at the same time, it's tremendously more efficient, particularly from the point of view of case management and scheduling. A lot of our scheduling problems result from the fact that if members are seized, we have to find ways they can then continue their hearings together. So it certainly makes that considerably easier. And I can tell you that we expect to realize a tremendous benefit in efficiency from the single member.

Currently approximately 35% of our cases proceed by way of single member simply with the consent of counsel. We are anticipating that in the beginning approximately 80% would go by way of single member. There is reference in the legislative material to situations such as complex cases, for example, where the chairperson would have the authority to delegate larger panels of three members.

There are other occasions, in particular, with brand-new members. The minute a member walks onto the board, they have three weeks of training. They're not going to be able to walk into a hearing room and hold a hearing all by themselves. There will have to be some sort of support in multiple panels for a period of time. That's why we're calculating that approximately 80% of the cases will be single member.

In terms of the refugee appeal division, you will have noted in the references there that we're assuming there are only going to be approximately 14 members on that appeal division and that they would be very experienced members. But cases would be heard in the appeal division not by a two-member panel, but by single members, except, again, with the authority to delegate three-member panels. But that would be on only very complex, precedential cases, which would be quite exceptional. We would not anticipate there would be many of those within a year.

Mr. John McKay: I note as well that the minister in her comments talked about more ministerial intervention in an earlier situation. How do you see that playing out? Do you see that as the minister saying, in effect, that this particular claim we see as, for want of a better phrase, manifestly well founded? Do you see it playing out that way, or do you see the minister intervening in other ways? As I read the legislation, there is a contemplation that the minister will become more of an activist at the board.

Mr. Peter Showler: Yes, I think that's correct. But there are a significant number of cases, particularly any cases where there's the potential for exclusion, where exclusion is an issue. I can tell you now there are cases before us, but the minister has lacked resources. There are cases that she would like to appear on, and, quite frankly, the board would like them there, too, because they could provide assistance, as they have sources of information, particularly in terms of security issues, that we would not. So we'd welcome their attendance.

But in terms of the efficiency of the board, what that would mean is that if the minister becomes a party, first of all it becomes adversarial, and secondly, it becomes a more complex hearing. So we can anticipate that with greater participation of the minister, we will have more cases that will be “complex cases”. We accept that as part of the requirements of doing business. But it's also a requirement of making quality decisions, because quality decisions don't refer just to positive decisions, of course; they refer to accurate conclusions in terms of exclusions as well.

The Chair: Thank you, John.

[Translation]

Mr. Bernard Bigras (Rosemont, BQ): Mr. Chairman, I'd like to focus in particular on the Montreal office.

When you last appeared before the committee, the decision had already been made. Even before the minister made the announcement a few weeks ago, you had already set your goal to reduce the processing time to an average of six months. At least that's how I understand it. As you yourself stated at the time, the processing time at the Montreal office was more than 12 months.

First of all, I'd like to know if you have evaluated the current average processing time and the number of cases that are outstanding. I'd also like to know what percentage of the cases being processed in Canada are actually being processed at the Montreal office.

• 1605

Mr. Peter Showler: I believe the processing time at the Montreal office is now 8.2 months. I think it's the shortest in the country at the present time. As for the number of cases processed by that office, some 10,900 claims were handled last year. The total for this year is different. At present, slightly over 8,000 cases are awaiting adjudication in Montreal.

Mr. Bernard Bigras: What percentage of the overall caseload in Canada is being processed in Montreal? Do you have these figures?

Mr. Peter Showler: As I said earlier, about one third of our caseload is being handled by that office.

Mr. Bernard Bigras: I see. One third of all claims currently being processed in Canada are being handled by the Montreal office.

Mr. Peter Showler: That's correct. As I said, our current national inventory is approximately 26,000 claims.

Mr. Bernard Bigras: Fine. You stated that one way of reducing the average processing time would be to have added resources, quite naturally. You have already managed to reduce processing times from 12 months to 8.2 months. Your objective continues to be six months. As a sound administrator, have you evaluated the financial resources required to achieve the six-month target for claims processing at the Montreal office?

Mr. Peter Showler: We have given some thought to this matter, not just in terms of reducing processing times at the Montreal office, but at all board offices as well. It's hard for me to give you a specific answer because, as I said, we feel that there are many other ways to improve efficiency. We also know that our workload has increased by about 23 per cent. Therefore, we would probably need to see an increase of between 10 per cent and 15 per cent in our resources.

