AFGN#6: Humanitarian Assistance for the Afghan people

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC, NDP
On the question around resources, there's no question that there's a lack of resources for processing the application. The minister indicated at the immigration committee that it takes on average three years for privately sponsored refugees to make their way to Canada. They were contemplating that for the Ukraine situation, and if it's going to take three years, it's too long. You're right that there are too many people who are stuck in the backlog.
What should the government do by way of resourcing this properly so that we can get in the people who have been waiting and backlogged in the queue from other countries, as well as the people who are now in need of refugee status? Should they apply the same immigration measures they have made available to Ukraine so that people can come with a temporary residence permit and then make the application for refugee status here in Canada, or even extend that to privately sponsored opportunities?

Dr. Wendy Cukier, Founder, Lifeline Afghanistan, and Professor, Ryerson University, Ted Rogers School of Management
There are innovative approaches that governments have used in the past. There were 25,000 Syrian refugees who came in four months because the Prime Minister and the minister made a commitment and pulled out the stops. Whether you do it in the way they're doing it with Ukrainians or whether we do it the way we did it with Syrians, it's possible, but it does require resources and, more importantly, it requires shared political will. This can't be a partisan issue; this has to be a Canadian project.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC, NDP
I would agree that there needs to be innovation. Mind you, with the Syrian refugee initiative, the government didn't quite do it in four months, but I get your point. What you're saying is that it can be done much better than what is being done now, and what it needs is collaboration from all the parties and NGOs on the ground to get this work done. If the government's willing to lift the cap and make that opportunity available, I would absolutely agree with that.
I want to come back to the backlogs because part of the problem is this: The government announced the process for Afghans; however, they did not put additional resources into IRCC. Not only are people in other countries with refugee status backlogged, all immigration streams have been backlogged and there's complete chaos. That is the situation right now.
The government says it has put in additional resources, but these are not enough to deal with what we are dealing with right now. From that perspective, should there be a dedicated specific response and resources, both in financial resources as well as immigration levels numbers, to address the issue? Could I get a quick answer?

Click to read the full discussion from the Committee meeting

Afghanistan Committee on March 21st, 2022
Evidence of meeting #6 for Afghanistan in the 44th Parliament, 1st Session

7:15 p.m.

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

I will go to Ms. Kwan, for six minutes, please.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to all the witnesses for the presentations and your excellent work.

I'll go first to Kaylee, if I may, with the sponsorship agreement holders piece.

Do I understand you correctly that you're asking for the government to not put a limit on the privately sponsored refugees from Afghanistan?

Kaylee Perez
Chair, Canadian Refugee Sponsorship Agreement Holders Association

Thank you, Ms. Kwan.

My specific comment was in regard to the eligibility criteria currently in place for Afghan refugees. Right now, in order to be able to submit the private sponsorship application of an Afghan, you have to be part of an LGBTQI group, a persecuted religious minority group, a human rights defenders group, a women leaders group or a journalists group. You have to be be affiliated with one of those types of groups.

My comment was in regard to the eligibility criteria being limiting. Why not enable all Afghans to access private sponsorship?

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you.

I absolutely agree that the government needs to expand eligibility and allow Afghans or any group anywhere to be able to make an application, but accessing a sponsorship agreement holder is very difficult. There are a lot of people who cannot access that, so should the government expand and lift the cap, frankly, on privately sponsored refugees? I'm looking for a quick answer, and I want to go to Wendy for the same question.

Thank you, Member Kwan.

Our association does not have an explicit position on that. What I would share is that we are concerned about the high inventory and the potential that a lifted cap could raise on processing in an equitable way for all refugees.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Maybe I can go to Wendy very quickly on that question. I do want to come back to address the processing delay and the lack of resources.

Dr. Wendy Cukier
Founder, Lifeline Afghanistan, and Professor, Ryerson University, Ted Rogers School of Management

Our position would be raise the cap. If the SAHs are concerned—and we understand their concerns—about equity and so on, lift the cap for a group of five, make it easier for a group of five to do the sponsorship.

I'll talk more about how different things are now than they were before, but suffice it to say that you now need to come up with $100,000 up front to support families with many of the SAHs, which is not reasonable or sustainable. There are other models that have worked well in the past and will continue to work.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

On the issue around refugee determination, Wendy, you suggested that what the government should do—which is what the NDP has been calling for for a very long time—is lift the requirement for refugee determination for groups of five. It makes no sense to have that requirement there, especially now in the face of what's going on in Afghanistan. Should the government lift that refugee determination requirement similar to what they have done with Syrian refugees?

I believe so, and I believe that we can still institute security and health checks to keep people safe.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

On the question around resources, there's no question that there's a lack of resources for processing the application. The minister indicated at the immigration committee that it takes on average three years for privately sponsored refugees to make their way to Canada. They were contemplating that for the Ukraine situation, and if it's going to take three years, it's too long. You're right that there are too many people who are stuck in the backlog.

