Social Assistance Receipt Among Refugee Claimants in Canada: Evidence from Linked Administrative Data Files

2015/10/16 Leave a comment

A good illustration of the benefits to evidence-based policy making by linking administrative and economic data. Bit dry analysis but essentially shows that number accessing declines with time but remains about Canadian average:

Focusing on the middle estimate [which excluded non-linked files], the receipt of SA in year t+1 among the 2005-to-2010 claimant cohorts generally ranged between 80% and 90% across family types, with rates highest among lone mothers and couples with more than two children. Similarly, the incidence of SA receipt generally ranged from about 80% to 90% across families in which the oldest member was between 19 to 24 and 55 to 64 years of age. Across provinces, the incidence of SA receipt in year t+1 was generally highest in Quebec, at over 85%, and lowest in Alberta, at under 60%.

SA receipt varied considerably across country of citizenship. Refugee claimants from countries such as Afghanistan, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Eritrea, and Somalia all had relatively high SArates (close to or above 90%) throughout most of the study period, while  rates were lower among refugee claimants from Bangladesh, Haiti, India, and Jamaica (generally below 80%).

The rates of SA receipt tended to decline sharply in the years following the start of the refugee claim. Between years t+1 and t+2, rates fell by about 20 percentage points among most claimant cohorts, declining a further 15 percentage points between t+2 and t+3, and 10 percentage points between t+3 and t+4. By t+4, between 25% and 40% of refugee claimants received SA. However, it is important to recall that these figures pertain to the diminishing group of refugee claimants whose claims remained open up to that year. These figures are also well above the Canadian average of about 8%.

Among refugee claimant families that received SA in year t+1, the average total family income typically ranged from about $19,000 to $22,000, with SA benefits accounting for $8,000 to $11,000—or about 40% to 48%—of that total.

In aggregate terms, SA income paid to all recipients in Canada totaled $10 billion to $13 billion in most years. Given their relatively small size as a group, the dollar amount of SA paid to refugee claimant families amounted to between 1.9% and 4.4% of that total, depending on the year and on the treatment of unlinked cases.

Source: Social Assistance Receipt Among Refugee Claimants in Canada: Evidence from Linked Administrative Data Files

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Away from spotlight of national Conservative campaign, Jason Kenney runs another

2015/10/16 Leave a comment

Interesting list of commitments (not in the party platform), reinforcing the link between domestic (diaspora) politics and foreign policy:

He’s [Kenney] been going non-stop since the campaign began, he said, because despite all the inroads the Conservatives have made, demographics and shifting immigration patterns provide new opportunities for outreach.

“We’re not going to retain every vote we have in the last election but I think we’re doing very well,” he said.

He’s doing more, however, than just showing up.

Kenney has made several campaign promises in recent weeks that appear nowhere in the official Conservative campaign platform.

To the Sri Lankans, Kenney promised a promise to expand Canada’s high commission to the city of Jaffna, a provincial capital in that country whose population is mostly Tamil. The Tamil diaspora in Canada is among the largest in the world.

To Iranians, Kenney promised to make it easier for them to access consular services from Ottawa, as opposed to having to travel to Washington, D.C. Canada expelled Iranian diplomats from Ottawa in 2012, leaving the Iranian diaspora without access to services like passports or other government documents.

To the Armenian community, a pledge to opening trade and consular office in Yerevan, the country’s capital.

Armenian Canadians should “return the favour to the Conservative party and its candidates by voting and helping party candidates,” the head of the Armenian Canadian Conservative Association reportedly said, according to a post about the announcement on the HyeForum, an Armenian community website.

While not speaking specifically about those promises, Kenney said the Conservatives have their eye on getting diaspora communities more involved in foreign policy.

“Think tanks, foreign policy commentators say that Canada’s diversity is in principle a great strength for foreign and economic ties around the world and we have never really done that in a systematic way,” he said.

“So we’ve been trying to develop ways to more formally engage the large diaspora communities who are new Canadians to deepen ties with countries of origin.”

The Conservatives have come under considerable fire, however, for how closely they appear to link foreign policy to diaspora politics.

Since 2006, under the Conservatives, 1.6 million people became Canadian citizens, Kenney pointed out.

“There are new communities that have developed in large part since our government came to office and so that’s an advantage we did not have in the past.”

