Speaking notes - Speaking points for the Hon. Jason Kenney, P.C., M.P. Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism at the 11th Annual Diplomatic Forum

Québec City, Québec, December 17, 2008

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Introduction

Thank you and good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen.

It is my pleasure to join you here for the 11th annual Diplomatic Forum.

It is fitting that my first opportunity to speak broadly about my portfolio to foreign Heads of Missions comes here in Québec City—a city that just celebrated a significant milestone this year.

As the birthplace of French culture in Canada, this magnificent city has endured for four centuries. Very few cities on this continent can rival Québec’s claim to being a cornerstone of North America.

Aboriginal peoples encountered these European settlers, who among them included the British, the Scottish and the Irish and whose existence has loomed large over the last couple of hundred years.

Québec City is rich in history and its diverse population is a powerful reminder of the many cultures that have built the Canada we know and love today.

Indeed the influence of the world’s cultures upon generations of Canadians is undeniable.

Today whenever I travel abroad, or receive foreign visitors here at home, I am not surprised by how enthusiastically the rest of the world sees our model of pluralism and immigration.

That success is no accident. It is the result of our history and of the values rooted in that history.

It is a history of accommodating differences in culture, language, and religion, rather than trying to impose a false conformity.

It is a result of an abiding belief in values such as ordered liberty, human dignity, and freedom of conscience—where harmony is the rule rather than the exception.

We have learned and benefited from the many differences among our founding cultures.

It hasn’t always been easy, and it certainly wasn’t always peaceful. It was—and it still is—a long road, a road built with the hands, minds and hearts of many great Canadians.

So in relative terms we are still a young country. Since our Confederation in 1867, more than 15 million people have immigrated to Canada. Last year alone we attracted more than 400,000 people—both permanent and temporary residents—from every corner of the globe.

Our latest national Census informs us that one in five people now living here was born outside our borders, the highest proportion of immigrants we have experienced in more than 75 years.

As Canada’s Minister of Citizenship, Immigration, and Multiculturalism, in some ways I feel as though I am a custodian of the human aspect of Canada’s future.

An American journalist by the name of Andrew Malcolm, who once worked in Canada, opined several years ago, and I quote, “It’s going to be a great country when they finish unpacking it.”

I like that quote. But the fact is we’re already a great country. And we’re never going to be finished unpacking. Canada is a work in progress, and the contribution of immigrants is a key factor in our evolving story.

Citizenship & Multiculturalism

Canada’s immigration program is built on three main pillars—reuniting families, providing refuge to people fleeing persecution, and bringing in people who can help our economy grow. At the same time, we need to safeguard the integrity of our program in order to protect Canadians from a range of health and safety risks.

We need immigration. It is part of our history, part of our fabric, part of our value system. And from an economic perspective, immigration has an important role to play in keeping our economy growing.

Like many other western countries, our workforce is aging, and our birthrate is low. We estimate that within a few years, all the net growth in our labour force will be as a result of immigration.

So, despite the current global economic downturn which has resulted in some countries considering  scaling back their immigration levels, our Government recognizes that, for Canada, immigration remains vital.

Accordingly, I recently announced plans to welcome between 240,000 and 265,000 new permanent residents in 2009, demonstrating our commitment to a strong immigration program.

In an era when many are tempted to batten down the hatches, we remain very open. In the past year or so we have lifted visa requirements for travelers to Canada from Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and Lithuania, the Czech Republic and Latvia.

We have introduced a number of changes aimed at modernizing our immigration system, improving service and improving outreach. And, we will continue to build more efficient services, including on-line services.

We’re working to make Canada a more attractive option for international students. For example, we’ve expanded eligibility for a program that allows international post-secondary students to work off-campus.  Since last summer, these students can apply on-line for their work permit.

After they graduate, we now allow them to stay in Canada and work for up to three years with an open work permit—meaning they no longer need a job offer before obtaining the work permit.

And we’ve just put in place a new program—the Canadian Experience Class—that will make it easier for certain students and temporary foreign workers to apply to become permanent residents.

While we maintain high levels of immigration, we also recognize that it’s not enough to say, “Welcome to Canada. Good luck!”

In an economic downturn, more than ever, it is important that we do what we can to help newcomers succeed. When they succeed, we succeed. And we have done a number of things in the past two years to improve their chances at success.

