44th Parl. 1st Sess.
September 17, 2024 10:00AM
- Sep/17/24 5:28:04 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I think that, like me, you noticed that the member for London West was going to talk about Don Chapman in her speech, but she did not have enough time to finish.
I am particularly interested in what she had to say about Mr. Chapman. I would like to give her a minute or two, at your discretion, so that we can hear her thoughts about him.
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- Sep/17/24 5:28:27 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I deeply appreciate the opportunity that my Bloc Québécois colleague has given me to continue and to finish expressing my thoughts on this bill, which I consider very important for all Canadians everywhere in Canada.
Don Chapman is one of those Canadians who was adversely affected by what the Harper government did and what the Leader of the Opposition continues to support. Even now, during our committee meetings, when we try to advance the work, he keeps putting up roadblocks.
I am extremely grateful for the support of the Bloc Québécois, the Green Party and the NDP, who continue to support us so that we can serve Canadians. For the families we have met, the stories we have heard and the harms these families have suffered, it is our job as elected officials to fix the problem as soon as possible.
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- Sep/17/24 5:29:27 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it is clear at this point that, among the Bloc, the Liberals, and the NDP, we have a lot in common with respect to seeing this important work go forward. Unfortunately, we are not seeing the same coming out of the Conservatives, and the member has spoken about this quite a bit.
We know that the Conservatives voted against provisions that would have rectified the unconstitutional second-generation cut-off amendments. The Conservatives filibustered the bill for 30 hours, which I believe the member also spoke about, at committee. They stalled third reading debate for the bill eight times. Instead of seeing the actions required for us to come together to help the exact people whom we are elected to represent, we are seeing the Conservatives playing with people's lives. Could the member please speak to that?
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- Sep/17/24 5:30:16 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, my colleague on the other side said very well how terrible it has been. It has been really hard to do the work that Canadians sent us to do on our immigration committee, and sometimes it has been in the front of those families that have been harmed by those actions of the Conservatives. Watching them filibuster the work that we want to do has been very difficult.
I appreciate the support that we have received to move this forward. It is important for Canadians, and it is important that we do right by the people who have been wronged by the former Conservative government.
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to rise in the chamber today to give some more context for the proposed legislation to amend Canada's Citizenship Act.
I would like to begin by acknowledging that we are gathered today on the traditional and unceded territory of the Algonquin and Anishinabe people. I would also like to recognize that indigenous people have been here since time immemorial. The contributions they have made to our country in the past, present and future have been and will continue to be significant. It is our responsibility to continue to work towards reconciliation in coordination and collaboration with indigenous people each and every day.
Being Canadian means taking steps to tackle inequality and injustice within our society. We do this not only through our words but, more importantly, through our actions. Bill C-71 proposes an amendment to the Citizenship Act in response to issues raised in both Parliament and the courts. These changes would restore citizenship to the remaining lost Canadians, individuals who either could not become citizens or who lost their citizenship due to outdated legislative provisions. While previous amendments helped many, a small cohort of lost Canadians remains.
The legislative amendments outlined in Bill C-71 would help lost Canadians and their descendants regain or obtain citizenship. They would also address the status of descendants impacted by the Harper Conservatives' first-generation limit. The revised law would establish clear guidelines for acquiring Canadian citizenship by descent. Once the legislation is enacted, the harmful first-generation limit would no longer apply, allowing Canadian citizens born abroad to pass their citizenship on to their children, provided they can demonstrate a substantial connection to Canada. A Canadian parent born outside the country would be able to transfer citizenship to the child if they have lived in Canada for a cumulative total of three years before the child's birth.
These changes would result in a more inclusive and fair Citizenship Act and would right the wrongs of the previous Conservative government.
