BC college faculty feel pressure to ‘pass’ students with poor English | Vancouver Sun

2017/08/18 Leave a comment

Conflict between universities and colleges as a business versus maintaining standards?

Veteran college English instructors are routinely receiving passionate, imploring pleas for passing grades from the international students who increasingly fill their classes.

The foreign students’ emotion-filled emails and in-office appeals, often issued in jumbled English, invariably aim to cajole faculty at Langara College and other institutions into giving them a break, so they will be able to move on from their mandatory courses in English literature.

The foreign students often maintain their entire future depends on passing the English course.

Langara College has experienced a five-fold rise in foreign students since 2014, but two English literature and composition instructors say the college’s over-reliance on international fees is not working for many high-stressed foreign students, their anxious offshore parents or for shortchanged domestic students.

Langara College English instructors Peter Babiak and Anne Moriarty are among a small number of Canadian higher education officials who are ending their silence to raise concerns about the expanding business of international education, which now brings 130,000 foreign students to B.C., mostly Metro Vancouver.

“I do feel sorry for the (international) students, of course, but that’s not really the point. When I assign grades, presumably I need to be objective and not let emotions get in the way,” says Babiak, who has been teaching at Langara since 2002.

Like many faculty at universities and colleges, Babiak and Moriarty feel pressure to wave through the full-fee-paying foreign students, especially in mandatory first-year English literature courses, even if they lack fluency in English.

“There is a booming industry dedicated to helping students jump through English-language hoops, which teachers like me everywhere work hard to defend. Being part of this is weighing heavily on my conscience,” said Moriarty.

Langara Provost Ian Humphreys, however, said Tuesday “there is no pressure on faculty to pass students who are not yet achieving learning outcomes.”

Humphreys said he is proud that Langara “is an open access institution that serves a diverse student population – both domestic and international – that has a high proportion of English language learners.” He says the college’s grads have a strong success rate when they transfer to other institutions or the job market.

Moriarty, however, said that even though many of the foreign students work hard in their technical, business and computer courses, many also leave their mandatory English literature course to the end of their multi-year programs, knowing their English is weak.

Both Babiak and Moriarty also agonize over how classroom discussions in English literature courses are often severely restricted because of language barriers. It means, he said, students who seriously want to study novels, linguistics and composition don’t get as much high-level interaction as they could.

Source: BC college faculty feel pressure to ‘pass’ students with poor English | Vancouver Sun

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Immigration tribunal to audit long-term detention practices

2017/08/18 Leave a comment

Needed:

The Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) will conduct what it calls an independent audit of the long-term detention of non-citizens, after two court rulings in the past three weeks found detainees may be denied basic fairness.

The audit, to be completed this fall on a sample of cases from closed files, comes after Ontario Superior Court Justice Edward Morgan likened a refugee claimant’s treatment at the hands of adjudicators to that of Joseph K in Franz Kafka’s novel The Trial. The claimant was detained off and on for 17 months in a maximum-security provincial jail, even though he had done nothing wrong, the judge said in a ruling on Monday.

The IRB oversees the detention-review system, conducted by members of its Immigration Division – civil servants paid between $89,112 and $101,892, very few of whom are lawyers. More than 6,200 refugee claimants and permanent residents have been detained in fiscal year 2016-17, of whom more than 400 have been inside for more than 90 days. Reasons include being a danger to the public, of uncertain identity or a flight risk.

One of those, Ricardo Scotland, a 38-year-old single father from Barbados, went before Justice Morgan and was released on a writ of habeas corpus – a declaration that his detention was unlawful. He had been held as a flight risk and had been convicted of no crimes. At his last detention review before he asked Justice Morgan for his freedom, the Canadian government told the Immigration Division that it supported his release. But the adjudicator still refused to grant it.

Subodh Bharati, a lawyer who represented Mr. Scotland, said he welcomed the audit, but questioned how independent it would be. He said that, at a minimum, Immigration Division members need basic legal training on the principles of fundamental justice and the importance of procedural fairness.

“As Mr. Scotland’s case has clarified, there are fundamental problems that will require substantive change,” he said in an e-mail. “I hope that this audit is a starting point of more thorough overhaul which includes consultations with detainees and immigration lawyers.”

Audrey Macklin, a University of Toronto law professor, called the audit a positive and long overdue step by the IRB to initiate internal reform, after external pressure. “These [pressures] have variously exposed detention decisions as procedurally unfair, arbitrary, incompetent, unnecessary, and indifferent toward the value of liberty, the best interests of children and the needs of people with mental-health problems,” she said.

