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Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

First of all I want to thank you, Minister, and the department officials for being flexible in meeting with us under the craziness that's going on in the House. I thank you for that.

I have a question, Minister, and it involves my riding. It involves parental sponsorship applications under the old system. There's a family living in my riding who have waited 12 years for the processing of a parental sponsorship application, which was initiated in July 2007. I appreciate you will have no knowledge of this, but we will give some papers to your officials and hopefully you could comment generally on this.

The department continues to promote family reunification, yet here we have a family in my riding that has continued to languish in the New Delhi visa office since May 2009. Seemingly, the department cannot figure out how to update the details all because the file has the misfortune of being initiated under the original system. I'm not going to reveal the names for privacy reasons, but I'll have my assistant give somebody up there a copy with more details. He's doing that now.

Notwithstanding that this is something that you're not aware of, I would like it if you could comment generally on how this is happening—a 12-year wait?

I'm sure you're not.

If someone could contact my office at a convenient time, I'd appreciate it.

Thank you.

I will share my time with my colleague.

You're very kind, Mr. Chairman. I guess that means I have to be nice to the minister. I'll try to be.

I have a question with respect to the visa issue of Mexico, and I realize there's a gray area between the three ministers, but you are in charge of visas. The media is reporting that there may be hundreds of Mexican nationals in Canada with ties to drug cartels, particularly in Quebec. I appreciate that the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness challenged that, but there is no question, whether the media has the right figure or Minister Goodale has, that they're here.

This is the result of the government's visa lift in 2006, which I believe the minister's own officials recommended against. The result of that is we've been flooded with, really, thugs and criminals. My question for you as the Minister of Immigration is: what do you intend to do about this alarming situation, other than to pass it on to the Minister of Public Safety?

I understand that, Minister, and good for you. Encouraging trade is a good thing. The problem is, unless the media is wrong—and I can't believe you're going to say the media is wrong—there are criminals who have come from Mexico under drug cartels, according to the media, who are here, and the government knows they are here. Minister Goodale didn't deny that. The only thing he denied was the numbers.

On the fact that they're here, what steps are you taking to deal with that issue to give confidence to the public that these types of people...? I'm sure they are not all bad people, but there are some who are bad. How can we create confidence in the government that this issue is going to be resolved?

I've read three newspapers, Mr. Minister. I don't want to get into that. It's been alleged and the Minister of Public Safety has not denied it.

Yes, but you're admitting that some of these people—

I'm sorry, go ahead.

We're not going to come to the same accord. I think there's generally a problem that the government has to resolve.

The Parliamentary Budget Officer predicts that the cost to taxpayers for illegal border crossing will be $1.1 billion by March 2020, which is under a year from now.

Do you concur with the Parliamentary Budget Officer with respect to these border crossers? If you do not concur, what is the estimated amount?

I believe Mr. Maguire and I will support the motion. My only concern is that, if we're going to do that, I believe all material has been sent. Maybe that's all that's been sent, those emails. If there are any emails of any type, everything should be sent.

It seems to me that the three main bodies involved aren't talking to each other. I say that because of the Auditor General's finding that the information management systems of the IRCC, the CBSA and the IRB are largely incompatible. I wonder if any of you have any comments with respect to that. If my assumption is correct, how's that going to be resolved?

How often do they meet?

That's your answer to the Auditor General's comment. You feel this management committee is solving the issue.

I'd like to refer, Mr. Chairman, to clause 301. I'm wondering if any of you could comment why it was necessary to add clause 301, which states, “to maintain, through the establishment of fair and efficient procedures, the integrity of the Canadian immigration system”.

My question is what prompted the addition of this clause.