The subject of board members is somewhat more complex. Two years ago, 10 new members were appointed for a two-year period. This period will end in October of this year, at which time we will be left with a total of 173 board members. There are approximately 200 board members currently at work hearing claims and reducing the overall inventory. As I said, in terms of processing times, it's not simply a question of processing the cases now before the board. It's also a matter of reducing the inventory to approximately 16,000 cases.

Mr. Bernard Bigras: Was the six-month goal that you had set prior to the minister's announcement based on the new procedure that will be introduced which will involved assessing risk at the same time as hearing the claim for refugee status? Did this six- month goal take into account the soon-to-be-made announcement or did you come up with the idea without really knowing what was in store? Basically, if you did not set this goal based on the new processing procedure, maybe this means that claims could be processed even faster than this.

Mr. Peter Showler: Yes, possibly. Several years ago, before I was appointed chairperson, the board discussed the possibility of processing times of anywhere from two to six months. It considered whether this was a realistic goal and deemed that it might be in several years' time, that is by the end of this fiscal year. Now then, had it not been for the increase in the number of cases, we might have been able to achieve that goal.

• 1610

Mr. Bernard Bigras: I have another question for you. Naturally, the IRB needs resources in order to function efficiently. There is also the matter of board members and their expertise. You're telling us that you need added resources, but how much consideration do you give to the knowledge and experience that board members will acquire in the process of rendering fair, effective decisions?

Mr. Peter Showler: That's a very good question. When I mention different ways of making the IRB operate more effectively, I'm saying that we need to pay attention to the selection, training and development of board members. We're making some changes in this area. First, in terms of the selection process, as you know, the minister oversees a selection committee. I must say that when we looked at the last group of potential board candidates, only 31 per cent of the candidates from across the country were deemed qualified to work for the board. I'm not saying that 31 per cent of the candidates were actually appointed, only that 31 per cent qualified for the position, meaning that 69 per cent did not.

If I may, I'd like to point out an error in the committee's report. It contains a reference to the minister's committee. In fact, this committee is responsible solely for selecting board members, not for renewing their terms. The latter happens only after the performance of board members has been assessed. We've informed the minister, who is in total agreement with us, that initially, board members will be appointed for two years only, in accordance with the committee's recommendation, and that the selection process will be followed by an individually tailored training program. That's totally different from what was done in the past. During this two-year period, candidates will be carefully monitored to ensure that they are qualified and competent. If the candidates are found to be incompetent, they will not be appointed. If they are recommended for appointment, they will serve five-year terms. That's our objective.

[English]

The Chair: Merci, Bernard.

Welcome, John Williams. You have five minutes, and then we have Gerry.

Mr. John Williams: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have a couple of financial questions to begin with. I see that your budget is $96.9 million, of which $56.9 million is going to be spent in the field regarding determination, appeals, and reviews, and $40 million is for corporate management and services. Aren't you a little heavy on the head office?

Mr. Peter Showler: There are answers to that and I'm going to ask Mr. Bailey to give them.

Mr. John Williams: Mr. Bailey, briefly, please.

Mr. Glen Bailey: Yes, okay.

The essential thing is that corporate management services considers a number of things that cover all three divisions and can't be broken down. For example, there are registry services; the function of all the staff who work in the registrar's offices in each of the regional bureaus. Secondly, there are funds that are included in there that relate to the new case management system, the new software. That's why the increase has taken place, and there's a big chunk in this current fiscal year for that because we're in the process of buying new software in order to allow us to effect new case management techniques.

Mr. John Williams: Can't you do cost allocation? Everybody else can handle cost allocation. Under the new FIS program, you're going to have to handle cost allocation.

Mr. Glen Bailey: Under the new one we will, yes. But in terms of this particular situation, it's a centralized system that would deal with all. We can do that. That's one way of looking at it. I'm explaining the figure to you also in terms of...

There's a third thing that's in there. There was a court decision in November with respect to translation of decisions, so there is an amount there with respect to the need to anticipate that in future we will be translating a significantly larger number of the decisions of the board. And again, that has not been broken down. That literally arrived just as we were putting this document to bed.

Mr. John Williams: I think you should do some breakdown for subsequent years.