She said the audit should examine the qualifications, background and competence of Immigration Division adjudicators, “especially in relation to their capacity to understand, interpret and apply the relevant law.” It should also examine whether the adjudicators “genuinely apply the rule that the burden is on the state to justify ongoing detention, not on detainees to justify release.”

The announcement of the audit also follows a July 25 ruling by the Federal Court in Ottawa, in response to a constitutional challenge to the detention-review system brought by a Jamaican immigrant who had been in Canada since he was 8. As an adult, he amassed multiple criminal convictions and was detained for five years while Jamaica confirmed his nationality.

The Federal Court said the laws as written are not inherently flawed, but there may be shortcomings in how the Immigration Division applies them.

Justice Simon Fothergill set out several “minimum requirements” for the system, such as that the burden of showing why someone should be detained is always on the government, and that the adjudicator must always consider alternatives to detention. Also, the total time in detention should be “reasonable in all of the circumstances.”

The IRB said in a news release on Wednesday that “while recognizing that Immigration Division members make thousands of well-reasoned decisions each year, often in challenging circumstances, the gravity of these decisions – determining for example whether or not an individual will continue to be deprived of their liberty – requires the IRB to be proactive in identifying and pursuing opportunities for improvement.”

Source: Immigration tribunal to audit long-term detention practices – The Globe and Mail

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Les migrants haïtiens doivent savoir ce qui les attend, croit un élu new-yorkais

2017/08/17 Leave a comment

Hopefully this kind of initiative, along with Canadian consulate outreach to Haitian and other communities in the USA, will reduce the flow:

Venu de la Grosse Pomme pour vérifier si le Canada est vraiment l’eldorado imaginé par de nombreux ressortissants haïtiens, le conseiller municipal new-yorkais Mathieu Eugène promet de remettre les pendules à l’heure auprès de la communauté en rentrant chez lui.

«Je vais pouvoir mieux informer mes frères et mes soeurs qui croient trouver ici la terre promise, a souligné M. Eugène. La perception des Haïtiens aux États-Unis, c’est que le Canada va accueillir à bras ouverts tous ceux qui ont un TPS [Temporary Protected Status], mais ils ne savent pas ce qu’est la réalité.»

L’élu était à Montréal mardi à l’invitation du conseiller de la Ville du district de Saint-Michel Frantz Benjamin, avec qui il a rencontré plusieurs leaders de la communauté haïtienne, en plus de visiter un centre d’hébergement de demandeurs d’asile.

Des gens paniqués

M. Eugène représente un quartier de Brooklyn où résident de nombreux citoyens d’origine haïtienne. Connu et respecté dans la communauté, il voit défiler dans son bureau des gens paniqués qui viennent d’apprendre que leur TPS, un statut de protection temporaire accordé aux Haïtiens après le tremblement de terre de 2010, viendra à échéance dans six mois, et qu’ils devront alors retourner dans leur pays d’origine.

Se fiant naïvement à de fausses informations qui circulent sur le web et sur les réseaux sociaux, ou à des rumeurs propagées par des connaissances, relate Mathieu Eugène, ils croient améliorer leur sort en gagnant le nord du 49e parallèle.

«Ils vivent du désespoir et de la désolation devant la menace d’être déportés en Haïti. Ils ont entendu dire que la situation sera peut-être meilleure ici. Confrontés à des difficultés, ils en sont rendus à penser que le Canada est la solution.»

«Je vais leur donner des informations justes et leur dire d’y réfléchir à deux fois, mais c’est difficile de les décourager ou de prévenir leur décision de venir au Canada. Je ne peux pas contrôler tous les Haïtiens», note-t-il toutefois.

Mathieu Eugène a l’intention d’organiser une conférence de presse à New York et même des rencontres d’information, pour expliquer aux migrants qui craignent l’expulsion du pays de Donald Trump que le même sort les attend peut-être dans la contrée de Justin Trudeau, même si les messages du premier ministre sur Twitter peuvent sembler très accueillants.

Mais pour lui, la priorité est cependant de poursuivre les pressions politiques aux États-Unis afin que soit prolongé le statut de protection temporaire pour les Haïtiens, ce qui n’est pas une mince tâche, étant donné les prises de position de l’administration Trump.

«C’est une lutte que l’on mène depuis longtemps, et on va continuer», a-t-il promis.

