Borderlines: Recent Episodes
Steven Meurrens and Deanna Okun-Achoff
A podcast for the discussion of immigration law and policy. Each episode features 2-3 lawyers, academics, politicians, and stakeholders discussing current migration issues.
Martin Levine was a Visa Officer and Analyst at Citizenship and Immigration Canada from 1978 - 2009. He then worked as a contract employee as an ATIP Analyst for numerous federal departments. He previously appeared on Episode #108.
We discuss locally engaged staff, reconsideration requests, recording visa office interviews, IRCC office politics, visa officers as police officers vs. social workers, rude lawyers and whether people should join the civil service.
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Kyla Lee is a criminal defense lawyer at Acumen Law and the host of the Driving Law podcast.
In this episode Kyla answers dozens of questions about common driving offenses, including impaired driving and dangerous driving. Topics include how these offenses work, roadside prohibitions vs. criminal charges, defenses to impaired driving charges, distracted driving and more.
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This episode is a historical deep dive on Order in Council PC 1911-1324, an Order in Council from 1911 which stated that for a period of one year black people would not be permitted to immigrate in Canada because the Canadian government deemed them unsuitable to Canada's climate. I am re-uploading the episode to fix some audio issues and also to add more context on areas that people had questions about.
The episode explores Order in Council PC 1911-1324, scientific racism, homesteading, Wilfred Laurier's term as Prime Minister, the 1911 Canadian election, the situation in Oklahoma that caused black people to migrate to Canada and more.
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Martin Levine was a Visa Officer and Analyst at Citizenship and Immigration Canada from 1978 - 2009. He then worked as a contract employee as an ATIP Analyst for numerous federal departments.
This episode is like reading the results of an Access to Information Act on how IRCC works, and then asking questions of the person who wrote it. We discuss the culture at IRCC, whether artificial intelligence will improve decision making, whether visa officers should have more discretion, budget cuts and training issues and how the biggest obstacle to meaningful change at IRCC might be the Treasury Board.
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This is the second instalment (Part 1 is Episode #105 in this mini-series on Trauma-Informed Lawyering. In this segment, my own clinical counsellor, Dr. Deborrah Dunne discusses in more depth:
a) vicarious trauma and compassion fatigue;
b) the importance of self-care in running a trauma-informed practice;
b) strategies for identifying trauma (in yourself and your clients);
c) tools on how to "get present," and ideas for how to help your client get there too
Thank you again, Deborrah for all of your precious time!
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In this episode, we speak with Dr. Sharalyn Jordan (Associate Professor in Counselling Psychology and Equity Studies in Education at Simon Fraser University, and chair of the Rainbow Refugee society in Vancouver BC), and Dr. Deborrah Dunne, clinical counsellor.
Our guests take us through a "Trauma 101" style overview of PTSD, C-PTSD and the neurobiology of trauma. We also start in on a discussion of "tips and techniques" for trauma-informed lawyering. Regrettably, we had to lose Dr. Dunne toward the end of the episode (because our discussion went on for too long). Happily, we have undertaken to produce a "part 2" episode with Dr. Dunne's further thoughts on how to work with traumatized clients. Central to that conversation will be a discussion of how advocates should address their own trauma (including vicarious trauma) to set the stage for "optimal engagement" with their clients. Look out for that episode in the days to come! And please subscribe to our channel and send any comments/questions/suggestions for future consideration.
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Samuel Hyman is a Vancouver lawyer with one of the more well known practices in Canadian customs law.
We dive into Canadian customs law for individuals, examining the procedures and rights that Canadians have at the border around the seizure of goods, the imposition of administrative monetary penalties and loss of NEXUS. We discuss the consequences of violating customs regulations and how to challenge CBSA decisions.
After, Sam shares his view on why eliminating the distinction between immigration and tax status could unlock significant revenue gains for the government.
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This episode originally ran on October 5, 2021.
Carl Brault worked for almost twenty years at the Canada Border Services Agency. His roles included Border Services Officer, Intelligence Analyst and Inland Enforcement Officer. He currently provides consultation services to authorized immigration representatives and can be reached at cb-advisingservices@outlook.com.
3:00Working as a summer student as a Border Services Officer.
6:30September 11, 2011
9:50What kind of training does a CBSA officer receive before they start working at the border?
18:10Working as a CBSA Intelligence Analyst
21:30Working as an Inland Enforcement Officer
25:00Is CBSA understaffed or overstaffed?
28:30Level of autonomy officers have in deferral requests.
38:30What should lawyers or individuals do when making deferral of removal requests?
42:30The ability of CBSA to make positive decisions by not acting.
48:30What is the difference in culture across different offices?
51:15What are examples of where counsel harms their clients cause at CBSA?
54:00Do CBSA officers care about how lawyers are dressed?
56:30Has the attitude towards removals at CBSA regarding removals gotten more rigid?
1:05:00Do CBSA officers want more discretion when it comes to removals
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In this episode, we are joined by Gerald Chan, a privacy and criminal defense lawyer from Stockwood's LLP. We discuss several significant cases and topics within the realm of privacy law and its intersection with Canadian immigration law.
Gerald's paper on text message privacy can be found here.
Specific cases include:
R. v. Bykovets, 2024 SCC 6 (whether police need warrant to obtain IP address)
R v. Marakah, 2017 SCC 59 (whether police need warrant to obtain text messages)
R. v. Spencer, 2014 SCC 43 (online anonymity)
We also discuss the intersection between privacy law and immigration law, including when CBSA can search electronic devices, and invasive requests for documents. .
