Proposal to make citizenship ceremonies optional a ‘disservice to all of Canada’

2023/03/02 Leave a comment

More coverage of this misguided proposal:

A proposal by the Canadian government to allow prospective citizens to tick a box on a website rather than affirm a formal oath of citizenship is causing concern among those who see the longstanding swearing-in ceremony as an important rite of passage for new Canadians.

As detailed over the weekend in the Canada Gazette, the Department of Citizenship and Immigration is proposing to allow new citizens to fast-track their applications by giving them the option of affirming their citizenship oath via a secure internet webpage rather than raising their hands at a citizenship ceremony.

“In the 5 years from 2016–2017 to 2021–2022, citizenship grant applications have more than doubled, from 113,000 to 243,000,” read the statement published in the Gazette.

“Immigration levels continue to rise, with a target of 500,000 permanent residents for 2025, which will contribute to ongoing increases in citizenship applications.”

As of October 2022, the department said, around 358,000 citizenship applications were pending with Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, with some waiting over two years before having their citizenship ceremony — the last step in Canada’s long and drawn-out citizenship process. 

The change, the department said, would save prospective citizens two to three months of processing time. 

Institute for Canadian Citizenship CEO Daniel Bernhard told the National Post that losing the ceremony is tantamount to losing an important chapter in Canadian history.

“It’s really unfortunate,” he said.

“The day you become a citizen is a once-in-a-lifetime occasion that has implications for every generation afterwards. People recognize that, and these are very special, meaningful and very emotional days, not just for the new citizens but also for their family and friends.”

Rather than giving options to bypass the affirmation, Bernhard said Canada should be doing more to celebrate citizenship.

Indeed, fewer Canadian permanent residents are going through the process of obtaining citizenship.

Last month, Statistics Canada reported that just under half of permanent residents who immigrated to Canada between 2011 and 2021 obtained Canadian citizenship.

That’s compared to just over 75 per cent in 2001.

A 2022 Leger poll commissioned by the Institute for Canadian Citizenship found immigrants are realizing that life in Canada isn’t as rosy as assumed, with the current leadership and/or government (43 per cent), high cost of living (35 per cent) and racism (19 per cent) listed as the top three reasons why they wouldn’t recommend others immigrate to Canada.

That same survey reported around 22 per cent of new immigrants saying they were likely to leave Canada over the next two years.

That said, the same survey reported 71 per cent of respondents saying Canada provides immigrants with a good quality of life.

While Bernhard understands the need for the government to streamline the process, particularly in this time where unreasonably long processing delays have become default for the federal public service, he stresses it shouldn’t be at the expense of ceremony.

“I understand the government is facing a lot of pressure from people who, very reasonably, want their applications to be processed more quickly, but I would hope that we would be able to find those efficiencies in other parts of the process,” he said.

“These celebrations are really special, and if we do away with them, that’s a disservice to all of Canada.”

Source: Proposal to make citizenship ceremonies optional a ‘disservice to all of Canada’

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Soon a Canadian citizenship oath could be just a scroll and click away: But should it be?

2023/03/01 Leave a comment

The Canada Gazette notification of plans to further water down citizenship by allowing the oath to be administered by a “non-authorized person” risks further weakening the meaningfulness of Canadian citizenship.

IRCC justifies the proposal solely on operational and financial grounds, without any serious discussion of policy considerations. In a sense, this repeats the process of the previous government’s quintupling of adult citizenship fees in 2014-15, with a Gazette notice that discounted any impact from fee increases on naturalization rates. As we know from the recent Statistics Canada analysis and the Institute for Canadian Citizenship, that was likely one of the factors, along with the impact of the pandemic, on the drastic decline in naturalization from 60.4 percent in 2016 to 45.7 percent in 2021, five to nine years after landing.

More worrying is some of the rationale for this change. Upfront costs of some $5 million over 10 years are expected to be recouped though reduced ceremonies as the Gazette notice states: 

“Consequently, it is expected that participation in ceremonies would be lower than it is currently, and there would likely be fewer ceremonies overall. Therefore, the Government of Canada would save costs, as the proposal would likely reduce the number of ceremonies the Department would be required to arrange.”

In a nod to inclusion, the notice mentions that applicants will save “up to three months processing time.” Furthermore, “swearing or affirming in this manner via the secure online solution is expected to take significantly less time” than the 90 minutes the current ceremonies take. 

These are insignificant compared to changes made early in the government’s mandate that eased residency and language requirements, or the more recent change to the Oath to recognize Indigenous and treaty rights.