I also note that you have 1,040 staff, 788 in the field and 252 in the corporate management head office. So a quarter are employed in the head office, but they sure consume a lot more dollars than the field services. You have almost half the money allocated to the head office, which only has a quarter of the staff, roughly speaking.

• 1615

Mr. Philip Palmer: There are some deceptions there. For instance, in my line of work, where I have a total of 44 employees reporting to me, my budget is centralized in Ottawa because that's our command-and-control structure, but in fact three-quarters of my employees are in the regions. So it isn't fully reflective of the way in which in fact the FTEs are allocated.

Mr. John Williams: I would hope there are no more deceptions, Mr. Palmer, because I've been putting a lot of emphasis on ensuring that reports on plans and priorities and the performance reports in the fall give members of Parliament a clear indication of what is actually happening in the departments. So I give the same message to you as to every other department I talk to on this issue: that as parliamentarians we expect clear, concise, and informative information that we can analyse, rather than something that, using your word, can cause “deception”.

I also take a look at your cost-processing files. It seems to me you have about 30,000 claims finalized in a year at a cost of $2,400 apiece. That works out to $72 million. If I take, roughly speaking, a 30,000 inventory of refugee claims—table 3.4 says claims finalized were 29,500, so call it 30,000—and you say the average cost of claims finalized is $2,400, that works out to $72 million. But you're not spending $72 million. Where's the discrepancy?

Mr. Glen Bailey: First of all, part of it is accounted for by the fact that we finalized 27,700 cases this particular year, and that would be—

Mr. John Williams: But you only spent $47 million. You're still a long way over using your math of $2,400 times 27,700. If somebody has a calculator... I'm too lazy to work it out.

Mr. Glen Bailey: I don't have a calculator.

Can we come back to you with some further information?

Mr. John Williams: Yes, why don't you come back to us?

In the same situation on your appeals, you're saying $1,650 per cost—oh, do you have a calculator, Mr. Ritz?

Mr. Gerry Ritz (Battlefords—Lloydminster, Canadian Alliance): There you go.

Mr. John Williams: You use it. So it's 27,700—

The Chair: Mr. Ritz, it's nice to have you here. It's the Williams and Ritz accounting firm.

Mr. John Williams: That's right. So 27,700 times $2,400 equals... And the number is?

Mr. Gerry Ritz: Sixty-six million, four hundred and eighty thousand.

Mr. John Williams: So you're out on your math somewhere. You could perhaps give us an explanation.

Mr. Glen Bailey: Yes, and I'd like to give you a fuller explanation, but if I could also give another part of it, it is the question that when we calculated this figure, $2,400, we were including all of those figures in corporate management services that weren't broken down by the division.

Mr. John Williams: So further confusion.

Mr. Glen Bailey: What I'd like to do, though, is also say that I think you've made a couple of points about the way in which we present our statements to you that I think we will take under advisement. We can't do it this year, but we'll certainly try to reflect some of that, because there are a number of things that in terms of giving you a clear picture we could be doing better, and we'll certainly try to do that.

Mr. John Williams: It's the same on the cost per appeal. You're saying $1,650 per appeal, 4,800 appeals finalized—and again, I'd like to see your actual costs, a more accurate reflection of what your costs are. Obviously it's not $2,400 per appeal by claim finalized, unless you're bringing in some other information out of that head office allocation and so on.

Mr. Glen Bailey: That's exactly what we're doing. But I think what I'd like to do is be able to give you a full explanation of how we arrived at that figure so that you can see the linkages.

Mr. John Williams: Now, talking about—

The Chair: I'm sorry, John, you're going to have to wait for a while.

Mr. John Williams: I thought I had an hour, Mr. Chairman.

Some hon. members: Oh, oh!

Mr. Rick Limoges (Windsor—St. Clair, Lib.): That's a different committee.

The Chair: John has made some points, and I'm wondering whether or not in your performance report in the fall you might want to take those things into consideration.

Mr. Glen Bailey: Yes, I think they're good points, because obviously we want to be clear with you and we want you to be able to understand easily. If what we're presenting isn't, then it's useful for us to know it, and we'll certainly try to make adjustments.

The Chair: You know John comes to us as the chair of the public accounts committee. You can tell readily that he went right for the jugular, so to speak, in terms of those financial statements.

Anyway, we're going to David Price.