Those Canadians are looking for change just like everyone else, said Liberal John McCallum, and they are not responding well to what he calls the Conservatives’ divisive — and often entirely misleading — approach.

A recent set of ads appearing in the Chinese and Punjabi press asked readers whether Trudeau’s values — described as being about putting brothels in communities, allowing marijuana to be sold in corner stores and allowing drug injection sites in local neighbourhoods — none of those things are in the Liberal platform, McCallum said.

“It’s wrong, on principle, and it’s a sign of desperation.”

Source: Away from spotlight of national Conservative campaign, Jason Kenney runs another | National Newswatch

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UK: Anti-Muslim hate crime to be treated as seriously as antisemitism

2015/10/15 Leave a comment

Good and needed as part of engagement strategy:
Prime Minister David Cameron will tell police forces in England and Wales to record anti-Muslim hate crimes separately and treat them as seriously as anti-Semitic attacks. The move comes amid rising incidents of Islamophobia.

New funding to boost security at religious buildings, including mosques, will also be announced.

The policy move on Tuesday is designed to reassure Muslim communities that the government’s counter-extremism strategy will be balanced, amid fears that the measures alienate them.

Cameron will make the announcement at the first meeting of his new Community Engagement Forum, which will meet to discuss the government’s counter-extremism strategy, due to be published next month.

Islamophobic crime in London jumped by 70 percent in the year up to July, according to official statistics from the Metropolitan Police, one of the few forces to record anti-Muslim hate crime.

Anti-Muslim hate crimes in other parts of the UK are currently monitored by Tell MAMA, an unofficial recorder of Islamophobia in the UK that relies on victims logging incidents online or over the phone.

Speaking ahead of the announcement, Cameron said he wanted to show Muslim communities support.

“I want to build a national coalition to challenge and speak out against extremists and the poison they peddle.

“I want British Muslims to know we will back them to stand against those who spread hate and to counter the narrative which says Muslims do not feel British.”

“And I want police to take more action against those who persecute others simply because of their religion,” he added.

Source: Anti-Muslim hate crime to be treated as seriously as anti-Semitism – Cameron — RT UK

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New passport processing system suspended after glitches, security gaps revealed

2015/10/15 Leave a comment

The normal risks of moving to a new system compounded by likely political direction to implement by a certain date:

Citizenship and Immigration Canada has suspended its use of a new system to process passport applications after CBC News reported about widespread glitches with the program.

The department confirmed it is “pausing” the processing of passports through the Global Case Management System in order to incorporate “lessons learned” during the testing phase. Citizenship and Immigration is also taking time to evaluate feedback from employees, said spokesman Remi Lariviere.

At least 1,500 Canadian passports have been produced under a flawed new system that opened the door to fraud and tampering, according to documents obtained by CBC/Radio-Canada.

Internal records from Citizenship and Immigration revealed the processing program was rushed into operation on May 9, despite dire warnings from senior officials that it was not ready and could present new security risks.

Lariviere insisted that no passports have been issued with security gaps.

“This is a regular part of good product management,” he said. “To be clear, at no point has the integrity or security of passport issuance been compromised.

Department warned about risks

Since the launch of the new system, officials have been scrambling to fix hundreds of glitches and seal security gaps. Weeks after the new process was brought on line, there were calls to stop production.

Those recommendations were ignored, and the passports continued to be issued in the first phase of production under the new system, designed to enhance security and integrate with other global programs.

Numerous reports show that during a period of several weeks, it was possible for Citizenship and Immigration employees to alter the photo on a passport after it had been approved. And there are numerous reports of discrepancies between information contained in the database and what actually appeared on a passport.

Source: New passport processing system suspended after glitches, security gaps revealed – Politics – CBC News

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What Kathleen Wynne can do about anti-black racism

2015/10/15 Leave a comment

Anthony Morgan, a research lawyer at the African Canadian Legal Clinic, proposes the creation of an anti-racism secretariat to undertake research and public education to reduce racism.

Not really sure the extent to which this will be effective, compared to the Ontario Human Rights Commission as well as other activities, governmental and non-governmental, with the comparable objectives:

Peel recently joined Toronto, Ottawa, Hamilton and London as Ontario jurisdictions where black people are the primary targets of the humiliating, human rights violating police practice of street checks and carding. Peel Police Chief Jennifer Evans has even decided to join the line of other Ontario chiefs who are defiantly committed to continuing this practice despite evidence of its discriminatory impact on black people.