Nouvelle plongée dans l’incertitude

Dans la communauté haïtienne de Montréal, on espère que le message de M. Eugène sera entendu aux États-Unis, parce que bien des demandeurs d’asile risquent de voir leurs espoirs déçus, a expliqué Chantal Ismé, vice-présidente du conseil de la Maison d’Haïti, au visiteur new-yorkais.

«La plupart des personnes qui traversent la frontière actuellement ne répondent pas aux critères pour obtenir le statut de réfugié, a-t-elle fait valoir. Peut-être que certaines personnes seront acceptées, mais à cause du grand nombre de personnes qui arrivent et des délais qui s’allongent, les délais seront très longs avant d’avoir une réponse. Ces gens fuient l’incertitude pour être plongés dans une autre incertitude. Si leur demande est refusée, ils seront déportés vers Haïti, pas vers les États-Unis! C’est la précarité qui les attend à nouveau.»

«Le Canada les accueille temporairement, et notre approche humaine leur laisse peut-être croire que c’est le paradis ici, renchérit Ninette Piou, directrice du centre N A Rive. Mais la route est encore longue ensuite et le processus est plein d’écueils.»

Source: Les migrants haïtiens doivent savoir ce qui les attend, croit un élu new-yorkais | Isabelle Ducas | Actualités

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Demandeurs d’asile: la communauté haïtienne ébranlée

2017/08/15 Leave a comment

Activists (and opposition members) always complain that not enough being done with limited recognition of the operational challenges involved. But that is the role they play in society:

Pourquoi avoir utilisé le Stade olympique ? Pourquoi des tentes ? Les gouvernements canadien et québécois n’auraient-ils pas pu faire mieux ?

Pour des Haïtiens réunis en colloque hier à Montréal-Nord à l’initiative de jeunes leaders de leur communauté, l’arrivée importante de migrants a été très mal gérée et la réaction gouvernementale, choquante.

« L’idée d’utiliser le Stade olympique a donné l’impression que le Québec était sous le coup d’une invasion », a dénoncé hier Frantz André, porte-parole du Comité d’action des personnes sans statut.

M. André, qui s’est rendu à Saint-Bernard-de-Lacolle, dit avoir été tout aussi choqué par toutes ces tentes qui ne font que replonger les Haïtiens « dans le traumatisme du tremblement de terre de 2010 ».

Amir Khadir, député de Québec solidaire, était présent au colloque. Lui non plus ne comprend pas que l’accueil des migrants soit aussi chaotique. « Nous avons de multiples édifices publics qui pourraient les héberger, notamment des hôpitaux vides. Je ne comprends pas qu’on n’ait pas recours à ces bâtiments et qu’on laisse les migrants à la frontière, dans des tentes, loin de la communauté qui est toute prête à offrir son soutien. »

À son avis, les gouvernements doivent envoyer des messages sans équivoque, « sans gêne et avec diligence », et démontrer qu’ils ne plient pas devant le ressentiment de certains.

Sacha-Wilky Merazil, qui s’est exprimé à titre de citoyen, a fait un vibrant plaidoyer pour les migrants « qui ont tout laissé dans l’espoir d’une vie meilleure. Ces gens ne s’attendent pas à une faveur, mais à ce qu’on les accueille dignement ».

FAUSSES RUMEURS ET COMMENTAIRES HAINEUX

Au micro, de nombreux intervenants ont corrigé certaines fausses perceptions, rappelant notamment que le fait que Montréal ait le statut de « ville sanctuaire » a été mal interprété.

La réalité, a dit Daphney Laraque, c’est que ce statut donne essentiellement aux migrants la possibilité d’avoir recours à certains services publics, d’envoyer leurs enfants à l’école, par exemple.

« Ça ne veut pas dire qu’on y est accueilli sans restriction. Ceux qui arrivent ici risquent tout aussi bien d’être arrêtés et expulsés. »

Mme Laracque a ensuite rappelé que chaque dossier est analysé à la lumière des règles en vigueur.

Les fausses rumeurs de toutes parts ont donc donné l’illusion aux uns que le Canada accueillait chacun à bras ouverts, et aux autres que le pays était une passoire, ce qui a valu à la communauté haïtienne son lot de commentaires haineux.