Mr. David Price (Compton—Stanstead, PC): Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I'll follow up on questions that Bernard was asking. You mentioned 30% of the potential board members qualified. Out of that 30%, how many were actually hired?

• 1620

Mr. Peter Showler: Once the person qualifies by what's called the MAC committee, the members advisory committee, they go into what's called a candidate pool, which means they're eligible for a two-year period. Anytime during that two-year period they might be appointed. The appointment process is separate.

I can tell you that over the last two years, in terms of the number of persons in the candidate pool, approximately one-third of them have been eventually appointed to the board. So simply because you qualify does not mean you're then going to be appointed. Then there is the final process, and of course the final process is a decision by the Governor in Council.

Mr. David Price: I guess that's what I was looking for.

Mr. Peter Showler: Then let me be candid. That's the answer.

But at this point, the way the system works, what we can try to do is ensure... What we say to the minister is “This person is qualified. In our view, they're qualified. We think they will make a good board member, a competent board member.” After that the selection process lays in the hands of the Governor in Council.

Mr. David Price: The next thing I'd like to ask you about is our border customs officers. Our border customs officers end up really being our first-line immigration officers in many cases. In my own riding I have seven border crossings, and I talk to these people quite a bit. They do complain a lot that really they get just about no training at all from Immigration, and yet they're first-line; they're there all the time. It's not an easy job to do, particularly not having the training. Yet there's nothing in your budget. I should think that somewhere in there, there would be spots for a transfer of money for training, particularly in Immigration. Is there anything planned?

Mr. Peter Showler: That's the responsibility of the immigration department. Until they're referred to us, we have no role.

The Chair: That's a good question to put to the minister next week.

Mr. Peter Showler: The minister would be surprised to find out if she thought I was responsible for training her front-line immigration officers.

The Chair: Are you suggesting that it might be one of the things... It's okay, Peter.

Mr. David Price: On page 25 you talk about a contingency plan, yet there's really nothing in the way of details at all. Is there anything laid out yet for a contingency plan? Obviously we're looking at another summer coming along, and we're already hearing figures like 1,200 possible arrivals.

Mr. Peter Showler: In terms of that reference to contingency plans—by the way, first of all, there's a national contingency plan, because we learned from last year. We know we're not only talking about the west coast. We know there's a possibility that there could also be arrivals from the east coast. So the contingency planning first has been a matter of learning from last year what elements have to be in place if there is a sudden marine arrival.

There are a lot of factors to consider that are unknowns. Quite frankly, they could come by large container. They could come by boat. I don't want to scare you, but we know this is a globalization issue. Maybe not this year, but in one year, two years, eventually they're going to arrive in a large plane. Then they could land in your riding or any riding here.

So our contingencies are more on the basis of the generalities and how we can respond to them.

In terms of the west coast, we've been more focused, and one of the problems with contingency planning is there are a lot of partners. There's a lot of connection between provincial and federal authorities. Certainly the department plays a large role with the board, but so do the correction agencies, whichever province it is, and often so do social services agencies, particularly if minors are involved, and so does the legal aid agency, whoever provides the legal aid agency in whichever province. So it's more a matter of organizing all of the partners that would be involved and at least having contingency plans so that you can anticipate the kinds of generic responses you have to make.

The specific plans would have to wait. We have some pretty good ideas in terms of the west coast. We're guessing more in terms of the east coast.

Mr. David Price: So they are ready then.

The Chair: Members of the committee, this is a quorum-call bell, so you don't have to get excited.

Mr. David Price: I still have a minute.

The Chair: Yes.

Mr. David Price: Last February when you were here you said you weren't looking for more resources then. You were going to do it internally. Of course, the minister has given you, through the budget, more resources. It sounds like today you're still asking for more resources. If I look here, though, it seems to me there is more money in the budget than actually shows up in here. In here it says the increase of the $11 million is just for translation costs.

• 1625

I'm missing something somewhere.

Mr. Peter Showler: That is with regard to the Federal Court decision that was referred to. This is completely exterior to the board.

I can tell you, it's a matter of great frustration to the board and to me personally that this was the decision of the Federal Court. It's been appealed, not by us but by the justice department, to the Supreme Court. The issue is whether or not the board has to translate all of its decisions—and that's all of its decisions—for which the cost is in the range of $11 million.

So it's an extraordinary cost. In a way, instead of being an immigration refugee tribunal we start to become a translation agency.