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A. Connie Campbell is a lawyer at Edelmann & Co.
We discuss inadmissibility for organized crime and answer a question about whether we think that law societies should screen lawyers for Islamophobia or anti-Palestinian sentiments.
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Corey Clamp worked at Citizenship and Immigration Canada from 2003-2008. His roles included working as a Litigation Management Analyst in Ottawa, several supervisory roles at the Canadian High Commission in New Delhi and as a Senior Immigration Officer at the Canadian visa office in Ho Chi Minh City.
We discuss Corey's immigration career, the importance of overseas offices, refusing applications, the importance of individual personalities in the visa processing process and things that Corey believes members of the public or applicants should understand about the role of visa officers.
We also answer a recent question about what our thoughts are regarding Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada's 2023 Temporary Public Policy to bulk waive eligiblity requirements to clear the temporary resident visa backlog, and the 19,000 refugee claims that resulted by the end of 2023.
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Deanna and Steven discuss the partial visa reimposition on Mexican nationals, the cancellation of Mexican eTAs, IRCC procedures for cancelling visas in general and the Supreme Court granting leave in Pepa. We also answer a listener question, which is whether Canadian visa officials should screen prospective immigrants for antisemitism.
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This episode is a repost of episode 35, which has been our most listened to podcast episode to date. It was recorded on 27 January 2020.
Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration) v. Vavilov, 2019 SCC 65 was a landmark 2019 Supreme Court of Canada decision in which the Supreme Court of Canada outlined a new framework for the standard of review in Canadian administrative law.
The episode begins with a discussion between Steven and Robert Denay about how the standard of review works. Deanna and Steven then discuss how Vavilov could impact immigration law and practice.
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Peter Edelmannwas a founder of the Borderlines podcast and immigration lawyer who was appointed to the British Columbia Supreme Court in December, 2019.
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Amandeep Hayer is the founder of Hayer Law, a Vancouver immigration law firm.
The Express Entry points requirement is currently higher than it has ever been. In this episode we discuss when they are likely to decrease.
We also discuss a recent Ontario court decision which struck down Canada's two generation limit on citizenship by descent.
Finally, Steve recently listened to a podcast which stated that the following are five signs that a lawyer is not taking their practice seriously. They are: (1) the lawyer answers their own phone rather than having calls go through a receptionist, (2) they use a non-professional e-mail account like gmail, (3) they meet potential clients at coffee shops, (4) they lower their fees when pressured, and (5) they have many practice areas. We also discuss not having a website, Law Society sanctions and Google reviews.
00:00 - Introduction and Express Entry
28:00 - Ontario decision striking down citizenship by descent limitation
37:00 - Are these signs that a lawyer is not taking their practice seriously?
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Warda Shazadi Meighen is an immigration lawyer in Toronto and the founder of Landings Law.
Canadian immigration legislation states that adoptions that can lead to immigration must create a legal parent-child relationship and sever the pre-existing legal parent-child relationship.Many Islamic countries have adoption, or guardianship, regimes based on kafala law, by which adoptive parents become the sponsor or guardians of a child, but the pre-existing legal parent-child relationship is not severed. As a consequence, adoptions from many Muslim countries are not recognized under Canadian immigration law. Warda has launched a Charter challenge to change this.
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Jamie Chai Yun Liew is a Professor at the University of Ottawa and the author of Ghost Citizens - Decolonial Apparitions of Stateless, Foreign and Wayward Figures in Law.
In this episode we discuss statelessness, which is when someone does not have citizenship in any country because of the operation of law.
We discuss how people can become stateless, citizenship revocation, the Federal Court of Appeal decision in Budlakoti, how lack of documentation can lead to lack of citizenship, challenging statelessness, and more.
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Will Tao is a Canadian immigration and the founder of Heron Law Office.
In January 2024 Justice Crampton, the Chief Justice of the Federal Court released a decision where he ruled that what constitutes “espionage” in Canadian immigration law must evolve “as hostile state actors increasingly make use of non-traditional methods to obtain sensitive information in Canada or abroad, contrary to Canada’s interests.”
He held that it was reasonable for a visa officer to determine that a prospective Chinese PhD student, Mr. Li, was inadmissible to Canada for espionage because he may in the future be targeted and coerced by the Chinese government into providing information that would be detrimental to or contrary to Canada’s interests. There was nothing to suggest that Mr. Li has a present or future intention to provide such information to the Chinese government. Rather, the concern was future coercion or co-opting.
Later that month, the Government of Canada’s announcement of a New Policy on Sensitive Technology Research and Affiliations of Concern (the “Policy”). The Policy included the publishing of a list of around 100 research organizations and institutions in China, Russia and Iran that pose “the highest risk to Canada’s national security due to their direct, or indirect connections with military, national defence, and state security entities.”
In this episode we discuss these two developments, and what it means for prospective immigrants, with a focus on China.
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Douglas Judson is a lawyer in Ontario who practices in litigation. He can be found on Twitter @dwjudson
In this episode, we are taking a break from immigration and discussing defamation law, which is the law around communications about a person that tends to hurt their reputation. We are focusing on one of the defenses to defamation lawsuits, which is Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation, or SLAPP. Many provinces, including British Columbia and Ontario (and if you have watched the Jon Oliver episodes, many jurisdictions in the United States) have anti-SLAPP laws designed to encourage public discourse about matters in the public interest.