« Le racisme exprimé à l’égard de la communauté haïtienne sur les réseaux sociaux est inacceptable, a dit en entrevue Émilie Nicolas. Ce racisme témoigne certes du fait que la droite anti-immigration est de plus en plus organisée au Québec. Heureusement, beaucoup de Québécois prennent la peine de dire haut et fort qu’ils sont opposés à ce discours et ça, c’est important. »

Source: Demandeurs d’asile: la communauté haïtienne ébranlée | Louise Leduc | Actualités

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Douglas Todd: Canada struggling to ‘absorb’ immigrants, report says

2017/08/14 Leave a comment

Good account by Douglas Todd on one of the more thoughtful CIC policy decks  (possibly part of pre-2015 election transition planning given the date of June 2014). Lexbase was kind enough to provide me with a copy.

While some of the issues identified – housing, healthcare, public transit – affect both immigrants and non-immigrants, the deck provides a good overview of the main issues, identifies data gaps particularly at the local and municipal level and proposes an absorptive capacity index to help inform future levels planning (unclear whether this is being pursued):

Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada officials are digesting a significant report that defines absorptive capacity as “a two-way process that encourages adjustment on the part of both the newcomer and the receiving society.”

Indeed, the internal report, obtained under an access to information request, shows that immigration analysts are worried that the “absorptive capacity” of Canada is going down.

“Declining outcomes of recent immigrants have shown that integration is not automatic,” says the report, which surveys emerging problems with immigration flows and the pressure it’s putting on Canadian sectors.

While some Canadians behave as if it’s xenophobic to question immigration policy, immigration rates and their results, the sweeping in-house government report, titled Evidence-Based Levels and Mix: Absorptive Capacity, does exactly that.

The report, obtained by Vancouver lawyer Richard Kurland, shows integration of immigrants into Canada, despite relative success here compared to most countries, is faltering ­– in regards to housing, jobs, health care, education, religious tensions, ethnic enclaves and transit.

With Canada now accepting 300,000 immigrants a year, in addition to accommodating 700,000 international students and temporary foreign workers, the 2014 report, which has no listed author, recognizes real problems. It wants policy makers to adapt.

Assimilation has been largely superseded by the word “integration” [always has been integration].And now Canadian government immigration officials are talking about a new concept: “absorptive capacity.”

Some pivotal points:

Immigrants are struggling with housing
Like millions of Canadian-born residents, immigrants are battling to afford adequate housing, especially in major cities. They face particular barriers because of their larger household sizes.

Many immigrants, however, do well in housing after a decade, though with risk.

Immigrant “home ownership rates rise significantly with time spent in Canada and surpass that of the native-born after 10 years in Canada, (but) newcomers tend to risk more capital and spend more of their income on housing costs, making them more vulnerable to market fluctuations.”

Language gaps are expanding

Despite language requirements for immigrants and the availability of free language classes in Canada, many may not be learning English or French nor passing it onto their young children.

The study found that in one large school district in Metro Toronto [Peel], three out of 10 children needing ESL training were born in Canada.

Language limitations also create obstacles in Canadian workplaces. “Skilled immigrants face labor market integration challenges such as limited language proficiency.”

Immigrants have difficulties getting health care

“Waiting for care is the number one barrier to access, although this problem is not specific to the immigrant community, as Canadians also mention long wait times as a critical problem,” says the report.

Immigrants are not dispersing across the country

Two out of three immigrants move to Toronto, Montreal or Vancouver.

That means immigrants are almost 2.5 times more concentrated in Canada’s three largest cities than is the total population (only 27 per cent of whom live in these cities).

Despite a phrase often heard in discussion of immigration — “Canada is a large country” — the study makes clear “absorptive capacity” is being tested almost entirely in our large cities. And virtually no city-by-city data exists on how that’s working out.

Ethnic enclaves are expanding

There is a strong tendency for newcomers to settle with members of their own ethnicity in the core of cities and, more recently, their suburbs.

“Residential concentrations of newcomers is a growing concern,” the report says, suggesting self-chosen ethnic isolation can create further barriers to full integration. [Todd somewhat overstates the deck’s observations as the analysis is more nuanced.]

Tensions exist over religious differences

“Religious and cultural accommodation continues to be an issue regarding practices that are deemed in conflict with Canada’s institutions,” the report says, naming “forced marriages” and “family violence issues.” [may reflect the then Conservative government focus as these are not accommodation but criminal issues – more common ones being related to religious accommodation such as worship space, food requirements etc].

Transit hassles abound for immigrants

With Metro Vancouver residents debating whether to build a bridge or tunnel on the south arm of the Fraser River, the report shows public transit is a much bigger worry for Canada’s urban and suburban immigrants.

