Canada's Immigration Act under legislative review, "Not Just Numbers" report examined at hearings (04/05/98)

Canada's Immigration Act under legislative review,
"Not Just Numbers" report examined at hearings

by Andrij Kudla Wynnyckyj
Toronto Press Bureau

TORONTO - On March 11 in Ottawa, the Canadian government held the last of its public consultations during a review of the 1978 Immigration Act and its policies in the area of citizenship and immigration.

A report, commissioned in November 1996, was made public earlier this year under the title "Not Just Numbers: A Canadian Framework for Future Immigration." The 178-page document, which includes 173 recommendations, has been scrutinized with a mixture of outrage, suspicion and hope by immigrants and sponsoring groups. Since mid-February these feelings have been given play in the nation's press.

The report's authors are Susan Davis, a former program officer of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and former national executive director of the Jewish Immigrant Aid Services of Canada; Dr. Roslyn Kunin, president of an economic consulting firm and a West Coast academic; and Robert Trempe, a retired senior bureaucrat from Quebec's provincial Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration.

On March 4, Eugen Duvalko, chairman of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress Immigration Committee (UCC-IC); Bohdan Mykytiuk, president of the Toronto-based Canadian Ukrainian Immigrant Aid Society (CUIAS); and Mykhailo Wawryshyn, a member of the UCC-IC and of the CUIAS board of directors, participated in a public hearing in Toronto's cavernous Metro Convention Center.

They also submitted a joint response to the government-sponsored report. In addition, Mr. Duvalko told The Weekly that the UCC-IC and the CUIAS contributed to the brief prepared by non-governmental organization representatives of the NGO-Government Committee on the Private Sponsorship of Refugees and presented in Ottawa on March 11.

A "confused" report

Asked to give the "Not Just Numbers" report a grade, Mr. Duvalko, also the CUIAS executive director, paused and then said: "How do you average out good points and absolutely miserable points?"

"The report is confused about its attitudes to immigration," the UCC-IC chair said. "On one hand, it contends that immigration is essential to economic and cultural vibrancy; and on the other, it becomes obsessed with the financial burdens immigration imposes."

Mr. Duvalko said the opportunity for the UCC to offer formal submissions as the report was being prepared was limited. He said there were few calls for input from the community, and that most of the legislative review committee's consultative research focused on comparative studies of immigration policies in other countries.

The UCC-IC chair said the Ukrainian umbrella body has asked to be consulted about preparations of the Citizenship and Immigration Bill, but added that constraints on his time will limit his ability to lobby the government effectively in the coming months. However, he encouraged interested parties to contact the CUIAS, the minister, and their local members of Parliament.

Heat over language issue

Suggestions to make proficiency in English or French mandatory requirements for applicants wanting to immigrate to Canada have been particularly irksome.

In their introduction, the "Not Just Numbers" authors contended that along with the "unique value base" articulated by the country's Charter of Rights and Freedoms, "language is a defining value of Canada," which led them to suggest a number of measures that has gotten the government into hot water.

Citizenship and Immigration Minister Lucienne Robillard has been attending the majority of hearings held in major cities across the country, and in February she faced harsh reactions from Vancouver's large Asian Canadian community. The resultant media coverage has led the minister and the government to soft-pedal the language requirements.

Mr. Duvalko called the recommendations concerning language proficiency "clearly unfair." He criticized Recommendation 35, which calls for a tuition fee for "all sponsored ... immigrants who are 6 years of age or older and have not achieved a basic knowledge of English or French," saying it is blatantly discriminatory.

"First off, Canadian parents are not asked to pay additional funds for remedial classes within the public education system, so why should such a burden be placed on immigrants?" asked Mr. Duvalko.

"Secondly, sponsors already pay a [recently introduced] Right of Landing fee into the system," he pointed out.

Mr. Duvalko said the employment market has changed since the 1950s-1970s, a time when many non-English/French-speaking immigrants could be accommodated by a wider range of low-skilled jobs, but "language proficiency is an easily acquirable skill that proceeds well as individuals integrate with host communities."

In addition, according to the joint response, Ukrainian Canadians in the three Prairie provinces "warmly welcome children who are not conversant in English into their Ukrainian-English Bilingual schools. These children enrich the bilingual school program and do not suffer academically from not having the initial proficiency in English."

The report's framers stated baldly that "we do not believe that persons dealt with as war criminals under the Citizenship Act should also have a right to full process, including appeal and review rights, under the Immigration Act."