In the realm of child welfare, black children are grossly overrepresented in every Ontario region where there is a sizable black population. After initially being caught flat-footed, the Ontario government has responded by supporting two separate province-wide consultations to address the systemic anti-black racism chronically plaguing Ontario’s policing and child welfare institutions.

It’s likely only a matter of time before similar province-wide government consultations have to be launched to remedy the over representation of blacks in school dropout rates, suspensions and expulsions, Ontario prisons, mental health committals and incidents of police use of deadly force, among others.

Though not as prominent on the public radar as it should be, anti-black hate crime also remains a pressing problem in Ontario. According to annual reports by the Toronto police and Statistics Canada, for the last few years blacks have been the principal target of racist hate-crimes in not only Toronto but across Canada.

Recently in Ottawa, a Black Lives Matter mural was defaced with the following threat: “ALL LIVES MATTER, NO DOUBLE STANDARD, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.” This was the third Black Lives Matter mural to be defaced in Ottawa over the last few months. In another jarring incident in April, a black assembly plant worker in Windsor faced repeated incidents of nooses being tied and mysteriously placed in and around his working space.

The above incidents are not small, isolated and unconnected mishaps enacted by a fringe few. They collectively form part of the continually creeping culture of anti-black racism embedded in the public consciousness, conventions and institutions of Ontario. This culture is critically implicated in constructing a context for black life in which chronic crime, violence, unemployment and poverty too commonly compromise the health and well-being of Ontario’s black population.

None of the above is to suggest that the Ontario government and its institutions are not leading and/or supporting some important work to directly or indirectly address anti-black racism. It is to point out that what is being done is simply not enough.

There remains a powerfully promising institutional response to anti-black racism and other forms of race-based discrimination that the Ontario government is yet to deploy: the Anti-Racism Secretariat. Since 2006, Ontario’s Human Rights Code has provided for the creation of this secretariat mandated to undertake research and public education programming designed to prevent and eliminate racism in Ontario.

For reasons that are unclear, the secretariat has never been established. In the chasm of the Ontario government’s silent inaction, it is tempting to speculate that black people being the primary targets of racism in Ontario is the reason for this.

Source: What Kathleen Wynne can do about anti-black racism | Toronto Star

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Canadian Science Policy Conference 2015: Diaspora Scientists: Canada’s untapped resource of knowledge networks

2015/10/15 Leave a comment

Another example of multiculturalism in action: building diaspora scientific links this coming November:

A first of its kind in Canada, this inaugural symposium aims to discuss the topic of diaspora scientists and their potential to strengthen international science and technology collaboration.

The symposium seeks to mobilize the untapped resources of diaspora communities to strengthen Canada’s global connections in science, innovation and trade.

The objectives of this symposium include:

· Mobilizing and connecting existing diaspora scientific communities in Canada

· Providing networking opportunities among diaspora scientists to share experiences,
lessons, and best practices

· Exploring the full potential of diaspora scientists

· Forming a Canadian Network of Diaspora Scientists that includes a database of organizations and individuals who are active in this field

Source: Canadian Science Policy Conference 2015: Diaspora Scientists: Canada’s untapped resource of global knowledge networks

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Citizenship ceremony got ‘heated’ over niqab

2015/10/15 Leave a comment

Convenient that this story came out now during the last week of the campaign. While it could have been an official who leaked it, more likely at the political level (although less sensitive than other leaks – see Neil Macdonald: Government sensitivity over you hearing about ‘sensitive’ information – one wonders whether CIC will call in the RCMP to investigate this one as well?).

None of this excuses the man’s behaviour and it appears CIC officials handled the situation appropriately:

A leaked e-mail obtained by the Toronto Sun, sent to Citizenship and Immigration Canada (CIC) from an official at the ceremony that day, depicts an ugly confrontation between the man and several CIC employees, including the clerk of the ceremony, assisting officers, judges and a manager.

In the e-mail, the official wrote the situation caused “considerable moral distress” to staff and those in attendance. Those involved were “distressed at the prospect of being any part of the husband’s efforts to coerce his wife.” Those who were at the ceremony said the husband and wife were there with their four children.