Although transit hassles are significant for all residents of cities such as Metro Vancouver, they’re worse in the suburbs, where many immigrants are moving.

“Recent immigrants are twice as likely to use public transit as their Canadian-born counterparts.”

What’s the way forward?

Despite trying to be frank about Canada’s immigration difficulties, the report notes the country is recognized as “a world leader in creating an environment than enables newcomers to settle and become active, productive and connected citizens.”

Canada is ranked third out of the 31 countries that welcome immigrants. The Migration Integration Policy Index rates only Sweden and Portugal as doing better at absorbing newcomers.

For obvious reasons, the index doesn’t bother comparing Canada to the majority of the world’s countries, like most of those in Africa and Asia, which either deny entry to any immigrants or allow in a trivial number.

Despite Canada’s strong ranking, the Immigration department’s report notes another disturbing finding, which could have long-term repercussions.

Second-generation visible minority immigrants, compared to first-generation immigrants, are more likely to “perceive” they’ve been subject to discrimination.

Poll results suggesting 43 per cent of Canada’s second-generation visible minority citizens are convinced they’re being treated unfairly may point to an expanding crack in the dream of cultural integration.

As for coming up with better policies, the report makes it clear Immigration officials are often in a fog about the overall effects of large-scale immigration on Canada, not to mention the impact of international students and temporary foreign workers.

There is “no comprehensive stock-taking on how Canadian institutions and cities are adapting” to immigrants and other foreign nationals, says the report. The knowledge vacuum exists across housing, health care, the regional job market, transit and more.

Source: Douglas Todd: Canada struggling to ‘absorb’ immigrants, report says | Vancouver Sun

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Will Haitians force Trudeau into being hard-hearted? Andrew MacDougall

2017/08/12 Leave a comment

I always find MacDougalls’ (former Harper PMO Director of Communications) commentary valuable and thoughtful given his conservative perspective is expressed and argued in a largely non-partisan manner (in contrast to some former CPC staffers such as Candice Malcolm and Mark Bonokoski in Sun media).

This piece is no exception:

It’s summertime, and the border crossing is easy.

What was once a slow trickle of bodies from the United States to Canada threatens to become a steady flow. And instead of Muslims fleeing the imprecise scope of Donald Trump’s “Muslim ban” across the Manitoba border, it’s now worried Haitians who form the majority of those seeking sanctuary this summer in Quebec.

Why Haitians? Why now?

Essentially, those who fled Haiti in the wake of the devastating 2010 earthquake have been spooked by a change to their status in the United States under the Trump administration. And so they’re fleeing again. But it’s to a place where a similar change has already been made; Canada sends its failed Haitian claimants back to Haiti.

The particulars don’t matter; the Haitians are here, and more are coming because they think Canada is a soft mark. The Big O(we) in downtown Montreal is even being converted to a shelter for their arrival. And if they come in stadium-sized numbers it means a hard choice is coming for Justin Trudeau.

And it’s a choice (somewhat) of the prime minister’s own making.

When President Donald Trump unveiled his inaugural “Muslim ban” Trudeau responded with a tweet declaring: “To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength. #WelcometoCanada.”

It got great headlines at the time, and isn’t strictly applicable to the Haitians now coming, but what Trudeau is now finding out is that tacking on a sieve or a barrier to the sentiment expressed in that tweet is hard to do, especially when your political brand is basically that of the world’s saviour.

The Haitians in question aren’t fleeing persecution, terror, or war; they’d mostly rather not go back to Haiti. And every place they occupy in our asylum system is one less for those who are genuinely suffering.

Trudeau, for now, is holding firm. “Canada is a country that understands that immigration, welcoming refugees, is a source of strength for our communities,” Trudeau repeated last week. He also added, “protecting Canadians’ confidence in the integrity of our system allows us to continue to be open.”

The second half of the prime minister’s statement was, in Liberal eyes, butt-covering. But for a lot of Canadians, including the opposition Conservatives, it’s the operative half of the equation.

And right now that half is showing signs of severe strain.

A recent memo on the state of the Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) released under access-to-information highlights a massive backlog of claims and a system starved of needed resource.

The Trudeau government will either need to increase funding massively, turn down more people at the border, or — more likely — some combination of both to maintain “confidence in the integrity of our system.”

Doing so will be a tricky proposition for a government that has carefully cultivated its tolerant political brand. Any tightening of Canada’s policy under Trudeau could be seen as betrayal, no matter how justified it might be.