One thing we’ve done is completely revamp the way we select people in the economic stream of our immigration program.

We used to have a system that required us to process each and every application for immigration as a skilled worker, to a decision.

There was no consideration as to whether your skills and education matched what our economy actually needed. Not surprisingly, the line grew longer. And longer.

It’s now well over 600,000 people long, with corresponding wait times of several years.

We’ve changed that. Everyone who applied under the old system will be assessed under those rules. But from new skilled worker applications, we will choose people with the skills that match our labour-market needs, and return applications that don’t.

That will allow us to make decisions on new applications faster, reduce the backlog, and bring in skilled workers that have a very good chance at success because they are needed in our economy.

Since 2006, we have substantially increased funding in the provinces and territories outside Quebec by investing an additional $1.4 billion over a five-year period to help newcomers succeed.

Under the Canada-Québec Accord, Québec’s provincial government is responsible for all settlement services.

This funding supports a range of programming for new immigrants settling into our communities and our economy. They range from orientation sessions to referral services, from language training and job-search assistance and mentorship.

We want to help with more than just the essentials. We want to help as many newcomers as we can to build lives in Canada, and we want to engage all Canadians in the process.

That’s why we need to encourage as many newcomers as possible to access our programs and services. And it’s why we will continue to invest in such programming.

As I’ve traveled across the country, I’ve encountered some great success stories that illustrate how this funding is helping people. But challenges certainly remain.

A couple of weeks ago, back in my home province of Alberta, the Somali community invited me to come and speak with them. Many Somali newcomers are benefiting from Alberta’s strong economy, but others are struggling at settling in and integrating into Canadian society.

And, unfortunately, some of the youth in that community have turned to criminal activity and violence.

As witnesses to such violence, some end up being victims themselves. So the question we have to ask ourselves as a government is what kinds of innovative services can we offer to help young newcomers integrate into society and become responsible adults?

How do we reach out to them and build bridges between the culture of their parents and mainstream Canadian culture?

I know these are questions that pre-occupy many of your countries as well when accepting immigrants. I like to think Canada has been extraordinarily successful in building those bridges.

But there is more that we can do to reach out, whether through recreation projects that foster mentorship, volunteerism, leadership skills or civic education.

Co-operation with other countries

Integration is just one of many challenges for us. And there are undoubtedly things we can learn from one another. In this increasingly mobile world of ours, cooperation on migration issues is becoming more and more essential.

There are certainly advantages for all of us in maintaining a free flow of people and goods across a safe and secure border.

Clearly it is also in our interests to cooperate in ways that enhance our individual and collective security.

And there are ways that we can work together on global migration issues for greater good.

I will give you one example. Just last week Canada accepted 24 Bhutanese refugees. They are the first of 5,000 Canada plans to take in over the next few years. And those 5,000 are part of 100,000 Bhutanese who have been living in refugee camps in Nepal since the early 1990s.

That’s almost 20 years. Not long ago it seemed there was no solution in sight for these people. Neither country seemed keen to accept responsibility for these refugees and offer them a durable solution.

Canada was one of seven countries that joined together with the United Nations. We worked together on a plan and approached the Nepalese and Bhutanese governments with a collective voice.

And this was clearly a case where the whole was greater than the sum of its parts. By working together, we were able to make progress in those negotiations. As a result, a good number of these refugees will be rebuilding their lives in Canada, the United States, and a number of other countries.

We are one of only a handful of countries that resettle refugees. But many other countries deal with the influx of refugee populations across their borders.

Of course, resettlement is only part of the solution to the dilemma faced by over 8 million refugees in the world, many in protracted situations.

The large majority of refugees prefer to go back home. For many others, in-country solutions are more likely. And, of course, there is room for greater cooperation to prevent these situations from occurring in the first place.

Canada has a very generous refugee system. Since our government came to power in 2006, we have welcomed more than 51,000 refugees from around the world, through both resettlement and our in-Canada refugee protection system.

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Antonio Guterres, has spoken of the extraordinary quality of Canada’s hospitality toward refugees and asylum seekers.

He has praised Canada, with our respect for other cultures, and where border security that protects citizens also respects the rights of people in need of international protection.

