Hon. Peter Harder moved third reading of Bill S-8, An Act to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, to make consequential amendments to other Acts and to amend the Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations, as amended.

Hon. Mobina S. B. Jaffer: Honourable senators, I also rise today to speak on World Refugee Day and to thank Canadians for opening your doors and your hearts to my refugee family and many other South Asians who fled Uganda 50 years ago.

In June 1972 — 50 years ago — I was a student living in London, England, with my three siblings. My mother was visiting and was with us when we received the worst phone call of our lives, informing us that my father, a Ugandan member of Parliament, had been killed by President Idi Amin’s soldiers.

Our world came crashing down, but my mother did not give up hope. The next day, we heard a knock on the door. It was my father, Sherali Bandali Jaffer, who had fled Uganda to come to England. We could not believe our eyes. My father never shared the details of how he escaped with us, but we know that he had help from his friends in the military. Many of his colleagues were not so fortunate.

My husband and I went back to Uganda and were there on August 3, 1972, when the president declared that he would be expelling all Ugandan Asians. My husband and I were in the process of leaving Uganda when the army showed up at my in-laws’ home. I will never forget that day.

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Young military men had four guns pointing towards my husband — two facing his head and two poking his stomach, forcing him into a jeep. Luckily for us, the police arrived and insisted that my husband be taken to the police station and not army barracks. Luckily, my husband, Nuralla, was released later that day and we left Uganda as soon as we could.

His Highness the Aga Khan and his uncle Prince Sadruddin, who was the UN High Commissioner for Refugees at the time, intervened. They convinced former prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau and several other global leaders to help us. We were fortunate to be rescued so quickly and are forever grateful to Canadian immigration officials like Mike Molloy, who came to Uganda and quite literally saved our lives.

My story is not unique. Hundreds of refugees before me and after me have had similar experiences.

Honourable senators, on this World Refugee Day let us not forget the women, men and children languishing in refugee camps all over the world. They have lost everything, and we are in a privileged position to provide them with something that they long for: hope. Hope for a brighter future for themselves and for their families.

I will forever remain indebted to Canadians for opening their doors to me and my family when we needed you. I hope that we can keep our hearts and our doors open to refugees around the world and give them hope for a better tomorrow. Thank you, senators.

Hon. Ratna Omidvar: Honourable senators, I rise today to recognize World Refugee Day. This has never been a day for celebration, least of all this year, because this year marks a new threshold of misery, insecurity, heartbreak and displacement for millions of new people.

In Ukraine alone, over 7 million people have fled the brutal and ruthless invasion by Russia. In Afghanistan, we watched in horror as the Taliban returned, resulting in a mass exodus from the country.

All told, today there are over 100 million people who have been displaced. This is a new high. I know that sometimes numbers are meaningless because we hear so many numbers thrown at us, so let me try and put these numbers into some context for you. One hundred million people is more than the entire populations of the U.K., France or Italy, and more than twice the population of Canada. If you pulled together the world’s largest cities — New Delhi, Mexico City and Beijing — you would still not get to 100 million. By all accounts, this number is only going to climb because of climate change, climate migration and, sadly, more conflict.

I believe we need to come to grips with this new normal, yet tragic, way of life. Although I appreciate that Canada has worked hard to bring in Afghans and Ukrainians, we know that our response could be better, faster and more humane. We cannot be reinventing the wheel whenever a new crisis arrives, because there will always be a new crisis.

Canada needs to be better prepared, learn its lessons from the past as well as its successes — such as our response to Syrian refugees — and permanently realign the machinery of government at IRCC, Global Affairs Canada and other departments to create a rapid response mechanism which will make us more nimble, responsive and efficient. We owe it not just to the people who have lost their homes, but we also owe it to ourselves. Thank you.