Fortunately, for Trudeau’s image anyway, there are no good policy options to stem the flow, at least not with a recalcitrant President Trump in the White House. Canada cannot do a rewrite of the laws on its own, and closing the loophole that allows the current arrivals would only force more people to official border posts, where dealing with migrants is even more difficult politically.

This situation would then seem to favour more cash to the refugee system, but no such funding was included in the most recent federal budget. The Trudeau government has instead opted for a “wide-ranging” review of the system, with a report due in the summer of 2018.

It appears, then, the Trudeau government is hoping to ride out the current situation, hoping the word eventually gets back to the tens of thousands of Haitians in the United States that things really are no better in Canada and that they should stay where they are. Then again, a years-long backlog for processing might still be the better alternative.

For their part, the Conservatives would do well to suggest a fix in addition to keeping up pressure on the government to act.

Who knows? Coming up with a helpful solution could help redeem Tories in the eyes of voters who might not trust them on these and other matters.

Source: Will Haitians force Trudeau into being hard-hearted? | Toronto Star

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ICYMI: Canada has a border problem. Here’s how to fix it: Doug Saunders

2017/08/12 Leave a comment

Published in February but remains relevant given ongoing border crossings. Not convinced, however, re full suspension of safe-third country agreement with USA given signals it would send to future border crossers:

Stop illegal entries by creating a legal path. People aren’t making these crossings because they’re an easy way into Canada. In fact, illegal foot crossings are an exceptionally difficult and expensive way into Canada: Some migrants have paid drivers enough to buy business-class airfare.

People make them because they’re the only way into Canada. Under the 2004 Canada-U.S. Safe Third Country Agreement, Canada does not allow foreign refugee claimants who landed in the United States through its official border crossings: You’re required to apply for asylum in the first country in which you arrive. But if they can get themselves physically onto Canadian soil, they will be arrested, detained, released and given an assessment, a hearing and a right to appeal.

This is not, as some have said, a flaw in the act; rather, it is a feature of the Canadian Constitution: Once in Canada, you are entitled to the full suite of rights – including due process and a fair hearing.

We can deal with this in two ways. One, as suggested by some MPs, would be to secure the border more, by adding hundreds or thousands more police and border agents. They would probably spend their days and nights processing a rising tide of border-crossers, at great expense.

The other would be to stop the illegal flow completely by creating a legal entry method, with processing centres at border crossings. The numbers would increase somewhat, but it would be far less expensive and much less dangerous – and it would look secure, fair and rational to Canadians.

Consider suspending the Safe Third Country Agreement. The treaty made sense when it was signed, because the United States and Canada both treated refugee claims similarly, and offered similar treatment to people pursuing those claims. (The worry then was that claimants would try to sneak from Canada into the United States.) That has changed under the Trump administration. Refugee claimants fear, first, that their claims will get a less generous hearing under the refugee crackdown, and second, that they might be held in awful detention centres while awaiting a decision.

Since the agreement no longer serves its intended purpose, it mainly creates perverse incentives. Illegal foot crossings are one. Another is an exemption provided in the treaty to “unaccompanied minors” – which might tempt someone to send a child alone across the border. Suspending the treaty wouldn’t overwhelm us with migrants: There’s a very limited supply of asylum seekers who’ve made it into the United States. And under current conditions, it is easier for them to fly directly to Canada.

Get people processed fast. Many of those border-crossers – perhaps most – won’t qualify as refugees. They’ll wait months for a hearing, then years for an appeal, before they go home or are deported (by which time they’ll have roots in Canada, creating a second set of crises). Those who are legitimate refugees will also wait, in ambiguous status, in border towns for long periods and possibly in large numbers.

To avoid this becoming an enduring, high-visibility crisis with grave political implications, Ottawa should bring on board extra Immigration and Refugee Board staff and judges to work the border stations, so hearings can be made in weeks rather than months and appeals in months rather than years. This would cost, but not as much as supporting thousands of ambiguous people for years, or rebuilding the reputation of our immigration system. By making it legal, rational and quick, we can make the border act like a border again.

Source: Canada has a border problem. Here’s how to fix it – The Globe and Mail

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Temporary Foreign Worker program must be changed, workers say

2017/08/01 Leave a comment

Hard to know how widespread this abuse is but nature of program and vulnerability of workers means significant potential for such abuse:

Henry Aguirre, a temporary foreign worker from Guatemala, considered himself lucky when he got a job in Quebec as a chicken catcher, rounding up poultry and handing them over for processing.