In accordance with protocol, a female officer with the citizenship court checked the woman’s ID and informed her she would need to unveil during the ceremony.

“This lady said ‘yes,’” a source told the Toronto Sun. “She was willing to do it.” The woman, who was the applicant for citizenship, wasn’t involved in the argument between her husband and officials.

“He’s pacing furiously and she’s just standing there,” said the source.

When the husband’s objections grew increasingly louder, CIC staff pulled the man into a side room.

People walking by could hear the yelling through the door.

“We’re talking the span of an entire citizenship ceremony this was going on.

Loud, loud, loud yelling,” the source said.

“He spent the entire time having a screaming match with the manager,” the source said.

As the argument continued, the woman “slipped into the room” where the citizenship ceremony was taking place, removed her niqab and swore the oath of citizenship.

“It was a terrible, terrible feeling to have this woman want to exercise her legal rights and to have her husband try to use us,” said the source. “And were we, you know, at the back of our minds a little bit afraid for her safety? Yes.” Federal officials refused to give specifics about what happened, but confirmed with the Sun that an incident did in fact take place on that date.

“The 10:30 a.m. ceremony was delayed by more than an hour because of a candidate’s question around a CIC policy,” said CIC spokesperson Remi Lariviere.

The right of Muslim women to remain veiled during Canadian citizenship ceremonies has defined one of the more contentious issues in this election campaign.

Source: Citizenship ceremony got ‘heated’ over niqab | Malcolm | Canada | News | Toronto

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Neil Macdonald: Government sensitivity over you hearing about ‘sensitive’ information

2015/10/14 1 Comment

While MacDonald is unfair to CIC DM Anita Biguzs (she had no option but to investigate the leak), his broader points are valid:

But to Biguzs and her fellow mandarins at Citizenship and Immigration, the public should never have been told any of these things in the first place, and the fact that it was constituted a grave crime.

Interestingly, Biguzs’s memo does not call the information leaked “classified.” She calls it “sensitive.” There’s a big difference.

Classified information is an official secret, determined by security professionals to be potentially injurious to national security. (Or at least that’s supposed to be how it works.)

Disclosing an official secret is a crime.

“Sensitive information,” on the other hand, is anything the government doesn’t want the public to know, and, as noted, the government that Biguzs has served for a decade doesn’t want the public to know much.

Prosecuting embarrassment

Using Biguzs’s logic, federal scientists who decide the public should know about a scientific finding about the quality of the air we breathe or water we drink are unethical underminers of democracy, too, unless they seek permission to speak, which is rather difficult to obtain nowadays in Ottawa.

Of course, when a government does want reporters to know something, the information is suddenly not sensitive at all anymore, and democracy is well-served by its disclosure, sometimes even — and I speak here with some experience — when it’s an official secret.

In the case of the immigration and passport stories, apparently, the government was embarrassed, so the RCMP are now stalking the department’s hallways, further intimidating an already scared group of bureaucrats.

Politicians, including Harper’s Conservatives, love to talk about the supreme importance of accountability. It is a word that has been milked, flogged and ridden practically to death.

So Biguzs and her political masters might want to ponder this: If the information about the refugee review and the faulty passports had been divulged in a timely fashion, as a matter of public accountability, democracy would not only have been served, there’d be no need to call the police.

Source: Neil Macdonald: Government sensitivity over you hearing about ‘sensitive’ information – Politics – CBC News

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Former CSIS analyst on homegrown terrorism and Islamic doctrine – The Globe and Mail

2015/10/14 Leave a comment

Good interview with Phil Gurski, former CSIS homegrown terrorism expert, regarding the messages in his new book, The Threat From Within. Last para particularly noteworthy:

You write that extremism is like the aphorism about real estate and location – but “narrative, narrative, narrative.”

What they [al-Qaeda-inspired radicals] are propagating and distributing is this conviction they are responding to our aggression as Westerners, and they are merely defending themselves. And that’s not true, but it doesn’t have to be true to be effective. The whole point of the book is there is no pattern to this. We have to accept that terrorists come from us. They come from Canadian society. They are not off-the-boat immigrants.