Such individuals, according to the report, should be "dealt with" after they were "found to be war criminals or to have been members of organizations involved in war crimes or in crimes against humanity [and] removed from Canada as quickly as possible."

Recommendation 137 states that "The Immigration and Citizenship Act should include a provision to the effect that a revocation of citizenship should result, without appeal rights, in loss of all status in Canada and subsequent deportation in cases of:

a) a criminal conviction for war crimes or crimes against humanity committed before citizenship was granted,

b) a finding that the person was a war criminal or had committed crimes against humanity, or

c) fraud because of membership in an organization involved in war crimes or crimes against humanity.

Mr. Duvalko called this a "dangerous recommendation that tries to circumvent the basic rights afforded to citizens of this country."

"It goes against what is afforded in the Charter of Rights, a document that the report's authors themselves say spells out Canadian core values, in terms of protection of citizens," the UCC-IC chair added.

John Gregorovich, chairman of the Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties Association, assisted in writing the joint response to Recommendation 137.

"This recommendation creates two levels of citizenship," Mr. Gregorovich said. "If you're a Canadian-by-birth, you have the right to a criminal trial with full rights that have been built up by the past 800 years under the British legal system."

"If you're a Canadian-by-choice," the UCCLA chair continued, "you should apparently be dealt with in a summary fashion. This is the starkest statement yet of the creation of a separate status of citizenship."

Mr. Gregorovich said that safeguards are necessary because accusations of so-called "capital crimes" (such as murder, rape, torture and kidnapping, and by extension, war crimes) carry such a heavy weight.

"What they're doing is trying to retroactively solve a problem in the screening process," the Toronto-based jurist added.

Encouragement for NGOs, refugees

On a positive note, Mr. Duvalko said he was encouraged by the report's support for further expansion of the role of NGOs through the establishment of an Advisory Council.

Other positives included:

Recommendation 23, which includes NGOs in the drafting of policy;
Recommendation 24, which suggests that "the federal government should ... provide adequate funding for settlement and integration services" and allow the community "to continue to deliver integration services on behalf of the federal government."
Recommendation 63, which allows for federal-provincial arrangements for selection of immigrants, and thus enables a Manitoba UCC Provincial Council project in this area;
Recommendation 88, which suggests "means tests" for refugees be abolished; and
Recommendations 90 and 91, which give NGOs a strong voice in selecting refugees for admission.

However, adding to the confusion were demands in Recommendation 92 that refugees submit "paper pre-screening" of applicants. Mr. Duvalko said this would create an unwelcome bias in favor of those with access to the best lawyer or advocate in the form of written submissions and applications, and open the door for corruption.

Family class, care givers

Additional enthusiasm was expressed for recommendations concerning an expansion of the "family class" of immigrants to include children of age 22 or older, rather than the previous cut-off age of 19, and the creation of a "tier-three" level of family which would include "relatives or close personal acquaintances of [a] sponsor's choice," (Recommendation 40).

The joint UCC/CUIAS response suggested that, because of the 50-year separation of families by the Iron Curtain, strong ties remain with distant relatives although closer relatives might be deceased, and the new provision would provide for old-age care and a mechanism of assistance for those relatives a sponsor deems deserving.

The concept of care-giver immigration was complicated by Recommendation 75, which proposes to abolish the category.

Maintaining Ukrainian identity

Among the presenters to the public hearings, there was an interesting range of opinion. Mr. Wawryshyn contended that Ukrainian Canadians, as taxpayers and as a group that was cut off for so long from their compatriots, had a right to select immigrants that would "assist the local maintenance of heritage for one of Canada's principal constituent groups - Ukrainians."

Mr. Duvalko was more cautious, saying that the UCC-IC and CUIAS "are interested in promoting the arrival and increasing the number of Ukrainians to strengthen our community here, but this desire should be stated in a generalized way so that we can avoid accusations of being a narrow interest group."

Mr. Duvalko encouraged those interested in lobbying the government on immigration issues to contact the CUIAS at 2150 Bloor St. W., Toronto, Ontario M6S 1M8; telephone (416) 767-4595; fax, (416) 767-2658.

To obtain a copy of the "Not Just By Numbers" report contact the the Immigration Legislation Review Secretariat by sending a fax request to (613) 946-0581. The report can also be downloaded off the Internet, from the address: http://cicnet.ingenia.com/legrev/final/emain.html