NEW LEGISLATION GIVES MINISTER NEW POWERS

The federal government introduced yesterday legislative amendments to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act that would allow the Minister to control the ever increasing application backlog, limit the number or new applications, set priorities in processing and timeless. Here is a summary as set out in today's Globe and Mail newspaper:

IMMIGRATION AND REFUGEE PROTECTION ACT

Bill expands minister's control over immigration

New legislation, buried in budget implementation bill, gives minister power to decide the number and type of people allowed in
GLORIA GALLOWAY

March 15, 2008

OTTAWA -- The federal Conservatives are moving to give the Immigration Minister more power to control the number and type of people allowed into the country - and the speed with which they are welcomed here.

New legislation tabled yesterday would also allow the minister to cap the backlog of potential immigrants and cut off applications if the queue gets too long.

Immigration Minister Diane Finley told the House of Commons that the changes to the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act are aimed at increasing the number of workers coming into Canada.

"Our government has two objectives," Ms. Finley said. "The first is to bring more newcomers here to fill the jobs and be reunited with their families. The second is to do it faster."

Among other things, the new legislation says a visa "may" be issued to applicants who meet federal requirements.

For those who are inadmissible, the minister may still grant permanent resident status if it is justified on compassionate grounds or "by public policy considerations."

And the law would give the minister the power to set the number of applications, by type, processed in any year.

The changes in the Immigration Act are buried in a massive budget implementation bill. That means the opposition parties will have to approve them or bring down the minority Conservative government - something the Liberals have been unwilling to do.

But Liberal MP David McGuinty said the proposed rules would dash the hopes of large numbers of immigrant hopefuls.

He pointed to processing waiting times for immigrants, which have increased by 20 per cent over the past four years. More than 800,000 people are currently stuck in limbo on waiting lists.

"The government is so desperate to close the door on immigrants that it will ignore the painful mistakes of previous Conservative governments that tried to do the very same thing," Mr. McGuinty said.

"Why does the minister insist on closing Canada's doors to the newcomers we desperately need to fuel our labour and our population growth even though history shows this is absolutely the wrong approach?"

Ms. Finley replied that the Conservative government welcomed more immigrants to Canada last year than in most of the preceding 100 years.

"Not only are we doing more, we are doing it better," she said. "In the family reunification class, we have made that a priority, and now cases are getting processed 20 per cent to 40 per cent faster than they did under the previous government."

Olivia Chow, a New Democrat from Toronto, said Liberal governments let the backlogs grow "and the Conservative solution is just as absurd: They just will not take as many applications."

Ms. Chow urged the minister to instead bolster resources at Canada's overseas offices and relax the immigration point system. She said the target number of immigrants into Canada should be equal to 1 per cent of the population - or 330,000 people - to renew the work force and drive the economy.

The government says there were 429,000 foreigners allowed into Canada last year, but that included temporary workers and students in addition to 251,000 permanent residents.