Additionally, the new legislation would continue to reduce the differences between children born abroad and adopted by Canadians, and those born abroad to Canadian parents. Any child adopted overseas by a Canadian parent before the law takes effect would be eligible for the current direct citizenship grant for adoptees, even if they were previously excluded by the first-generation limit. Once the law is in place, the same criteria would apply to children adopted by Canadian citizens abroad. If the adoptive parent born outside Canada can show a substantial connection to Canada, the adopted child would be eligible for citizenship.
Bill C-71 would restore citizenship to those who have been wrongfully excluded and would establish consistent rules for citizenship by descent going forward. These updates build on the work done by the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration on Bill S-245, further refining the proposal and more comprehensively addressing the issues raised by the courts.
Canadian citizenship represents more than just a legal status; it embodies an ongoing commitment and responsibility. What does it mean to be Canadian? There is no one right answer to this question, and that is one of the great things about our country.
Let us start with how our commitments define us. One of those commitments is to understand ourselves and our history, flaws and all. Our country has a rich history, dating from before the founding of Canada to the indigenous people who have lived on these lands since time immemorial. Since Confederation, many diverse people have chosen Canada as their new home. With the exception of indigenous people, every Canadian's history begins with the story of a migrant. As Canadians, we have an ongoing commitment to reconciliation with indigenous people as we continue to strengthen our relationship with first nations, Inuit and Métis people across the country.
Another commitment we make as Canadians is to come together to build a stronger country for everyone. That is evident in many ways. Canadians spring into action to help those in need, and it is not limited to family, friends and neighbours.
We are there to help, whether that is through emergency response efforts to fight devastating wildfires or floods that threaten our community, keeping food banks well stocked or supporting local charities to help the most vulnerable among us. While these efforts may vary in scope and scale, the sentiment remains the same: We look out for each other when it matters. We know that our country's future prosperity hinges on that sense of goodwill and our continued collective efforts.
Canadians are also committed to inclusion. We choose to welcome diverse cultures, languages and beliefs, and that makes us unique. We value the experiences that have made our fellow Canadians who they are, just as we value the experiences others have. We respect the values of others as they respect ours.
We celebrate this choice. Take Citizenship Week, for example. Every year, across the country and around the world, Canadians use this fantastic opportunity to show pride in their diversity, cultures and achievements. Celebrating our differences helps us learn from one another and better understand the challenges and opportunities that arise in our communities. In turn, we identify new solutions to the problems we must overcome together. Though we are diverse, there are certain ties that bind us. In addition to helping others in times of need, Canadians also work to build opportunities for success and seek to share the benefits of that success with our communities.
How someone becomes a Canadian can vary greatly. As the minister said, it is important to recognize that. Regardless of how one becomes a citizen, we can all agree that we value each and every Canadian equally. Some of us are lucky enough to be born in Canada and are Canadians by birth. Others are newcomers who chose Canada, joined our communities and earned their citizenship. They are referred to as naturalized Canadians. Last, we have Canadian citizens by descent: individuals who are born outside our country to a Canadian parent, who proudly passes down their citizenship.
We hold and value each of these citizens as equal and as part of our diverse country. While we each define how we are Canadians in our own way, Parliament defines who becomes and how someone becomes a Canadian through the Citizenship Act. Our citizenship process and rules should be fair, equal and transparent.
However, it has recently become clear that the act must be amended to address the 2009 legislative amendments that excluded individuals due to the first-generation limit. The Ontario Superior Court has been clear: The Harper Conservatives' first-generation limit is unconstitutional, on both mobility and equality rights. Bill C-71 introduces inclusive changes that would address the challenges raised by the courts on citizenship by descent. This would apply particularly to those born overseas to Canadian parents.
Today we have a choice. We can commit to addressing past wrongs, take care of those among us who have faced injustice and inequality, be more inclusive and share the benefits we enjoy as citizens with others who deserve to call themselves Canadians too. As proud citizens of this country, we must uphold the commitments that define us as Canadians, whether we are citizens by birth, by choice or by descent.