What should the government do by way of resourcing this properly so that we can get in the people who have been waiting and backlogged in the queue from other countries, as well as the people who are now in need of refugee status? Should they apply the same immigration measures they have made available to Ukraine so that people can come with a temporary residence permit and then make the application for refugee status here in Canada, or even extend that to privately sponsored opportunities?

There are innovative approaches that governments have used in the past. There were 25,000 Syrian refugees who came in four months because the Prime Minister and the minister made a commitment and pulled out the stops. Whether you do it in the way they're doing it with Ukrainians or whether we do it the way we did it with Syrians, it's possible, but it does require resources and, more importantly, it requires shared political will. This can't be a partisan issue; this has to be a Canadian project.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

I would agree that there needs to be innovation. Mind you, with the Syrian refugee initiative, the government didn't quite do it in four months, but I get your point. What you're saying is that it can be done much better than what is being done now, and what it needs is collaboration from all the parties and NGOs on the ground to get this work done. If the government's willing to lift the cap and make that opportunity available, I would absolutely agree with that.

I want to come back to the backlogs because part of the problem is this: The government announced the process for Afghans; however, they did not put additional resources into IRCC. Not only are people in other countries with refugee status backlogged, all immigration streams have been backlogged and there's complete chaos. That is the situation right now.

The government says it has put in additional resources, but these are not enough to deal with what we are dealing with right now. From that perspective, should there be a dedicated specific response and resources, both in financial resources as well as immigration levels numbers, to address the issue? Could I get a quick answer?

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

Madame Kwan, I'm sorry, but we're 30 seconds over.

Go ahead quickly, please.

Yes, and business process re-engineering is essential. Doing things the way we've always done them and throwing money at them is, in my view, not efficient.

Kaylee Perez
Chair, Canadian Refugee Sponsorship Agreement Holders Association

Yes to increasing the immigration levels. That is crucial to having resources dedicated to process the existing inventory. Resources are needed at IRCC to hire staff to process cases and also for settlement-providing organizations to be able to make sure they are intentionally connecting with privately sponsored refugees and sponsors and also funding the infrastructure of sponsorship agreement holders to be able to say yes to working with new and additional sponsors.

7:30 p.m.

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

Monsieur Brunelle-Duceppe, I appreciate that.

Now I will go to Madam Kwan for a minute or a minute and a half.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you.

I have a quick question. The government announced that it would provide an extended family sponsorship process for Ukraine. Should the government be applying the same special immigration measure for Afghanistan?

The question is to both Wendy and Kaylee.

I believe there are many innovative approaches that can be used, and that's certainly one that would be very helpful to many of the families we're dealing with—for example, my employee I mentioned.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

I don't know if you're able to answer the question. It might be outside of your realm. But I wonder whether or not we should be exercising and expanding all the measures to people in Afghanistan.

Kaylee Perez
Chair, Canadian Refugee Sponsorship Agreement Holders Association

I don't have a particular response to your specific question. I'm not familiar with the details of what has been set up for the Ukrainian family reunification response.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you.

What I will say is, as you have mentioned, that expanding and maximizing the use of all of the available pathways to resettle Afghans in need is something we would support.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Maria, could you quickly answer yes or no to that question?

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

Go ahead, Ms. Wazir.

Maria Toorpakai Wazir
President and Founder, Maria Toorpakai Foundation

I missed the question.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

My quick question was whether or not the government should expand immigration measures to allow for extended family sponsorship applications for Afghanistan.

First of all, I want to thank all these governments. They're already doing a lot.

We still have those Afghan refugees in Pakistan. They're staying with us. Their applications are in progress. I think that for those who are stuck, this kind of thing should be sped up, because there are high-profile Afghans who are stuck and whose applications are still in progress and taking a long time. So yes, I think this would be wonderful.

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

Thank you, Madam Kwan.

On behalf of all members of Parliament and the committee, I want to thank the three witnesses. Your input into this is very important and well taken, so thank you kindly. All the best to you.

8:15 p.m.

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

Thank you, Mr. Brunelle-Duceppe.

We will go to Madam Kwan for six minutes.

Go ahead, please.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to all of our witnesses for your presentations and, of course, for your work.

I would like to go first to the ambassador, if I may, and follow up the line about evacuation, or even immigration measures to be made available to Afghans. We have heard from other witnesses, including retired majors, who indicated that there would be opportunities, for example, to go to a third country to provide assistance and help people get to safety.

Do you have any information, or can you tell us about what you saw on the ground while you were there, as to how other countries were able to do some of that work? We understand that the United States and some other countries were able to continue that work. Is that something Canada can learn from those other countries, to try to get more Afghans safely through to third countries and then come to Canada?

Reid Sirrs
Former Ambassador of Canada to Afghanistan, Global Affairs Canada

Thank you, Honourable Member Kwan. It's an excellent question that is hard to answer, because while we're at the coal face, we're not able to see so much of what people are doing in other countries in getting people to third countries to process.

