Good afternoon, Chair. Thank you very much for the opportunity to appear.

The Canadian Council for Refugees is Canada's leading national umbrella, representing over 200 frontline organizations working with, from and for refugees and migrants.

We are very grateful to the committee for having given us this opportunity to present our perspectives and recommendations with respect to the budget implementation act.

Federal budget 2024 had important investments to support refugee claimants, but the budget implementation act is now suggesting major new changes to refugee and immigration law that are extremely concerning, without prior consultation. These include changes that will not only undermine international human rights, but also our reputation as a rules-based refugee leader. The CCR objects to the budget implementation act being used in this undemocratic way to bring in potentially sweeping changes to the refugee system.

As you will see in our brief, our overarching recommendation is for you to either delete major sections of the bill or insist on the immigration and refugee aspects being separated out from the legislation to enable full hearings, debate and further parliamentary review of pending regulations, which have yet to be tabled. Lives are at stake.

We have four major concerns. I'm going to cover two regarding changes to the refugee claims process. CCR vice-president Jenny Jeanes will cover the other two aspects related to CBSA and detention.

It's worth remembering, members of Parliament, that Canada has an obligation under international law to provide safe haven to those who arrive at our shores fleeing persecution. The vast majority of those who seek asylum in Canada—almost 80% last year—are found to be refugees. We have a world-class refugee determination system to hear cases at the Immigration and Refugee Board. We need to let it do its job, but Bill C-69 is making major changes.

First, division 38 is creating a worrisome new step in the refugee claim process that creates an indefinite gap before referral to the Immigration and Refugee Board—the IRB—in which claimants could be asked to provide endless information and documents with no timeline for the claim to be referred for their hearing. It will lead to long delays, creating indefinite limbo for claimants and not only threatening fundamental rights but also, ironically, undermining the progress that has been made to date in streamlining processing.

CCR is recommending to the committee to amend clauses 410 and 411 to delete the provisions whereby if a claim “is determined to be eligible, the Minister must consider it further” to enable discretion in that case, and to amend clause 411 so an eligible claim must be referred to the IRB within at least a month of the required information being submitted. These are crucial amendments to secure due process.

Our second concern is that division 38 introduces new provisions that trigger an early opportunity for a claim to be declared abandoned before it has even been referred to the IRB. The measure is likely to lead to claims being unfairly declared abandoned, penalizing people who, through no fault of their of their own, miss a deadline or forget to file a document in a byzantine system that is already providing zero formal support services. Those most at risk are likely to be the most vulnerable.

The provision will also—again, counterintuitively—contribute to a backlog of abandonment hearings at the IRB. It is absurd to ram these measures through now. They need to be rethought.

We are recommending that MPs move to delete clause 412 or at least, in the alternative, change proposed section 102.1 from “the Minister must” to “the Minister may” to allow for situations where claimants are obviously trying to complete requirements but are prevented due to lack of counsel. It's only common sense.

I want to turn it over to CCR's vice-president to continue with our presentation.