Whether we are born in Canada or in another country, we are bound by our shared values, our mutual respect for our country and for each other and our enthusiasm to call ourselves Canadians. Canadian citizenship is a fundamental part of who we are. It unites us, opens up opportunities and challenges us to live up to our values: self-knowledge, service to others, democracy, equality and inclusion.
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Madam Speaker, the previous member who spoke, the member for London West, made a point, so I want to make a point to the parliamentary secretary. I want to just congratulate him on the multi-meeting filibuster he conducted on the draft report on Afghanistan. He was able to make it last from May well into September, and it ended only yesterday. He did quite the job on it. It is unusual to have a draft report debated in public. I invite members of the public to go watch that particular filibuster.
The member mentioned the court ruling, so I want to draw his attention to paragraph 265 of the judge's ruling. In it, she said that of the errors in processing in the sample size she looked at, 50% were the fault of the department. The department was unable to provide accurate information. In one case, the department sent the proof of citizenship document with the wrong date on it. In another case, it sent the wrong document. It had the wrong person's name, and it was not even the name of another family member.
An hon. member: Oh, oh!
Mr. Tom Kmiec: Madam Speaker, I hear the member for Waterloo heckling me, as she did yesterday.
I had asked the minister a question earlier in the debate, and I am going to ask the parliamentary secretary: How many persons who are abroad currently would be eligible for the provisions in Bill C-71?
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Madam Speaker, I am glad to be here to speak to Bill C-71. We have worked on this issue at many meetings of the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration. I hope we can move the agenda forward and get the legislation passed so we can bring lost Canadians home.
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- Sep/17/24 5:42:42 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank the member for speaking to this very important issue and the real impacts on Canadians and those who are denied their citizenship as a result of the outdated rules that were put into place by the Harper government.
I have an interesting point. I was given a response by the leader of the Conservative Party to a family that was asking about his stance on this exact legislation. His response, which I find is interesting, was this: “Conservatives will help preserve what it means to be a citizen of this country and fundamentally what it means to be Canadian. Please be assured that they will continue to support and advocate for this legislation to reach its third reading in the House of Commons.”
We know this is blatantly false. We know that the bill has been stalled, basically, eight times since last October by the Conservatives to prevent it from reaching third reading. Can the member please speak to why he believes the leader of the Conservative Party is misleading families that deserve to have their basic human rights met?
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Madam Speaker, I am very happy to stand here to say that we, as the government, would love to work with the Bloc and the NDP to pass the legislation. I understand that the Conservatives are filibustering everything and trying to change everything around. I am very committed to getting Bill C-71 passed because it affects constituents in my riding. They are also lost Canadians, and they are waiting for the bill to pass so that we can make everyone a Canadian.
Some hon. members: Oh, oh!
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- Sep/17/24 5:44:32 p.m.
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I remind the hon. member for Thornhill and the hon. member for Waterloo that someone was speaking and we should respect that right.
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- Sep/17/24 5:44:50 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to ask my colleague a question about children born abroad and adopted, whose parent passed away, and who were denied citizenship.
Why do the Conservatives think that these children, who have already gone through the pain of losing a parent and being born into difficult conditions, should be excluded from the citizenship process?
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Madam Speaker, we as a government want to pass the proposed legislation so we can bring all Canadians here, all the lost Canadians, so we can make them Canadian citizens. I am so happy to work with the members from the Bloc and from the NDP, and we are hoping to make Bill C-71 legislation.
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Madam Speaker, it is my pleasure to rise today in the House, the day after by-elections in two provinces in Canada. There are some commonalities in these two outcomes. In both ridings, the Conservative vote went up by 50% from the last general election. In addition, as in the election in June, when a Conservative was elected in Toronto—St. Paul's, another safe Liberal riding turned out to be not so safe at the end of the day. Something has to happen for people to start listening to what Canadians are thinking. For those across the aisle who are still pretending there is not a problem, that Canadians do not see a problem in the way the country is being run, I ask them to start paying attention and change their direction.