Mr. Judson recently represented the plaintiff in Rainbow Alliance Dryden et al v. Webster, 2023 ONSC 7050, where the Ontario Superior Court of Justice had to determine if using the term "groomer" to refer to members of the 2SLGBTQI and drag community attract the protection of Ontario's anti-SLAPP laws.
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Pantea Jafari is lead counsel at Jafari Law, which she opened in 2012.
In this episode, we discuss IRCC's response to the crisis in Israel, the West Bank and Gaza. Details of the program that is the subject of our discussion can be found on IRCC's website at canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/services/israel-west-bank-gaza-2023/canada-tr-measures.html.
Our discussion focuses on the temporary measures in place for Palestinians who live in Gaza, and are seeking to reunite with a Canadian citizen or permanent resident relative who lives in or intends to live in Canada. In addition, we discuss the open work permits for Israelies, comparisons between Gaza and Ukraine, consequences of Canada abiding by a possible ICJ ruling that Israel comitted genocide, antisemtism and more.
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Robin Seligman is the founder of Seligman Law, an immigration law firm in Toronto.
In this episode we discuss Canada's business immigration programs, including a history of the Immigrant Investor Program and Entrepreneur Program, the current Start-Up Visa Program, and difficulties that entrepreneurs face in coming to Canada to start businesses.
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Michael Greene, K.C. is an immigration lawyer in Calgary. He served as the National Chair of the Canadian Bar Association’s Citizenship & Immigration Section in 2000-2001. He is representing Jaskirat Singh Sidhu in his immigration and deportation matters.
We discuss the Federal Court decision in Sidhu v. Canada (Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness), 2023 FC 1681.
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This episode is a repost of episode 56. We discuss issues involving the deportation of long term permanent residents for criminality.5:45 - What are the grounds for deporting a permanent resident for criminality?13:00 - How does the appeal process work?17:00 - What are the factors in deportation.19:00 - An overview of the history of the law involving the deportation of permanent residents.26:00 - What is the probability of success for a permanent resident in avoiding deportation once proceedings start?36:00 - Stays of removal41:00 - Strategies and tips for responding to procedural fairness letters involving removal.Michael Greene, K.C. is an immigration lawyer in Calgary. He served as the National Chair of the Canadian Bar Association’s Citizenship & Immigration Section in 2000-2001. He is representing Jaskirat Singh Sidhu in his immigration and deportation matters.
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Tamara Mosher Kuczer is the Founder & Principal Lawyer of Lighthouse Immigration Law Professional Corporation. She can be found on Twitter @ttrrmk.
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Deanna Okun-Nachoff, Erica Olmstead, Erin Roth, Kamaljit Kaur Lehal and Laura Best discuss compassion fatigue in the practice of refugee law and how they avoid burnout.
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Mason v. Canada was a Supreme Court of Canada decision which assessed whether inadmissibility on security grounds for engaging in violence required a nexus to national security.
The Supreme Court of Canada's decision clarified the interpretation of "inadmissibility on security grounds" under section 34(1)(e) of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act (the "IRPA"). The Court ruled that to deem someone inadmissible under this provision, there must be a direct link between the acts of violence committed and a threat to national security. This decision overturned a Federal Court of Appeal which had permitted a broader interpretation that did not require such a link to national security.
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“When and why did Canada develop the legal powers to detain and deport immigrants?” This is the question asked by Simon Wallace, a PhD Student at Osgoode Hall Law School and refugee lawyer, in his paper published in Queen’s Law Journal titled “Police Authority is Necessary”: The Canadian Origins of the Legal Powers to Detain and Deport, 1893 – 1902. The paper can be found here - https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4497377 Mr. Wallace joins us today to discuss the origins of Canadian deportation law and its initial targeting of Romanian Jewish refugees.
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Raj Sharma is an immigration lawyer in Calgary.
In Borderlines Podcast Episode 69 we discussed his case Mohammad v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2022 FC 1, in which the Federal Court quashed an Immigration Appeal Division decision, stating that the IAD did not properly give enough weight to the unique contributions that Ms. Mohammad made as a health care worker during COVID-19, and the debt that was owed to her.
The IAD disagreed with the Federal Court, and Raj Sharma sought judicial review again.
The case, and today's episode, provides an insight into how redetermination works, and the degree of deference that visa officers and the IAD need to show the Federal Court.
Laura Best is an immigration lawyer practicing in Toronto.
We discuss refugee resettlement and Canada's housing crisis, as well as whether Canada's housing shortage is impacting support for immigration.
There has been an increase in security screening in Canadian visa applications for residents of several countries.
Chen v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2023 FC 885 is the first Federal Court of Canada decision to discuss mandamus in the study permit context. Mandamus applications are actions to the Federal Court of Canada to compel IRCC to conclude the processing of a delayed application.
This episode is a historical deep dive on Order in Council PC 1911-1324, an Order in Council from 1911 which stated that for a period of one year black people would not be permitted to immigrate in Canada because the Canadian government deemed them unsuitable to Canada's climate.
Will Tao is a Canadian immigration and the founder of Heron Law Office.
During this episode we discuss what got Will into immigration law, why he started his own firm, how he balances client files, advocacy and family life, whether he will take paternity leave after his second child is born, whether he thinks it is possible to take lengthy sabbaticals, his approach to practice and his general apporach to the practice of law.