But to make citizenship more inclusive, the government would need to implement, at least partially, its platform commitment in the 2019 and 2021 election platforms to eliminate citizenship fees, a much more substantive measure.

Citizenship, as I have argued in the past, provides a mix of personal and public benefits. 

Applicants personally benefit from the security citizenship provides in terms of mobility and voting rights and the ability to run for office. Canadian society benefits from the “common bond for Canadian-born individuals and naturalized Canadians alike, signifying full membership in Canadian society.” 

This proposed change highlights how the government treats citizenship as a service transaction rather than a substantive unifying and integrating process to help new Canadians feel fully part of Canadian society. That the government has not issued the revised citizenship study guide, announced three ministers ago, is but a further example. 

Canadians, newcomers and old-timers, should raise their concerns with their MPs, regarding this diminishment of citizenship and the integration of new Canadians:

Starting as soon as June, new Canadian citizens could take the oath on their own — without the need for a citizenship judge.

The proposed change is an attempt by immigration officials to reduce processing time and backlogs.

However, critics warn the move would drastically change the decades-old ritual for generations of newcomers and with a click on the keyboard, further dilute the meaning of Canadian citizenship.

“This just further cheapens the significance of becoming a Canadian citizen. It’s just as easy to click terms and conditions to become a citizen as it is to create a Facebook or a TikTok account,” said Daniel Bernhard, CEO of the Institute for Canadian Citizenship.

“That’s really a shame.”

The change, as part of the modernization and digitalization of immigration processing, is expected to reduce the current citizenship processing time by three months to 21 months, according to the plan published in the Canada Gazette over the weekend.

Swearing an oath has been a legal requirement of becoming a citizen in this country since 1947. It’s a solemn vow taken by citizenship applicants to follow the laws of Canada and fulfil their duties as citizens.

Citizenship is not only a milestone for new immigrants toward their belonging and commitment to Canada, it also comes with the benefits of a passport, voting rights and the ability to run for elected office.

Under the proposed change, the immigration minister would have broad discretion to allow citizenship applicants to take the oath by other means and not necessarily before an authorized individual. 

Currently, new citizens swear or affirm the oath before a citizenship judge at virtual or in-person ceremonies, which are mainly scheduled on weekdays, during working hours, although ceremonies are occasionally scheduled on Saturdays. 

“Many clients have to take time off work to attend citizenship ceremonies, and this time off is not necessarily paid by employers,” the immigration department said in the Gazette.

“The flexibility would allow the Department to implement options aimed at improving client service and reducing processing times of citizenship applications.”

The proposed change came in the wake of new data indicating a nosedive in citizenship uptake over 20 years.

The 2021 census found that just 45.7 per cent of permanent residents became citizens within 10 years, down from 60 per cent in 2016 and 75.1 per cent in 2001.

“Citizenship does take a long time, and they’re working on the process,” said Bernhard, whose organization obtained the data. “But the actual problem is not how long it takes to get the citizenship. The actual problem is the desirability of Canadian citizenship itself.”

During the pandemic, citizenship processing time has doubled from the prior 12-month service standard, even though the number of citizenship applications granted annually has risen significantly to 243,000 from 113,000 over the last five years. 

With Canada moving toward bringing in half a million new permanent residents a year by 2025, the inventory of citizenship applications — standing at 358,000 — is expected to grow.

Citizenship applicants must go through a stringent screening process to ensure they meet all requirements, including three out of five years of physical presence in Canada at the time of applying. Those between ages 18 and 54 must also show proficiency in either official language and pass a citizenship exam before they are scheduled for a citizenship ceremony.

Due to COVID, officials have brought in virtual citizenship ceremonies as of April 2020. Since then, 15,290 of the 15,457 ceremonies have been held online in front of an authorized official, generally a citizenship judge.

The “self-administration” of the oath-taking would now allow new citizens to sign a written attestation online without a witness to complete the obligations of citizenship, and applicants would still have the option to do it before a citizenship judge, the immigration department told the Star in an email Monday.

Officials said the measure could result in savings as fewer ceremonies are expected to be hosted.

For Andrew Griffith, a former director general at the immigration department, the change marks another diversion of the federal government in its approach to immigration and citizenship.

“I just look at all of our immigration policies,” said Griffith, now an Environics Institute fellow. “It’s basically the more, the merrier. It’s not about the ability to integrate. It’s just increasing numbers. I can see the logic in terms of you just want to push people through but I always thought that immigration and citizenship was more than that.