Canadians see clearly how badly government is being run and how they are being marginalized and divided; they are demanding change as soon as possible. One indication of the pure government incompetence is the way the Liberals have managed immigration. One year ago, I was directed to serve on the House of Commons Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration. It is not a strength I had before, but my office in Calgary Centre has an immigration caseload that is quite large.
Let me take a moment here to thank my staff in Calgary, Shaney Pap and Laura Wlodarczyk, because they do a fantastic job for Canadians, new Canadians, visitors and families that are navigating the maze of Canada's immigration process. It is a complex enough program, and it has been grossly mismanaged over the past four years.
How do we deal with a backlog of 2.6 million files? We should expedite 1.2 million files per year for two years in a system that previously managed about 320,000 files per year. They increased the workforce by 50%, from 9,200 employees in 2020 to 13,685 in 2023. It was a big increase in government, but corners were cut; we see the consequences of that with the recent arrests that are happening in Canada.
Why is the legislation before us? In December 2023, Ontario's Superior Court declared the first-generation cut-off rule in the Citizenship Act unconstitutional. That ruling was a damning indictment of the Liberal-run citizenship department. The court found a staggering 50% error rate in the processing of citizenship applications. This means that half of all applicants were mishandled, leading to abnormally long processing times and widespread malpractice. Such a high error rate is unacceptable and speaks volumes about incompetence and mismanagement in the current administration. That is the rationale for finding the previous law unconstitutional.
I might suggest that fixing the problem would make the whole issue less unconstitutional, but Bill C-71 proposes to grant citizenship to individuals born abroad with at least one Canadian parent having spent 1,095 days in Canada, the equivalent of three years. At the same time, it fails to require these days to be consecutive and lacks provisions for criminal record checks. This approach is deeply flawed and undermines the very essence of what it means to be a Canadian citizen.
Citizenship is not just a legal status. It is a commitment to our values, our laws and our way of life. By lowering the standards for obtaining citizenship, the NDP-Liberals are devaluing this precious status and putting our national security at risk. The world looks at a Canadian passport as being a very important document.
I forgot to mention at the beginning of my speech that I am splitting my time with the member of Parliament for Thornhill.
Let us compare Canada's rules with rules around the world. The requirement is three years in Canada, according to the proposed bill, and five years in most other democracies. This would be five years of real connection, not just 1,095 days sporadically spread out over a quarter century of a person's life. Bill C-71 would remove the 2009 limit that only allows citizenship for the first generation born abroad.
Under the bill, children born abroad to a Canadian parent, even if the parent was also born abroad, can gain citizenship as long as the parent meets a weak substantial connection test. The parent only needs to show 1,095 cumulative days of physical presence in Canada at any point in their life. Since the days do not need to be consecutive, people from multiple generations living abroad, with limited and sporadic ties to Canada, can still claim citizenship for their children. This weakens the substantial connection requirement and risks creating a class of citizens with minimal ties to this country.
Moreover, the government has not provided any analysis of how many new Canadians will be created by Bill C-71. Despite the potential for tens of thousands of new applicants, especially with the removal of the first-generation limit, the Liberals have failed to disclose how many people will gain citizenship through the legislation. This lack of transparency, a common thread, is concerning and prevents us from fully understanding the impact of the proposed bill. Bill C-71 would add thousands of new applications to an already overburdened system.
Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada is already struggling with delays and errors in processing citizenship applications. Adding a significant volume of new applications from abroad would overwhelm the department, exacerbating the existing backlogs. This would lead to an even longer processing time and further erode trust in our citizenship process. The bill does not require individuals granted citizenship to undergo criminal background checks. This poses a potential security risk and undermines Canada's standards of who can become a citizen. Ensuring that new citizens are of good character and pose no threat to our society is a common-sense measure that should not be overlooked.