Mr. David Price: So you therefore have no increase, according to the last budget brought in?

Mr. Peter Showler: Well, the only increases we're anticipating in the new budget that we've discussed are, for example, in terms of the minister's interventions. If there are more interventions there may be additional items there, and there may be other matters as well. For example, if we speed up front-end processing, that might bear on it a little, but nothing in this budget has referred to or dealt with this increase in the CRDD from $25,000 to $31,000. That's not in there.

Glen may want to add something to that.

The Chair: Okay. Thank you.

Mr. Bryden.

Mr. John Bryden (Wentworth—Burlington, Lib.): Just to pick up on your thoughts in terms of refugees arriving by aircraft, can you elaborate a little bit more on some of the contingencies you see down in the future? That comment took me quite by surprise.

Mr. Peter Showler: Well, that's the most long-range situation. We certainly hope it doesn't happen this year, but we have to anticipate. As I say, with globalization...

Perhaps I can back up in terms of the boats. A few years ago a change in the legislation allowed seizure of any vehicle used to bring in illegal immigrants. The notion was that this would deter people. But we've already seen the situation where if you manage to find some boat that is of sufficiently low value, and if you have a human cargo that's of sufficient value—and you've read the newspapers, so you know we're talking $30,000 to $40,000 a cargo—that's a lot of money.

So it's simply a matter of projecting that at some point there are going to be airplanes that manage to get here. Again, if they have a cargo of 500 people, with those kinds of numbers...

Quite frankly, we know at some point it's going to happen. It's an issue of globalization. We know it could happen. In terms of contingency plans, a plane could arrive anywhere in Canada, but we still know we're going to have to have certain basic features. We are going to have to have national responses.

In terms of the west coast, we had only two adjudicators there. We had to move to eight adjudicators, and at one time, ten. We have to be able to take national resources and move them very quickly to somewhere in the country.

So we discuss those basic principles in terms of anywhere in the country. That's the level of contingency planning for airplanes.

Mr. John Bryden: You project 32,000 claims in the coming year and then 29,500 for the two subsequent years. Can I ask you, what is the basis for those estimates? Why are we going down in the two subsequent years?

Mr. Peter Showler: In Toronto in particular, an unusual number of claims were delayed in making their application. A sum of some 3,000 cases are going to be absorbed a little bit in this past fiscal year and primarily in this next fiscal year, but we see that as an anomalous one-time number that does not accurately reflect what the regular inflow is. That's the basis upon which we've gone down to 29,500 afterwards.

Mr. John Bryden: In these estimates of the projected number of claims, is there anything I see here that reflects the impact on the number of claims that will result from provisions in the Immigration Act that do not pertain to the single-member panels?

For instance, in the new Immigration Act, we've stiffened up security screening and we've extended detention. Have you examined the impact of this type of provision on the number of claims you expect? Is that in your calculations at this time?

Mr. Peter Showler: No, it isn't, but I'll let Mr. Bailey respond to that, if he wants. He was involved in the preparation of those numbers.

Mr. Glen Bailey: We haven't factored that in. At the time we were preparing this, of course, policy decisions were still outstanding. The legislation was not yet finalized. It's still subject to your approval, so it's hard for us to know exactly how we would project.

• 1630

In the 29,000, we said, okay, there was this factor of a bunch of claims that we knew were going to hit us in this next fiscal year. We essentially assumed that nothing in the legislation would have a significant impact one way or the other in terms of having either a pull factor or a non-pull factor with regard to new claims coming forward.

Typically, in both Canada and other countries, you see sometimes surges or decreases related to the introduction of new legislation. When we looked at what was in the new legislation, we didn't see anything that was going to have a significant impact in that regard.

Second, while we have forecast for this coming year that there might be some irregular migrant arrivals—by boat, for instance, on whichever coast—we didn't project that into the future. Again, this was something that hit us unexpectedly last year. We anticipate that it might repeat next year, but it would be awfully difficult for us to project two or three years out into the future. We could give very misleading indications to you and to the public as to what might actually happen when we don't really know in that detail.

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

The Chair: For further information, that quorum call has now become a vote call. We'll be having a vote in approximately 20 minutes. I think we'll be able to finish up by then.

I'll go to Mr. Williams, who will be my last questioner, and then I have a couple before that's it.

An hon. member: Before next time.