Aguirre, 27, said he was quickly disillusioned when he learned the job paid him by volume instead of full-time, with no pay for time spent travelling from farm to farm.

He said he and his fellow Guatemalan workers had signed job offers they didn’t understand since they were all written in French.

“We didn’t understand the work permit; if we had, we wouldn’t have signed,” he said through an interpreter in a recent interview.

Aguirre was one of a group of foreign workers and activists who attended a small demonstration outside Montreal’s St Joseph’s Oratory earlier this month to call for changes to Canada’s temporary foreign worker program.

Among other things, they are calling for an end to the practice of issuing closed work permits, which restricts a worker to a single employer.

Viviana Medina, a community organizer who attended the protest, said closed work permits, language barriers and a fear of losing their jobs means many workers are reluctant to file complaints against their employers.

“The moment they say something, they’ll be sent back,” she said. “They have to stay in these conditions because they don’t want to lose their jobs.”

A study from the Université du Québec published earlier this month found that many Guatemalan migrant workers in the province are charged recruitment fees in their home countries, despite such practices being prohibited.

The study, which is based on interviews conducted between June and November 2015, found some workers even ended up using the deeds to their homes as a guarantee they’d pay back the money they owed for recruitment fees, according to the spokesman for a union that helped with the study.

“The precarity that brings really makes it difficult for a worker to ever take a stand and complain about the working or living conditions or abuses in the workplace or lack of getting the things that were guaranteed to them,” said Pablo Godoy of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union.

The federal government says it acknowledges the need for action and has taken a number of steps to reduce exploitation and abuse of temporary workers.

“Changes include increased inspections, improved information sharing and referrals for criminal investigation, and administrative monetary penalties and bans for employers who violate program conditions,” Julia Sullivan, an official with the department of Employment and Social Development, wrote in an email.

The government plans to do more in the future by further increasing inspections and making sure workers and employers understand their rights and obligations, she said.

Aguirre, frustrated with catching chickens, eventually began using a job placement agency to look for other work.

He and 14 others were subsequently picked up by border services in Oct. 2016 accused of violating the terms of their work permit, he said.

The workers have filed complaints with the province’s workplace health and safety board and requested a judicial review of their treatment during their arrest.

Their lawyer, Susan Ramirez, says she’s met hundreds of workers who have been denied health care or other rights.

“It’s a systemic problem,” she said in a phone interview. “It’s problematic because they’re under the governance of one employer who ignores their rights, and there’s a language barrier.”

Aguirre, for his part, has successfully obtained an open work permit until October, when the request for a judicial review will be heard in court.

Source: Temporary Foreign Worker program must be changed, workers say

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Australia: Immigration as a Security Threat – The New York Times

2017/07/28 Leave a comment

Waleed Ali on the increasing shift in Australia:

But the idea of a home affairs minister focused on national security makes sense only if we assume immigration is entirely a security problem. This points to the true ideological import of this newly formed department.

Australia began this century with a Department for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs. Back then, the department’s slogan was “Enriching Australia through Migration.” Just over a decade ago it dropped the multiculturalism portfolio entirely, creating instead a Department of Immigration and Citizenship. Now it’s to be rolled into a national security department. Thus, we can chart Australia’s public conception of migration from being a celebrated aspect of its multicultural character to a civic idea whose highest ultimate expression is citizenship to a threat to be managed.

That certainly chimes with Australia’s established rhetoric on asylum seekers, which has dominated public expression of our immigration program. And it might suit the increasingly nationalist belligerence of our age. But it does not suit Mr. Turnbull, a man who until recently was fond of celebrating Australia as “the most successful multicultural society in the world”; a man who only a few weeks ago was declaring that his party was established to be liberal, in contradistinction to conservative.

When the story of the Turnbull government is written, he will have been the prime minister who finally debased immigration in the Australian political imagination. The image last week of the prime minister draped awkwardly in military power will surely accompany that chapter. And those gas masks won’t look much like liberalism. Most likely they won’t look much like success either.

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Douglas Todd: Why Canadians need to debate immigration economics

2017/07/25 Leave a comment

A more nuanced critique of immigration levels and policies than most, raising some valid concerns regarding increased housing and congestion issues in our major cities, and the possible impact on per capita income:

Simon Fraser University political scientist Sanjay Jeram is bravely going where few Canadian scholars — and virtually no politicians — dare to go.