We do support parts of the bill. While we have significant concerns, there are aspects that we support. Conservatives support the restoration of citizenship to individuals who lost it because of non-application or rejected applications under section 8 of the former Citizenship Act . This primarily includes people born between February 15, 1977, and April 16, 1981, who were affected by the old rule that required them to apply to retain their citizenship before turning 28 years old. This was part of the original content of Senator Yonah Martin's Senate public bill, Bill S-245, which aimed to address these issues more directly.
We also support the extension of equal treatment to adopted children born abroad. Under the proposed changes, adopted children would be treated the same as biological children of Canadian citizens for the purposes of passing on citizenship. This was supported by Conservative members during the Bill S-245 clause-by-clause committee review, and it is consistent with our party's long-standing position on equal treatment for adopted children.
Conservatives are committed to fixing the broken citizenship system that the Liberals have neglected. We will enforce a more robust substantial connection requirement, streamline processes and address backlogs to ensure timely handling of citizenship applications.
Our approach will restore integrity and trust in the system, ensuring that Canadian citizenship remains a privilege earned through genuine connection and commitment to our great nation. After nine years under the government, Canadians have endured enough chaos and incompetence. It is time for a change. Only common-sense Conservatives will put an end to the Prime Minister's reckless mismanagement and fix our broken immigration and citizenship process. We will restore integrity, trust and efficiency to it, ensuring that Canadian citizenship remains a privilege earned through genuine connection and commitment to this great nation.
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- Sep/17/24 5:55:19 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I would like to take the opportunity to say how happy I am to see my colleague come back; he sits on the immigration committee with me.
I find it really interesting that he is complaining about the Liberals taking too much time to fix something that the Conservatives broke.
This is something that his Harper government, the same government that the current Leader of the Opposition sat in, did to leave Canadians behind and to create second-class citizens. Can the member opposite talk about that and why he thinks it is a Liberal problem when it is a problem that they created themselves?
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- Sep/17/24 5:56:01 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, nine years would be a long time for a problem to exist, but somebody should have fixed something in nine years if that problem actually occurred nine years ago. If it was created nine years ago, I would ask this of my colleague on that side: Why did her party support the party that brought it to the House and voted, every one of them, for the same motion.
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- Sep/17/24 5:56:29 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, obviously this is not about creating revolving doors in this context, but about righting historic wrongs. I would like to know what my colleague from Calgary Centre would say to Canadian women who married a non-Canadian before 1947, who are nearly 100 years old now and who, because of the Conservatives' filibustering, may never see their most basic rights upheld before they die.
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- Sep/17/24 5:57:06 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, that is something I am not too familiar with, but does the member have an example we could discuss? I am on board with discussing this with him. Maybe there are many examples of situations to draw from. We could look at a certain situation, but here we are developing a policy for all immigrants in Canada. I would be happy to look at this with my friend.
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- Sep/17/24 5:57:59 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, it has been clear since day one, since June 2023, that the Conservatives do not want to rectify the unconstitutional second-generation cut-off rule for lost Canadians and their families. They voted against provisions that would have rectified the unconstitutional amendments. They filibustered the bill for 30 hours at committee, and they stalled reading debate for the bill eight times. One thing that I know is that actions speak louder than words, and their actions have been really clear.
Why are the Conservatives misleading family members with their fake commitments?
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- Sep/17/24 5:58:45 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I agree with my colleague that actions speak louder than words, so let us talk about actions here. Let us talk about how we are actually dealing with Canadians. Let us talk about the substantive test that made this ruling unconstitutional. That was the action of the Liberal government, which has been unable to deliver any efficiency in getting people through the immigration process.
A 50% failure rate because of mistakes is what makes this unconstitutional. That should be fixed forthwith. That would address the ruling of unconstitutionality that came with this.
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- Sep/17/24 5:59:45 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, my hon. colleague mentioned the difference in the tests of someone's connection to Canada. Could he offer a few comments on the value of citizenship—
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