While Canada’s system is one our citizens are rightly proud of, it is far from perfect. We struggle with the balance between wanting to give everyone a fair hearing, and at the same time ensuring most of our resources are dedicated to helping those truly in need of our protection.

We have signed the Safe Third Country Agreement with the United States, which enhances the ability of both governments to manage refugee claims made by people at ports of entry on our shared land border.

Under this agreement, refugee claimants must seek protection in whichever country they first have the opportunity to do so. The agreement has enhanced the orderly handling of refugee claims, boosted public confidence in the integrity of asylum systems, and helped reduce the abuse of refugee programs.

Indeed, this agreement is helping us to find that balance between giving everyone a fair hearing and ensuring that most of our resources are dedicated to helping those really in need of our protection.

I am still not convinced that we have that balance right. But I am optimistic that we can do more to help those in the most desperate situations.

Working with our partners on security

As my remarks have suggested, for the most part we have built a country in which people of many cultural backgrounds, many religions and many social viewpoints can live side by side in tolerance and peace.

We accept about 250,000 new immigrants each year, and they are hard-working, law-abiding people who want only the opportunity for a better life for themselves and their children.

But while Canadians cherish our open and caring society, we cannot be naïve. There are those who want to come here not for the purpose of building a better life, but to commit crimes, acts of terrorism, or to recruit others to their cause.

Just as we open our doors to legitimate immigrants and refugees, we must close our doors to people who pose a threat to our national security and the safety of our communities.

To meet this fundamental obligation, we are working on many fronts, including through law enforcement, our intelligence and national security agencies, and by strengthening border security.

Terrorism is a global reality, and like our allies, Canada is not immune to the threat. September 11, 2001, and the many subsequent terrorist attacks around the world remind Canadians every day of our vulnerability and our collective obligation to contribute to global security.

As in the United States and other countries, immigration to Canada is regulated by comprehensive legislation to admit people who meet specific requirements while denying entry to those who threaten public health and safety or national security.

It involves extensive screening abroad by highly trained security and immigration officials. For example, 100 percent of those who make asylum claims on arrival in Canada are security-screened, which includes fingerprint examinations.

Our last budget included funding for biometrics. We are taking steps to work this technology into our immigration program and improve our border security through fingerprint and facial-recognition technology, beginning with those applying for temporary visas.

Canada’s immigration and border management systems are robust and in many ways, we believe, could be used as an example by others.

Citizenship and Immigration Canada, the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service and the U.S. Department of State have re-signed an agreement to allow our two countries to continue to exchange information on a case-by-case basis.

This means that potential violators of citizenship or immigration laws can be intercepted prior to their arrival in Canada or the United States.

Our War Crimes Program has also been recognized as a model for other countries, several of which, including the United States, Australia and Norway, have sent teams to Canada to study our methods.

Almost 3,000 individuals who are believed to have been involved or complicit in war crimes or crimes against humanity have been prevented from coming to Canada.

Hundreds of other non-Canadians have been removed from Canada as well, and in several cases arising from World War II activities, Canadian citizenship has been revoked.

Security certificates are another tool that has enabled us to remove inadmissible individuals from Canada who are considered to be risks to national security and public safety.

The Supreme Court has recognized that tools like security certificates are necessary in order to protect public safety.

While our goal is to ensure that we can continue to prevent unlawful individuals from remaining in Canada, we have also taken steps to protect the rights of those subject to a security certificate.

Conclusion

Ladies and gentlemen, we have an immigration program not just because immigrants fill demographic niches, bring valuable skills and knowledge, and contribute to our economy.

We open our doors because we have a fundamental commitment to human rights globally. We have bound ourselves to international covenants and commitments in honour of those values. That’s why our immigration system includes the check and balances it does.

But our first responsibility is to protect Canadians. That’s why our Government is working here at home and with partners in the United States, Europe and elsewhere around the world to identify and intercept those who would take advantage of the system to do us harm.

Balance is the key, and our Government will continue to find the right balance between keeping Canada safe from serious threats while upholding the Canadian values of justice, fairness, and the respect for human rights.

We have built a country that is universally admired. I hope you will take the opportunity to explore this vast land for yourselves, and I wish you all the very best of success in your meetings here this week.

Thank you.