Keller: The Liberals broke the immigration system at high speed. They’re repairing it by baby steps

Hard not to agree:

…In all of this, the Trudeau government is caught in a bind of its own making. It found, to its evident delight, that sharply ramping up the number of people arriving on notionally temporary permits was easy. To govern is to choose, but the government discovered that the less choosing it did – and the more rubber-stamping of visas it encouraged – the easier governing appeared to be.

It is now discovering that unwinding things, even a little, is more difficult. It will be lobbied heavily to eviscerate its modest promises, and to quietly reverse this course reversal.

That is also where Liberal predilections reside. They didn’t just break the immigration system. They broke it with great enthusiasm. And their repair job is still mostly blueprints, drawn up haltingly and under the duress of public opinion.

Compared with Europe and the United States, Canada has long had a wider immigration door, but also far more control – an aspect of the “order” in peace, order and good government – over who enters. That is what underpinned public support for immigration.

And controlling the door was important because once somebody gets into Canada, whether as a temporary worker, student or even tourist, it isn’t easy to get them to leave. Not if they don’t want to. Ottawa decides who gets in but has much less control over, or information about, how many people whose visas have expired, and who are no longer legally allowed to reside in Canada, nevertheless remain.

In the months and years to come, that is likely to be the final aftershock of Liberal immigration policy.

Restoring sense and sanity to the system won’t be easy. Breaking is easier than repairing.

Source: The Liberals broke the immigration system at high speed. They’re repairing it by baby steps