This episode is a joint recording of Borderlines and Ask Kubeir, a popular YouTube channel about Canadian immigration news and updates, hosted by Kubeir Kamal, a regulated immigration consultant in Toronto.We discuss how obtaining Canadian permanent residence is becomming more difficult for several groups, including recent international graduates, as well as how some immigrants feel let down by the high cost of living and the inability to get their credentials recognized.
Jandu v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2022 FC 1787, was a decision where the Federal Court quashed several visa refusals and misrepresentation findings for truck drivers. The case raised several interesting issues, including the roles of Service Canada and IRCC in assessing genuineness, and what documentation visa officers can reasonably expect work permit applicants to provide. Rafeena Rashid and Jelena Urosevic were counsel for the refused truck drivers. 3:00The facts of Janndu11:00Conflicts when representing employers and employees. 13:00The lack of communication between Service Canada and IRCC when it comes to work permit applications. 20:00Assessing genuineness. 23:00Unreasonable documentation requests. 28:00Lessons from the case for future work permit applications. 37:00The distinction between a lack of genuineness and a finding of misrepresentation. 54:00What is the line between misrepresentation and lack of genuineness?
Sean Rehaag is an Associate Professor at Osgoode Hall Law School, the Director of the Centre for Refugee Studies and the Director of the Refugee Law Laboratory.Today we discuss his use of GPT to conduct legal research, artificial intelligence and decision making, differential results in Federal Court and Immigration and Refugee Board decisions, and how to identify if differential outcomes are actually a problem or significant.2:00Using GPT to conduct research. 14:00Issues with unreported decisions or decisions lacking precedential value. Do all decisions need to have precedential value given that it results in inconsistent jurisprudence? 19:00AI making decisions vs. AI helping to write decisions. 22:00Bias in decision making in LGBT claims around physical appearance. 28:00AI leading to uniformity in decision making. 38:00The receptiveness of the Federal Court to research into judicial decision making. 42:00Forum shopping as a result of judicial research. 46:00Should AI play a role in helping judges write decisions. 52:00Baker as an example of transparency in decision making. 54:00Is it possible to tell if AI is starting to render unintended decisions? 1:05Trauma in refugee decision making. 1:14How do you decide if differential results are problematic? For example, asylum claims for lesbians are higher than gay which is also higher than bi. Is this a problem?
Raj Sharma is an immigration lawyer in Calgary. He can be found on Twitter at @immlawyercanadaTopics:1:30 - Addressing divergent case law15:30 - Globe and Mail story about waiving TRV eligibility requirements to clear backlogs23:00 - Chat GTP replacing lawyers and visa officers31:00 - Processing delays36:00 - Mandamus42:00 - Open work permits for spouses of Canadians56:00 - C-10 work permits and Express Entry57:00 - A world in which GCMS notes are provided instead of refusal letters1:00 - Is the practice of immigration law getting less fun?
Tamara Mosher Kuczer is the Founder & Principal Lawyer of Lighthouse Immigration Law Professional Corporation. She can be found on Twitter @ttrrmk.5:00How would you summarize 2022 for Canadian immigration? 13:23Favorite development in Canadian immigration law25:00Least favorite development in Canadian immigration39:15Favorite Federal Court decision52:00What should people watch the most in 202356:00What might happen this year that people might not be expecting? 1:04What will happen with the Self-Employed Class and Start-Up Visa Program? 1:09Will Express Entry take under 6 months again and will there be a draw in the Parent & Grandparent Program? 1:12Predictions for citizenship and abolishing PR Cards.
The Secure Air Travel Act provides the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness with authority to establish a list of individuals that the Minister has reasonable grounds to suspect could be a threat to aviation or national security or intends to travel by air for the purpose of terrorism.
Sadaf Kashfi, works for Edelmann & Co. She advises clients on complex issues concerning U.S. and Canadian immigration, criminal law, and during the COVID-19 pandemic developed a successful practice representing individuals accused of quarantine act violations. Her e-mail is sadaf@edelmann.ca
The second, Eric Purtzi, is Associate Counsel at Fowler & Block, a criminal defense law firm. He has appeared at the Supreme Court of Canada 7 times. He is also a past guest on Borderlines, having appeared on episode 9 to discuss the constitutionality of retrospective laws. His e-mail is epurtzki@fowlerbloklaw.ca
How does the Secure Air Travel Act work? Who reviews naming on the Secure Air Travel Act? What is the threshold to be added to the list for possibly committing a crime in the air? Does the government have to publish how many people are on the list? How does someone learn that they are on the SATA list? What are the participatory rights for people to get off the SATA? How does the appeal or Federal Court process work? Could someone be put on SATA for refusing to wear a mask?
Prasanna Balasundaram is the Director of Downtown Legal Services. He represented the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers as interveners in the Supreme Court of Canada case Law Society of Saskatchewan v. Abrametz, which dealt with when delays can amount to an abuse of process.
2:00 Why did CARL intervene in this case?
6:00 Recalibrating abuse of process.
10:00 Possible remedies for abuse of process.
17:00 What is an abuse of process claim?
20:00 What is the Blencoe test?
25:00 Is a remedy under an abuse of process claim cash?
28:00 How can lawyers, stakeholders, and CARL collaborate on systemic issues?
31:00 Why does __ think that the Supreme Court did not address CARL’s argument about removal in the decision?
39:00 How does one choose test litigation cases?