In the face of an unspoken taboo against seriously debating immigration policy in Canada, Jeram says the time has come for Canadians to start openly discussing the migration issues they’ve been avoiding.

Housing, employment, urban congestion, the welfare state and training are all affected by Canada’s immigration policies, says Jeram, who has a PhD from the University of Toronto, the city in which he was born and raised.

Instead of Canadians and the media getting worked up about race-related migration issues that Jeram thinks are largely irrelevant — such as the short-lived “barbaric cultural practices” hotline — he astutely urges discussion of the influence of immigration on economics.

‘’The hidden consensus in Canada is we don’t talk critically about immigration. The taboo against discussing it is very real,” said Jeram, who understandably believes Canadians are almost alone in this regard.

“(Prime Minister Justin) Trudeau campaigned on openness to immigrationwithout limits. I have never heard him talk about the potential consequences that immigration has for overcrowding, housing, opportunities for domestic workers or the welfare state.”

Housing is on the top of Jeram’s immigration-issues list, since Metro Vancouver, Toronto and other cities are experiencing an affordability crisis.

The rental and housing markets in Canada’s cities are increasingly shaped, he said, by federal immigration policies, which have tended to bring to Canada two financially opposite groups of newcomers: the wealthy and those with low incomes.

Strong offshore in-migration into Metro Vancouver, including an influx of international students, Jeram said, has “created competition for low-end rental spaces in the city,” which is struggling with a shortage and exorbitant fees.

“There is also pressure on the higher end of the housing market” because of the arrival of many well-off immigrants and foreign investors, he said. “Money from the outside has turned middle-income properties into high-end properties.”

As a result, said Jeram, most of Metro’s millennial generation is being required to financially “stretch beyond the breaking point.” Most do not have pockets deep enough to buy detached homes or even condominiums.

“As a country, we don’t want to discourage foreign investment, but foreign investment in housing is not going to be productive or benefit us in the long run.”

He recommended new housing policies that restrict the “amount of foreign income, which is not produced in Canada, that can be used to purchase properties” in the country.

Since more than four out of five immigrants to Canada move to its major cities, added pressure is not only on housing, but on infrastructure, traffic and transit.

It contravenes human rights law to restrict the mobility rights of anyone in Canada, so Jeram thinks politicians should follow the lead of European nations and create incentives for immigrants and others to settle outside the Toronto and Vancouver metropolitan areas.

The job market is also being affected by immigration, said Jeram, 35, who admires the work of noted Oxford migration economist Paul Collier, a leader in migration, refugee and developing world studies.

Even though a majority of Canadians tell pollsters “immigration is good for the economy,” Jeram said some don’t realize their per capita financial well-being may be shrinking as corporations bring in immigrants to make up for skill shortages.

“Instead of offering internship programs or on-the-job training, they just import new workers from elsewhere. That leads to a smaller piece of the economic pie for host-society workers.”

It should be no surprise, he said, that corporations advocate more immigrants and temporary foreign workers.

“They have no skin in the game in regards to income levels at the low end of the scale. High immigration has no negative impact on them. Only positive.”

Canada’s federal politicians have to be forced to think more carefully, he added, about whether immigration policies are reducing public support for the country’s social safety net.

“The welfare state requires we all pay into it. And some will be worse off to sustain it. There may come a time when the Canadian consensus to support a high-tax society will fray.”

Most Canadians tell pollsters that bringing in more young and middle-aged immigrants who pay taxes will advance the welfare state.

“But it just doesn’t add up, because a working immigrant comes with dependants. And with rising immigration rates, that can become expensive and unsustainable. It’s nothing to do with race. It’s just economics.”

Contrary to conventional North American wisdom, Jeram said, “bigger is not necessarily better” for creating equitable financial well-being. “Most wealthy societies are very small.”

Will Canadians ever again be able to have a fair debate about immigration policy?

“That’s the million-dollar question,” Jeram says. “Politically it’s become too much of a hot potato.”

Canada is unusual in the way every major federal political party treads cautiously on immigration, Jeram said. All go out of their way to “placate” immigrant voters that dominate in many electoral ridings in major cities like Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal.

But if Canadians don’t soon start having rational discussions about the economics of immigration, Jeram said, working-class nativist movements bent on opposing globalization and reducing immigrant flows could quickly rise to the surface, as they have in Europe and the U.S.

Source: Douglas Todd: Why Canadians need to debate immigration economics | Vancouver Sun

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