“We’re just really further diminishing the value of citizenship.”

The public has 30 days to comment and provide feedback to the proposed regulatory change.

Source: Soon a Canadian citizenship oath could be just a scroll and click away

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Macklin: What happens when Roxham Road is closed

2023/03/01 Leave a comment

Useful commentary as always on some of the likely impacts. However, I am not convinced that all of the asylum seekers at Roxham Road would pursue more risky routes as their risk/benefit calculation would likely lead some not to pursue a more hazardous route.

No way of testing this hypothesis but arguably, many of the Roxham Road asylum seekers are in less desperate situations than those South of the USA border or crossing the Mediterranean.:

The other risk is of course to public support for immigration over this perceived loophole and the perception the government is not managing the border and immigration more generally:

Quebec Premier François Legault, supported by federal Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre, urged the federal government to shut down Roxham Road. This is the spot where, over the past six years, thousands of refugee claimants crossed into Canada and asked for refugee protection. 

The numbers who enter may seem high to some Canadians, but relative to the number of asylum seekers seeking protection in other countries, it is a trickle. It is also a fraction of those we have welcomed from Ukraine in the past year. No one can validly claim to know in advance whether the people who cross at Roxham Road meet the refugee definition, so attempts to distinguish them from Ukrainians on that basis is disingenuous.

The premier of Quebec complains about the alleged unfairness of Quebec bearing costs associated with asylum seekers who enter at Roxham Road. Canada allocates a proportion of federal funding to Quebec for newcomer settlement that is not indexed to the actual number of newcomers that Quebec admits. Quebec receives proportionately more money than other provinces to settle newcomers and does not account for how it spends it. Legault’s claim that Quebec lacks money and capacity to manage Roxham Road arrivals deserves little sympathy. 

Up until 2004, asylum seekers travelling overland would have entered in a safe, orderly way by presenting themselves at an official port of entry at the Canada-U.S. border. Then, the Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement turned ports of entry into brick walls for asylum seekers. 

Canada did this by exploiting a loophole in the Refugee Convention, which prohibits states from sending refugees back to countries of origin, but is silent about deflecting them to third countries (in this case, the U.S.). Fast forward a few years, and we discover that some asylum seekers are crossing into Canada at Roxham Road. It is not unlawful for a refugee to enter a country “irregularly” under the Refugee Convention or Canadian immigration law. Refugee law recognizes that desperate people will take desperate measures. 

Roxham Road is an open secret. No one needs a smuggler to find out about it, or to find it. If Roxham Road is blocked, will people become less desperate? Not likely. But they will be forced to take more dangerous and clandestine measures to avoid detection and apprehension. So here are the government programs that politicians are really proposing when they advocate making it legally impossible for asylum seekers to enter Canada:

Job Creation Program for Smugglers: Once prohibited from presenting themselves to Canadian authorities in a safe and orderly way at a port of entry, asylum seekers will increasingly rely on smugglers to guide them into Canada surreptitiously. The smuggling business will grow in response to this government-created demand and become increasingly lucrative, as well as violent and lethal. 

People will pay, and if they don’t have the money, they will borrow it and become indebted to traffickers, who will exploit them. Smuggling will proliferate. We will hear more stories about more people who suffer debilitating injury or freeze to death trying to cross the border from U.S. into Canada or vice versa. Smugglers will be blamed for facilitating border crossing, and for the injuries and deaths that ensue. Wait for it.

Stimulus Package for Military and Security Contractors: Pundits and politicians will demand that Canada invest in surveillance, military and physical infrastructure along a 9,000 km Canada-U.S. border in order to halt the “invasion” of people seeking refugee protection. 

They will describe this as a “humanitarian” program to protect hapless asylum seekers from predation by ruthless smugglers and traffickers. Military and security contractors will line up to proffer their high-tech gadgets and high-priced solutions. Turning a 9,000 km border into a high-tech wall is an expensive, cruel and futile fantasy. The border will be a perpetual crisis zone, where no walls are high enough, no tactics are effective enough, and no amount of money spent is ever enough. Wait for it.

These are the lessons from Fortress Europe and from Australia’s Pacific Solution. Rumours already abound that the Liberals are pressing the United States to somehow “extend” the Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement along the full length of the Canadian border. President Biden is proposing a similar rule at its southern border. Wait for it.

Source: Macklin: What happens when Roxham Road is closed

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