In Committee

CIMM#56: Committee discussed the Lost Canadian Senate Bill

“ Thank you to the senator for bringing this important bill forward. I appreciate its giving us an opportunity to look at the issue of lost Canadians. As you've indicated, Senator, the scope of the bill is very limited. That means that many people will still be left out in the situation of lost Canadians.

You were just mentioning the suffering that people have to endure as a result of that. What we do know, of course, is that the second-generation rule cut-off from the previous administration took place in 2009. Consequently, a class of people—Canadians—all of a sudden lost their right to be Canadian and were deemed lost Canadians and second-class citizens in that way.

That said, we have an opportunity to fix this. I get that the scope of the bill only deals with the 28-year rule. Do you have any objection to the idea of fixing the other lost Canadians on the second-generation rule where people have been cut off? That's one piece.

The other piece is to fix the rule for those who were born before 1947—the war heros, if you will, who fought for Canada and died for Canada and were never recognized as Canadians.

Would you agree that we should actually try to fix those? Would you have any objections to that?”

CIM#55: Inquiring about the challenges faced by Afghans with the Foreign Affairs Minister and officials

"In the minister's introduction, she talked about the laws that need to be changed. The bill has been introduced. Recommendation 11 of the Afghanistan special committee calls for the government to “review the anti-terrorism financing provisions under the Criminal Code and urgently take any legislative steps necessary to ensure those provisions do not unduly restrict legitimate humanitarian action that complies with international humanitarian principles and law.”

Doctors Without Borders has raised a concern. They do not support the changes tabled by the government. They are instead encouraging the government to enact a full humanitarian exemption, as recommended by their committee. They say the idea that someone could be charged with a crime for providing medical care to a patient in a hospital during a conflict is ridiculous and out of step with the international humanitarian law that explicitly prohibits punishing a person for upholding medical ethics:

The legislation proposed by Canada today requires humanitarian organizations to seek permission from the Canadian government before we send medical staff to respond to some humanitarian crises—what happens if they say no? Do we walk away from maternity hospitals or primary health clinics? The Geneva Conventions and International Humanitarian Law clearly state that countries have an obligation to facilitate the delivery of humanitarian assistance and a duty to not criminalize the work performed according to medical ethics, yet that's exactly what this legislation does.

That's a quote from Jason Nickerson, humanitarian representative to Canada, Doctors Without Borders.

My question to the minister is this: Why didn't the government put in the full humanitarian exemption?”

CIMM#54: Inquiring with IRCC officials about Bill S-245 and the Lost Canadians issue

"For sure, this Citizenship Act is a complex file, with so many changes over the years that amendments brought to the table often require amendments to the exception to the exception and so on. It's extremely confusing.

From my perspective, first off, I'd like to say that we have before us Bill S-245, and I want to acknowledge and thank Senator Yonah Martin for bringing this before us, because it gives us an opportunity to look into this issue and see how we can fix some of the problems. Maybe it will never be possible to fix all of the problems, but I think it will be important and incumbent on all of us to do our very best to try to fix as many problems as possible.

I appreciate the briefing in terms of your highlighting some of those areas. On the question around unintended consequences, I'd like to probe a little bit deeper into this issue around other countries, where, if you were to confer citizenship to the individual, it might cause them a heap of trouble, because in whatever country they might be in they may not be allowed to, for example, have dual citizenship.

Of course, conferring citizenship automatically in this way was done before. It was done under Bill C-37, it was done under Bill C-24 and so on. Somehow it was dealt with in those previous scenarios. I get it that times might have changed. There might be more people living globally, but nonetheless the premise of that has not changed.

Can you advise us on how officials addressed those issues back then? Why was it okay then to confer citizenship without these concerns of unintended consequences, but now it is a key concern?”

CIMM#51: Conditions Faced by Asylum-Seekers (In Camera Meeting)

CIMM#53: Government Operations Committee on Federal Government Consulting Contracts Awarded to McKinsey & Company

CIMM#50: In camera meeting

CIMM#49: Questioning Immigration Minister on Afghan file

CIMM#49: Inquiring about the challenges faced by Afghans with the Immigration Minister and IRCC officials

"Thank you very much, Madam Chair, and thank you to the minister and officials for coming to the committee today.

On the Afghan file, I would first like to touch on the issue around the cultural interpreters. They've been excluded from the program, and it requires legal counsel representing the families to take the matter to court. I think that, just before we started this meeting, one of the cultural advisers spoke with you about the lack of action from the government.

From that perspective, why is it that cultural advisers are excluded? I know there's work in place to try to include them, but there are still extended family members who are excluded, who are being targeted and hunted down by the Taliban because of their work for Canada.

Will the minister confirm that the extended family members of the cultural advisers will be brought to safety?”

CIM#48: In camera meeting

CIMM#47: Motion to call Ministers to testify on the Afghan situation and probing the McKinsey contracts

"Just to be clear, this motion was passed by the committee on October 7. Since that time the committee has had 12 meetings. One would assume that since the motion had passed we would be inviting these ministers to come to the committee.

What are we talking about? We're talking about Afghanistan—the report that was done by the Special Committee on Afghanistan. We're talking about the 37 recommendations that committee had made to the government, and their response to it.

Meanwhile, we have Afghans who are being hunted down by the Taliban. Their lives are in grave danger for the simple reason that they helped Canada with its missions.

Meanwhile we have a third country, Pakistan, which has issued an enforcement for people who are there without a visa or with an expiring visa. They will be jailed or sent back to Afghanistan.

I have information that has been provided to me that the police in Pakistan have raided a hotel where they generally know that some of the Afghans have been staying, waiting for the processing of their application to get them to safety.

The situation is very real. Some people have already lost their lives, by the way. Some of the family members have not had any contact with what's happened with these individuals. We're talking about a gravely serious and urgent situation.”

CIMM#46: Conditions Faced by Asylum-Seekers (In Camera Meeting)

CIMM#45: Jenny asked the Immigration Minister on Hong Kong lifeboat scheme, migrant workers treatment, systematic racism in IRCC, processing delay, and Afghan refugee applications

“ My first question for the minister relates to the Hong Kong lifeboat scheme. Approximately 12,000 individuals have come to Canada and applied under that scheme, and 6,487 people were approved as of October 2021. Only 45 had permanent resident status approved by January 2022. According to research from Community Family Services of Ontario, 22% of the open work permit applicants graduated in 2016 or 2017, making them ineligible for PR under the scheme. By the time they complete their PR requirements, the degree, the limitation of five years will be over.

As the minister can see, there remain substantial barriers for Hong Kongers to access the open work permit scheme. It's set to expire on February 7, 2023. No replacement has yet been announced.

My question for the minister is this: Will he eliminate the five-year rule to make the lifeboat scheme actually workable for Hong Kongers? Second, will he extend the program?”