Pantea Jafari is lead counsel at Jafari Law, which she opened in 2012.
In 2022 Pantea won a successful group litigation for over 100 Iranian applicants whose applications were refused under the Self-Employed Class. Pantea successfully argued that the Canadian government unfarily changed the standards for these applicants after they had applied.
We discuss the Self-Employed Class, the doctrine of legitimate expectations, breaches of procedural fairness, changing visa offices and how group litigation works.
Three former counsel at the Department of Justice discuss what practicing at the DOJ is like vs. private practice.
Jennifer Dagsvik worked as Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice from 2007 – 2017, and now is a Lecturer at Immigration and Refugee Law at the Bora Laskin Faculty of Law in Thunder Bay, and also a Director at the Newcomer Legal Clinic there.
Nalini Reddy worked as a Lawyer at the Department of Justice from 1999 to 2017. She is currently an Associate at Gindin Segal Law in Winnipeg.
Rafeena Rashid worked as a Lawyer at the Department of Justice in the Immigration Division from 2010 to 2016. She is a Partner and Co-founder of Rashid Urosevic LLP, where she practices immigration law full-time.
- Why they joined and eventually left DOJ
- What they liked most about DOJ and what they liked less
- The DOJ interview process
- When a DOJ lawyer's personal opinion about a case is different from their client’s.
- Things it would be helpful for private practice to know about DOJ.
- Things it would be helpful for DOJ to understand about private practice.
- The training at DOJ.
- Ways private bar counsel interact with DOJ.
- Challenges being a female lawyer.
- Are DOJ and private practice on an equal playing field?
- How hard is it to transition from DOJ to private practice?
- Work life balance and families
Peter Scarrow practiced Canadian immigration law from 1981 - 1991, opening the Taiwanese representative office for a prominent Vancouver law firm.
We discuss what practicing high net worth immigration from Taiwan and China was like in the 1980s and early 1990s, ghost consultant fraud, tax avoidance, and being a private banker vs. immigration lawyer (Peter did both).
David Thomas practiced immigration law from 1987 - 2014, when he was appointed Chairperson of the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal. During his career he developed a large investor clientele from South Korea, ran to be a Member of Parliament, and started a charity that delivered vitamins to North Korea.
3:00 - The start of Dave’s career practicing immigration law both at a large firm and then starting his own firm. 6:00 - Practicing immigration law in the 1990s. 13:00 - Do immigration lawyers travel less than they do now, reduced communication with IRCC and other changes in the practice. 18:00 - Things learned about the bureaucracy as the head of the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal 32:00 - Running for federal office 36:00 - Would David recommend immigration law? Is it becoming less fun? 44:00 - Starting a charity that delivered vitamins to North Korea. 51:00 - Comparing practicing immigration to the human rights tribunal. 1:02 - What the future holds.
A discussion of misrepresentation, including its application, consequences, the innocent mistake defense, failing to disclose past visa refusals, the difference between insufficient evidence and misrepresentation, and going after low hanging fruit.
Kyle Seeback is the Member of Parliament for Dufferin - Caledon. He is the author of Bill C-242, the Reuniting Families Act.
Bill C-242 would allow a parent or grandparent who applies for a temporary resident visa as a visitor to purchase private health insurance outside Canada and to stay in Canada for a period of five years.
On June 7, 2022, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada announced that it would enact these measures through public policy. The changes will come into force on July 4, 2022.
David Langlands is a recently retired 37-year officer of the Canada Border Services Agency. He worked at land, sea, air and even mail points of entry.
We discuss his career, interacting with refugee claimants and people fleeing dire circumstances, compassion, how he once found a zip-log bag labeled Antrhax in someone's suitcase, whether all CBSA interactions with applicants should be recorded, and more.
A discussion about the Federal Court of Canada decision in Mohammad v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2022 FC 1, how being a COVID-19 front-line worker is considered in the H&C context, mandamus, tips for litigators, and how to prioritize FSW applications vs. CEC
Raj Sharma is a Partner at Stewart Sharma Harsanyi in Calgary.
Mikal Skuterud is a professor of economics at the University of Waterloo.
The paper on TR-to-PR transition rates can be found here: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/en/catalogue/36280001202200100002.
The paper on outmigration can be found here: https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/pub/11f0019m/11f0019m2012340-eng.htm
3:00 - Does Canada economically need high immigration levels because of low-birth rights? 6:00 Is it short sighted from an economic perspective to focus on labour market needs and the wishes of people to have their parents live with them? 9:00 Is there a way to measure whether economic immigrants are increasing or decreasing GDP per capita? 19:00 What role should immigration play in resolving short-term labour shortages? 32:00 What would be the economic consequence if all foreign workers became permanent residents? 42:00 Is there data to support the notion that international students perform better economically in Canada? 53:00 How does the concept of utility play into macroeconomic planning in the context of immigration? 60:00 The economic integration of immigrants. 67:00 How should the CRS be re-weighted? 1:18:00 Is Canada becoming too reliant on immigrants propping up housing to support the Canadian economy?
A discussion about Canada's low approval rates for study permit, work permit and temporary resident visa applications for people from Africa.
The IRCC Anti-Racism Employee Focus Groups Final Report referenced in this episode can be found here - https://epe.lac-bac.gc.ca/100/200/301/pwgsc-tpsgc/por-ef/immigration_refugees/2021/122-20-e/POR_122-20-Final_Report_EN.pdf
A discussion of the law of self defense in Canada, including the 2021 Supreme Court of Canada in R. v. Khill. We also comparisons to the Kyle Rittenhouse case in the United States and Canadian immigration implications involving the law of self defense.