The Chair: We're going to let you off easy again, Peter, what can I tell you?

Mr. Peter Showler: That's twice.

The Chair: I know.

Mr. Peter Showler: I did intend to tell you that today as well is my birthday, but I didn't think that would be credible.

Voices: Oh, oh!

The Chair: How many birthdays can you have in the same year?

John.

Mr. John Williams: I'll pass on the singing, Mr. Chair. My singing is not good.

Mr. Showler, on the letter I requested explaining amplification on these numbers, perhaps you can give us the number of withdrawals, claims abandoned, claims withdrawn, as well as those finalized—i.e. brought to conclusion—and the costs and so on. Could you do that?

Mr. Peter Showler: Certainly.

Mr. John Williams: In terms of claims, I'm looking at detention reviews, finalized and so on. You mentioned the 600 Chinese migrants in Vancouver. How many of these disappeared into the community and you've lost track of because they weren't detained?

Mr. Peter Showler: How many disappeared into the community? Well, we can give you that number from the withdrawals. We actually have that number here. I'll ask Mr. Bailey to find it.

Now, we're talking from the specific number of the 599—

Mr. John Williams: The boat people who arrived on the west coast. Initially there was a reluctance to detain them, and I understand a number have disappeared. I'd like to know what that number is.

Mr. Glen Bailey: There were 67—and those were the people essentially who weren't detained—whose claims were determined to be abandoned.

Mr. John Williams: “Abandoned” means you just lost track of them. Whether they were qualified or unqualified, they're now part of the Canadian fabric, because they're here somewhere.

Mr. Peter Showler: Or they have gone to the United States.

Mr. John Williams: Oh, yes, they may have gone there.

Mr. Peter Showler: In essence, it means they were scheduled for a hearing, they failed to attend, we initiated abandonment of proceedings, and they were declared abandoned.

Mr. John Williams: Perhaps in the letter, then, you can tell us how...

Abandonment means they just failed to show and you lost them. Is that right?

The Chair: To be helpful, I don't want to duplicate work, John, and I think these are some of the very same questions Leon had asked. We have those numbers. They've been submitted to the committee. I just don't want the administrative people to have to regurgitate the same stuff.

Mr. John Williams: Very good.

Mr. Bailey, you said of the 67 that those were basically all the ones you hadn't detained. So about 100% of the ones who were not detained just disappeared?

Mr. Glen Bailey: First of all—

Mr. Peter Showler: No, that's incorrect. Right now, of the 599—and I'll just say 600—

Mr. John Williams: But quite a number of them were actually detained until you decided.

Mr. Peter Showler: —356 are detained. That's the number of those who continue to be in detention.

Mr. John Williams: Yes, but my point is, Mr. Bailey said practically all those who were not detained initially have disappeared. Is that a correct statement?

Mr. Glen Bailey: The majority of the people who were determined abandoned were people who were not initially detained. The question of requesting detention is a decision of the Department of Immigration. All we do is determine a claim for those people who are referred to us. If the person doesn't appear, then we can't determine the claim.

Mr. John Williams: Okay.

• 1635

I go back to the Auditor General's report a couple of years ago regarding the number of refugees and the number of illegal refugees. You're very much concerned about determining who is legal, who's legitimate and who's not, and you know there is a large number of people arriving here with no documents. Are you continuing to check people before they disembark airplanes to see if they have documents? Are you continuing that process in order to minimize the number of obviously illegal, illegitimate claims?

Mr. Peter Showler: Once again, the problem is that's not where the jurisdiction of the board lays until—

Mr. John Williams: But surely if somebody comes to you claiming an appeal and you find out they came off the plane with no documents, knowing that they weren't allowed on without the documents, wouldn't you just deny their appeal?

Mr. Peter Showler: We ask for an explanation. Sometimes the explanation is reasonable and sometimes it isn't, but we certainly ask about it.

I can tell you that we are aware that the Department of Immigration is doing that. It's not our responsibility. Whenever they receive documents, they copy them and refer them to us. If they don't have documents, they note that too.

Mr. John Williams: It would seem to me that I would just automatically deny their appeal, unless there were some serious, extenuating circumstances to justify it.

Another thing that came up—

The Chair: Peter, before you answer that, if I could—and we'll excuse you for these questions, John—some of us have spent the better part of a year asking exactly those questions. You will find them in our refugee determination report that was leaked by your buddy a long time ago. It's a draft, and you would have seen it there. Secondly, the solutions to part of your questions are in fact in the new bill. I'm sure you would want to come back in about a week or two to ask exactly those questions of the minister.