I do know that the complication for us was making sure that we had people properly screened to get on the flights to come to Canada. I think, moving forward, what we will have to look at are policies and regulations for how to process people more effectively and more efficiently. At the time, I think we did a very good job given the constraints we were facing.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

What about going forward, and not just looking back, and to say, what about now? People still need to get to safety. The government's immigration measures allow for people to access those immigration measures only if they are in a third country. Many Afghans are not in a third country, so what can Canada do to facilitate that process and what can we learn from other countries that have done that?

Right now the government has announced, for example, that for Ukraine they are setting up biometric centres in neighbouring countries. Can we not do the same?

I'm going to have to defer that to the immigration authorities who are the experts on that, because certainly we have seen how complicated it can be to get people through the system. We want to make sure that we get the right people through the system.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you.

Let me go to Mr. Shariff from the Aga Khan Foundation. I think Mr. Brunelle-Duceppe was just asking you a question about ensuring that NGOs on the ground would be able to provide humanitarian assistance without having to worry about prosecution from the Canadian government.

[Technical difficulty--Editor]

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

We will suspend for a few minutes.

8:20 p.m.

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

I will call the meeting back to order.

Madam Kwan, please restart your question.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you.

I'll follow up that question. With regard to ensuring that NGOs on the ground would not feel concerned that they might be prosecuted by the Canadian government with the anti-terrorism laws, you talked about having a durable measure, for sure. In the short term, other countries have provided an exemption or entered into a contractual agreement where they would be exempted from the anti-terrorism measures.

Is that a possible option at this time, given the urgency of the situation?

Khalil Shariff
Chief Executive Officer, Aga Khan Foundation Canada

Mr. Chairman and Ms. Kwan, thank you very much for that question.

Obviously we would welcome such an exemption if it were possible within the Canadian legal framework. I think you're right to say that virtually all our like-minded partners have found a way to carve out the humanitarian and development activities we're talking about. My sense is that we have to work expeditiously to create whatever the mechanism is that will work in accordance with the Canadian legal framework.

I don't think there's a policy issue here. All the other like-minded partners have done this. It's a matter of making sure there's a Canadian solution to this problem.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Absolutely. I think that if the Canadian government wanted to do it, we can certainly do it. Right now, time is of the essence.

I want to ask another question of all the witnesses. It's been brought to my attention that the minister has the authority to create public policies to enable the government to assist at-risk Afghan refugees at his discretion—with his own authority.

In consideration of the vulnerable populations and to protect the integrity of the process, the ministry says that we have not been releasing that information to the public. I wonder if any of the witnesses are aware of this situation where the minister has the authority to exercise special decision-making to help at-risk populations and we don't know what that policy is.

Are you hearing that on the ground?

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

Who are you addressing the question to, Ms. Kwan?

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

I'd like to ask Mr. Shariff that question first and then we'll go to the other witnesses.

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

Go ahead, Mr. Shariff, then Dr. Ernst and then Ambassador Sirrs.

Mr. Chairman, this is not something I'm current with, so I can't answer the question. Thanks.

Dr. Kelly Ernst
Vice-President, Vulnerable Populations, Centre for Newcomers

I am aware that the public policies have been used to get internally displaced people to Canada. In fact, I have received a number of refugees based on public policies being administered.

Reid Sirrs
Former Ambassador of Canada to Afghanistan, Global Affairs Canada

I'm in the same situation as Mr. Shariff. I'm not up to date on that particular aspect of a public policy for the minister.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you very much. That's interesting.

I just wonder whether or not you're experiencing anything on the ground. That statement actually came from the ministry, so we know for a fact that is what's happening. Of course, if we don't know what the public policy is, how it is being applied by the minister and for whom, how would people know at what point they can actually ask for that special consideration?

I'm going to leave that—

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

Your time is up, but you can have 30 seconds.

Jenny Kwan Vancouver East, BC
NDP

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

My last question is one I also asked the last panel. The minister has made an announcement for Ukraine that there would be special immigration measures, including sponsorship of extended family members for Ukraine.

Should the minister be applying the same measure for Afghanistan? Do you have an opinion on that?

I would like just a quick answer from all the witnesses.

I'll just say, Mr. Chairman, that the situation is a crisis situation. I think we should mount whatever response we can muster both in the country and then to support those who need to leave.

Absolutely. We should do it not only within Afghanistan, but in transit countries and here as well.

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

Ambassador Sirrs, please wrap up. Thank you.

Reid Sirrs
Former Ambassador of Canada to Afghanistan, Global Affairs Canada

My opinion is to follow policy and not implement policy, so I would defer to the authorities in immigration. They would be best placed to decide.

Thank you.

The Chair Sukh Dhaliwal
Liberal

On behalf of the members, I would like to thank the witnesses for being present today and for their input to this committee. I appreciate that.

I wish all the best to all three of you, particularly Ambassador Sirrs in your new appointment.

AFGN#6: Humanitarian Assistance for the Afghan people

Click to read the full discussion from the Committee meeting

https://openparliament.ca/committees/afghanistan-s/44-1/6/the-chair-16/

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