We took to Twitter to get listener questions for our first Ask Me Anything episode.
1) Will a gay refugee be deported if her sexuality changes? 2) Does Deanna have any insight or information into what is going on with caregiver applications? 3)Why are local visa offices not processing already approved express entry applications? 4)How do you think realistically IRCC should change their workflow and file processing? 5)Do we need to mention previous visa rejections in spousal sponsorship applications? 6)Why can spouses from visa exempt countries easily reunited with their loves ones in Canada while those who need visas cannot? 7)Why is there a particular hatred towards outland spousal apps? 8)What do you think about the IRCC’s local 3.5 workers to every 1 Canadian employed at the VO’s? Is this appropriate? 9) Why does artificial intelligence refuse so many applications? 10)Why is the IRCC so secretive?
Aditya Mohan is the founder of Robometrics, a company at the forefront of the intersection of artificial intelligence and human emotions like empahty.
We discuss the increasing use of artificial intelligence in Canadian immigration legislation, its benefits, and ways to increase transparency and oversight.
3:00 - What is artificial intelligence?
8:00 - What are deep learning systems?
14:00 - How does the use of artificial intelligence intersect with the rule of law?
21:00 - How do machines learn?
24:00 - Benefits of machine learning and immigration.
27:00 - Ways to improve transparency.
41:00 - Artificial intelligence providing reasons for refusals.
A discussion about the increasing use of artificial intelligence to decide immigration applications.
Mario Bellissimo is a Canadian immigration lawyer in Toronto, and the former past Chair of the Canadian Bar Association's National Immigration Law Section.
4:00 How imprecise wording in the forms can result in misrepresentation findings where immigration becomes a game of gotcha.
10:30 How the laws of procedural fairness and discretion will need to be re-written as a result of the implementation of artificial intelligence and predicative learning in immigration systems.
13:30 How using AI to triage applications is itself a form of automated decision making and why is there a lack of transparency about this?
19:25 The history of the introduction of AI at IRCC.
28:20 What is Chinook and ?
36:00 How processing delays can lead to applications being denied simply because they are moot.
39:00 How does one learn what AI is being used or whether a decision was made by AI?
44:45 If AI flags a file as being problematic does that create a proxy decision wherein a visa officer will want to affirm the AI.
55:00 Is it possible that AI will lead to a better immigration system as the AI will be able to thoroughly scan applications that humans have to skim given the limited number of decision makers and the large number of applications.
1:03 AI as counsel
1:13 The future. When AI analyzes the social media of a representative when assessing their client’s application.
Carl Brault worked for almost twenty years at the Canada Border Services Agency. His roles included Border Services Officer, Intelligence Analyst and Inland Enforcement Officer.
He currently provides consultation services to authorized immigration representatives and can be reached at cb-advisingservices@outlook.com.
3:00 Working as a summer student as a Border Services Officer. 6:30 September 11, 2011 9:50 What kind of training does a CBSA officer receive before they start working at the border? 18:10 Working as a CBSA Intelligence Analyst 21:30 Working as an Inland Enforcement Officer 25:00 Is CBSA understaffed or overstaffed? 28:30 Level of autonomy officers have in deferral requests. 38:30 What should lawyers or individuals do when making deferral of removal requests? 42:30 The ability of CBSA to make positive decisions by not acting. 48:30 What is the difference in culture across different offices? 51:15 What are examples of where counsel harms their clients cause at CBSA? 54:00 Do CBSA officers care about how lawyers are dressed? 56:30 Has the attitude towards removals at CBSA regarding removals gotten more rigid? 1:05:00 Do CBSA officers want more discretion when it comes to removals
Sarah Runyon is a criminal defense lawyer on Vancouver Island.
3:00 What is sexual assault? 5:30 Is all sex between an employer and employee deemed to be non consensual? 6:00 Why was sexual assault separated from general assault? Is rape a distinct offence from sexual assault? Are there degrees of sexual assault? 7:30 If someone is at a nightclub and they start dancing with another person without their consent does that fit the definition of sexual assault? 15:00 Evidentiary issues. 16:30 Often the criminal defense bar wants judges to have a wide discretion in terms of what they can consider. Is this the same in the case of sexual assault? 21:00 Does the maxim “it is better that five guilty people go free than one innocent person go to jail.” Is the legal system moving away from this in sexual assault? 27:00 Is a restorative justice approach better than the current criminal justice system? 28:45 Can sexual assault be verbal? 33:00 Is revenge porn sexual assault? 34:00 Is there a statutory limitation on sexual assault? 35:00 Is being drunk a defense to sexual assault? 44:00 If someone is drunk are they capable of consent? 48:30 How does one determine whether the complainant was intoxicated? 51:00 How does one show an honest but reasonable belief as to consent? 1:03 How does the “beyond a reasonable doubt” onus work in sexual assault cases that are “he-said she said”. 1:10 Trial by jury or judge.
A discussion of the 2021 immigration platforms of the Liberals, Conservatives, New Democrats, Greens, Bloc Quebecois and the People's Party of Canada.
Chantal Desloges is the Founder and Senior Partner of Desloges Law Group.
Cristina Guida is a senior associate lawyer with Green and Spiegel LLP in Toronto.