Mr. John Williams: I have another question in the same vein.

If I recall, there are two internal centres. One is in Montreal. When I say internal, these are places where people can claim refugee status within Canada. I'm not talking about an airport or a seaport.

Mr. Peter Showler: They can claim at any refugee office in Canada.

Mr. John Williams: There's one in Montreal, and I think the other one is in Toronto, but I may be wrong on that. I'm recalling the AG's report of a couple of years ago where a significant number of people claimed refugee status with no documents at one of these refugee offices. Obviously they got into the country with documents. If they show up at your office with no documents, wouldn't it be an automatic denial?

Mr. Peter Showler: No, it would not be an automatic denial. We have to ask why they don't have documents. What you must understand is that if there are fraudulent refugees, it could be an entirely fraudulent story. It could also be a completely genuine refugee who has been brought in by a professional smuggler, who has told them, on their peril, “If you don't do something with those documents and return them to me, you'll be sent back immediately.” So it's still necessary for us to investigate their claim on their individual evidence.

The Chair: John, I'm sorry, that's six minutes and ten seconds, twenty seconds, twenty-one seconds, now twenty-two seconds.

Mr. John Williams: I'm much more generous when I'm in the chair.

The Chair: Okay, I'll appear before your committee and test it out.

If I could, before I thank you gentlemen for answering some of us, on the appeal section, Peter, you talk a little bit about some of the increases anticipated in the current year, and you say that's due in part to a significant increase in the number of applications for family class visas being consider by CIC. Could you expand on that? I wonder what the connection is in terms of the appeals and the additional family class visas.

Mr. Peter Showler: One of the bases for appeals that the appeal division considers is where there is an application for family sponsorship and it's denied. Then the Canadian permanent resident or the citizen has the right of appeal. The minister has said she recognizes there are administrative backlogs, and they're going to increase the number of visas they're going to consider. We know if there is going to be an increased number, a percentage will be refused. So that's where we're anticipating—

The Chair: Part of the new bill might also... Again, I think we're dealing in hypothetics, but some of that is done.

Could I ask, though, how many people are there in the backlog who obviously have yet to be determined? There's a good number in the backlog, so to speak, who you have to track and therefore are a cost of some sort. Do we have that number?

• 1640

Secondly, would an administrative amnesty, or appeal or something, be able to help in terms of that particular backlog and hence the strain on the IRB and human resources?

Mr. Peter Showler: You're talking now about the CRDD? Is that correct?

The Chair: Right.

Mr. Peter Showler: We hate to use the word “backlog”. You know that.

The Chair: I know you do.

Mr. Peter Showler: But in actuality, we've ascertained that we think the maximum efficient inventory is probably in the range of 16,000 claims. If we had that inventory, we think we could move them along our process about as fast as we could possibly do efficiently within six months. Technically, you might say anything above that is something that is added time to the process.

Certainly this is a policy issue, but we'd be very reluctant to see an amnesty simply because... There then becomes the famous pull factor. If once again we go through that process—and certainly Great Britain is going through that process right now, and it's very problematic—we'd rather do it by some increase in resources and increased efficiency.

The Chair: Even the United States is in fact considering it. I've heard recently that they're looking at it.

My point is, other than a general amnesty or something like that, is there a credible basis administrative thing that in fact can help it along?

I know from the minister, in certain cases, as we were talking about, undocumented, say, Somalis and others, in fact had come here under some pretty bad situations but didn't have the documentation; therefore they've been waiting three or four years for that determination. One can deal with those in a much more efficient and effective way, but recognizing that security and safety is also of concern.

Mr. Peter Showler: Yes. In the Somali situation, those are ones who have already been determined to be refugees, but they're not being landed. Certainly one of the areas we want to look at is how we can improve our expedited process, and if we can do manifestly founded claims in a better way, we'll certainly do it.

The Chair: Okay.

Thank you again, Peter, Philip, and Glen, for your words of wisdom. We appreciate your input on the estimates. Thank you.

Committee members, tomorrow at 9 a.m. in room 269, West Block, we will start the study on the numbers and immigration, and officials will be here to start that particular process.

Thank you. The meeting is adjourned.