You point out, though, the narrative is partly rooted in religious doctrine, or at least concepts like jihad, hijra …

Here’s the dilemma that mainstream Muslims face: The people who commit these acts of terrorism see themselves as actually representative Muslims. In fact, they see themselves as the only true Muslims and start criticizing everyone else as being non-Muslims. So it comes from within Islam, but it is not Islam. How do we accept they have taken pieces of 1,400 years of Islamic history, and use it to their advantage?

You write that fundamentalist imams in Canada should be challenged.

Even if we’re not talking about terrorism, if we’re talking about small pockets of society that will basically advocate intolerance and rejection of other parts of society, do we want a country like that? What the [fundamentalist preachers] do is they are very intolerant and rejectionist of other Muslims, let alone non-Muslims. I think we have an obligation to challenge this, to argue against this.

But our political leaders don’t know the difference between Islamic doctrines.

Politicians are going to do what politicians are going to do. That’s fine. Everyone recognizes if we’re going to talk about this issue, to do something about it at an early level, we need early intervention, before it becomes a security-intelligence issue. The government’s role is to foster and encourage the grassroots that are starting in this country. The government role has to be very much a background role.

But if the problem is narrative, and the narrative has had 1,400 years, how does someone in Ottawa come up with a program to counter it?

The line I like to use – and it really shocks some audiences – is that right now the only solution we have is to start with the four-year-olds. If we can get all the four-year-olds to understand what this narrative is saying and reject it, we’ll be fine.

Like in junior-high assemblies where the police used to say, “Don’t do drugs?”

No, it’s more than that. We as a society have to understand the child you’re raising has to be raised in an environment of tolerance and acceptance. So if you can get that right across the board – not just Muslim communities, not just immigrant communities, but in Wonder Bread white communities – we’re going to be in good shape.

Source: Former CSIS analyst on homegrown terrorism and Islamic doctrine – The Globe and Mail

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Grad rates jump for Toronto Somali students thanks to programs geared to help

2015/10/14 Leave a comment

Despite the earlier controversy by some in the Somali-Canadian community, appears that this kind of targeted program can work:

The plan runs the gamut: Nudging Somali-speaking teens into taking leadership roles at school; ensuring their culture and faith are part of their courses; training their teachers; reaching out to their parents.

And over an eight-year period, those efforts have paid off: 80 per cent of Somali teens now earn high school diplomas, a jump of 27 percentage points between 2005 and 2013.

While the community still struggles in the school system — results on the Grade 10 literacy test and standardized math tests continue to lag, as well as the number of credits teens earn in Grades 9 and 10 — the increase in graduates means the plan has almost closed the gap with the Toronto District School Board’s overall rate of 83 per cent.

“When we have such a high-level of buy-in from students and the community, inevitably we trend toward improvement,” said Jim Spyropoulos, executive superintendent in charge of equity and inclusive schools. He predicts Somali youth will soon surpass the board-wide graduation rate.

He attributes the boost to programs funded by Ontario’s Ministry of Education that help schools in at-risk urban neighbourhoods, as well as board initiatives geared toward providing social, emotional and academic support specifically for Somali students, plus training to help educators create a classroom that reflects the diversity of the city.

Improved grad rates were being achieved even before a task force to help Somali teens — vehemently opposed by a vocal group in the community — was set up.

Spyropoulos said the task force’s 2014 recommendations, which include mentoring and university planning, were built on the previous initiatives.

“The kids were telling us what’s working,” and those initiatives were included in the task force plan, he said.

The community has changed over the years, he added. Twenty years ago, many of the Somali teens in Toronto schools were recent arrivals from a war-torn country. Today, they’re mainly Canadian-born kids who face different stressors — including trail-blazing for the next generation.

“Eighty per cent of them are now born in Canada,” added Spyropoulos. “We need to be effectively plugged into the community as to what are the realities of today, coping with second-generation stresses.”

Part of the focus will be on post-secondary education, which the board is tracking, because “these kids are pioneers… when they go (on to post-secondary), they change the world for generations after” who will then be more likely to go to college or university.

Among Somali teens who graduated in 2005, 24 per cent were accepted into an Ontario university and 13 per cent to college. Among the 2013 group, 41 per cent went to university, and 20 per cent to college. The university enrolment rate is lower than that of the board as a whole, which is 50 per cent.

Source: Grad rates jump for Somali students thanks to programs geared to help | Toronto Star

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