We discuss authorization to work in Canada without a work permit, including business visitors, students, perfroming artists, maintained status, the global skills strategy and other categories. We also discuss what Canada's immigration department continues to be "work."
Marina Sedai is an immigration lawyer and the past National Chair of the Canadian Bar Association Immigration Section, a role that she served in from 2018 – 2019, and is also a past provincial char of the CBABC Immigration Law Section.
We discuss various myths about Canadian immigration law, including: * Refugees get more financial help than pensioners. & Foreign nationals immigrate and then bring their whole extended family over. *If including your spouse or common-law partner on your permanent resident application is inconvenient or unhelpful to your immigration process then you can exclude them and later sponsor them. * Volunteering isn't work. * If my kid is born in Canada then my H&C application is guaranteed to succeed.
We discuss how mandamus applications work. Adrienne Smith is a Partner at Battista Smith Migration Law Group.
2:00 Does filing mandamus applications annoy Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada? 5:30 Has there been a change in the frequency with which mandamus applications are considered? 13:30 During COVID-19 is there a difference in filing a mandamus application between online and paper applications? 18:00 What is a mandamus application? 26:00 What is the legal test for a mandamus application? 49:00 During COVID-19 when a visa office is largely closed would you still file a mandamus demand letter? 55:00 Missed opportunities during COVID-19.
We discuss issues involving the deportation of long term permanent residents for criminality.
5:45 - What are the grounds for deporting a permanent resident for criminality?
13:00 - How does the appeal process work?
17:00 - What are the factors in deportation.
19:00 - An overview of the history of the law involving the deportation of permanent residents.
26:00 - What is the probability of success for a permanent resident in avoiding deportation once proceedings start?
36:00 - Stays of removal
41:00 - Strategies and tips for responding to procedural fairness letters involving removal.
Michael Greene, Q.C. is an immigration lawyer in Calgary. He served as the National Chair of the Canadian Bar Association’s Citizenship & Immigration Section in 2000-2001. He is representing Jaskirat Singh Sidhu in his immigration and deportation matters.
Hilary Evans Cameron is an Assistant Professor at Ryerson Law. Prior to become a faculty member, Hilary represented refugee claimants for a decade. She is the author of Refugee Law’s Fact-finding Crisis: Truth, Risk, and the Wrong Mistake. Her paper on risk salience in refugee decisions that we discuss can be found here. She is also the creator of www.meetgary.ca, a website which provides guidance to both decision makers and asylum claimants on the implicit biases and thought processes that can influence decision makers. She provides training to the Immigration and Refugee Board on this topic.
3:00 The two strong pulls in the law of how a decision maker should make a decision in a refugee hearing that impacts risk salience. 7:00 Can a decision maker ever be truly neutral? 11:00 Does the fact that the refugee process starts with a removal order “set things up” for strict scrutiny? Plus how politicians can influence error preference. 18:30 Refugee acceptance rates have increased recently. Is this a result of new decision makers or the same decision makers applying different maxims. Can someone’s risk salience approach change over time? 22:00 The non legal things that can influence decision makers. 26:30 Studies on accuracy in credibility and how risk salience follows. 30:00 Should decision makers make their biases explicit? 36:30 What is the fear that people have of refugee claimants? 43:01 The illusion of transparency. “The idea that truth will shine through.” 44:30 The myth that a memory is like a video recording. 46:00 The myth that a refugee claimant will never take unnecessary risks. 47:15 The myth of once a liar always a liar. 48:80 The maxim of the perfect applicant. 52:00 The maxim of “our expectations were clear.” 1:01 The inconsistency between standards in refugee law and trauma theory. 1:04 Hillary’s working with the IRB 1:15 Have any IRB members told Hillary that who the representative is can impact how they view the claim? 1:21 When should you admit a past lie?
Dennis McCrea was the founder of McCrea Immigration Law. He started practicing immigration law in 1974, and was one of the original members of Vancouver's immigration bar. In this episode we discuss how to build an immigration practice, how the practice of immigration law has evolved, avoiding burnout and more.
3:00 How lawyers use to interact with visa officers. 6:00 The formation of the immigration bar. 11:30 Thoughts on whether it is possible to have both a corporate immigration practice and a refugee or enforcement practice. 15:30 Did the practice of immigration law become more or less fun over time? 18:00 What kept Dennis motivated when it came to practicing immigration law? 22:30 What type of cases did Dennis enjoy the most? 26:00 What are some tools that lawyers can use to prevent burnout? 41:00 Did the practice of immigration law vary depending on which political party were in power? 42:00 How to retire. 45:00 How can junior lawyers who are trying to build a practice have time for hobbies? 48:00 How Steven and Deanna got into immigration. 58:00 Growing a firm. 1:03:00 Should you article at an immigration law firm. 1:06:00 Being too specialized. 1:13:00 What percent of Dennis’s practice was immigration processing, firm management and enforcement? 1:16:30 Thoughts on consultants. 1:19:00 Are decisions getting better or worse? Are boilerplate refusals becoming more or less common?
Joshua Sohn practiced immigration law for over 25 years. He is a past president of the Canadian Bar Association’s Immigration section. He worked both as a sole practicioner, at a small firm and at a big 4 accounting firm. We discuss Joshua’s career, what made him go to law school, whether he took immigration courses in law school, how he started in refugee law, differences between working as a solo practicioner, small firm and eventually at a big 4 accounting firm, and then back to a small firm, differences working in a downtown core vs suburb, and managing the stress of practicing immigration law and running a business. There are a lot of nuggets in here for aspiring lawyers and current practicioners.
2:00 Quitting social media after retirement. 9:00 Law school 14:00 Articles 17:30 Are there any courses or law schools that are best to help someone start a career in immigration? 19:30 Starting a career in refugee law. 22:30 Is it possible to make a viable practice just doing refugee law? 29:00 The law firm as training ground. 32:00 Practicing as a sole practitioner vs at a large firm. 35:30 Does it make sense for someone to do just immigration law or should people getting into the field specialize in another area as well? 37:00 Practicing immigration law in Vancouver vs. Surrey 41:00 Compassion vs. running a business 42:00 How IRCC’s current processes create new pressures on immigration solicitors. 49:00 The Big 4 accounting firms and immigration. 53:00 Mentorship and volunteerism. 1:01 Tips to tell a co-worker who leaves half-drunk coffee cups around. 1:03 Self-care for lawyers.
A discussion of the philosophy behind economic immigration, how Canada ranks economic immigrants, Ministerial Instructions and listener Q&A.
Ashal Kaushal is an Assistant Professor at the University of British Columbia's Allard School of Law, where she teaches, amongst other courses, Immigration Law.
6:00 An introduction to Canada’s points system, how Express Entry changed it and Ministerial Instructions.
14:30 The three models of economic immigration. The Human Capital Model, the Demand-Driven Model and the Neo-Corporatist Model
22:00 How the same job offer can be worth different points depending on the immigration program.
28:30 Is it possible to qualify the value of a prospective economic immigrant through their job?
32:00 Why are the points what they are? Why would a job offer go from 600 to 200 / 50, for example? How did the change from Conservative to Liberal government change?
37:30 A ranking system based on wage.
44:00 Ministerial Instructions
Listener Questions
55:30 How long will Express Entry last before they bring in a whole new system?
1:00 Should there be country caps on economic immigration? Will India remain the top source country of immigrants?
1:06 What, if anything, should be done about how the federal and provincial governments have economic immigration programs that target the same “high skilled” people?
1:16 Should Canada bring back the Immigrant Investor Program?
1:24 If you could make one change to Express Entry or economic immigration what would it be?
A discussion of when someone can be inadmissible to Canada for having committed a crime which doesn’t lead to a conviction.
Cases referenced are Garcia v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2021 FC 141 and Dlieow v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2020 FC 59
Sania (Ahmed) Chaudhry was counsel in Garcia. She is currently Legal Counsel (Professional Conduct Proceedings) at Real Estate Council of Alberta.
2:00 Introduction and an overview of Garcia v. Canada. 15:00 The purpose of Canada’s inadmissibility provisions. 17:10 What is the standard of proof for determining that someone committed a crime where there is no conviciton? 19:45 A review of Enforcement Manual 2 30:30 Determining equivalency and issues with inadmissibility findings where there is no conviction. 39:30 Dlieow v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration) 46:00 Living in a society where the State makes everything a crime.
A discussion of s. 34(1)(f) of Canada's Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, which provides that a foreign national or permanent resident is inadmissible for being the member of an organization that has committed terrorism. Topics include how terrorism, organization and membership are defined, the Proud Boys, QAnon and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party.
5:45 What is terrorism under Canadian immigration legislation? 9:45 What is an organization? 15:30 What does it mean to be a “member?” 19:00 The Bangladesh Nationalist Party 29:00 Would Nelson Mandela be encompassed? 30:45 Should only organizations that are officially designated by the government render someone inadmissible? 39:39 The Ministerial relief process. 47:35 Jose Figuerora 53:45 Could someone being a QAnon adherent make them inadmissible to Canada? 1:00 Does the designation of the Proud Boys broaden what could result in inadmissibility due to terrorism? 1:03 Could the leader of a party calling for an insurrection lead to all members of that organization being inadmissible for being a member of an organization which has committed terrorism? 1:05 What about antifa? The Republican Party? 1:13 Would it be misrepresentation to not declare one’s being a QAnon adherent in the IMM5669?
Chieu v. Canada (Minister of Citizenship and Immigration), 2002 SCC 3 was a landmark Supreme Court of Canada which affirmed the use of the Ribic factors in the H&C assessment. We discuss these factors and how they are used in immigration appeals.
1:00 How the assessment of Humanitarian & Compassionate considerations has become somewhat nebulus. 4:00 A case study of Chieu v. Canada 10:00 What is an example of a negative country condition in someone’s country of citizenship? 13:00 The decision and principles in Chieu. 15:00 The Federal Court of Canada in Zhang v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2020 FC 927, which seems to limit Chieu. 16:00 The Ribic factors and the types of immigration appeals. 20:00 How much weight each factor should get. 25:00 Stories about our appeals. 32:00 The remorse factor and flexibility. 45:00 The counter arguments to considering country of citizenship conditions. 50:00 Consents on appeal.
A discussion about responding to procedural fairness letters with digressions on possible bias against people from Punjab, unreasonable documentation requests, tunnel vision amongst visa officers, how if an officer goes out looking for misrepresentation in an application they will probably find it, aggressively banning people from Canada as a deterrance policy, IRCC misleading Parliament about whether it bounces applications for incompleteness and more.
Raj Sharma is a Partner at Stewart Sharma Harsanyi in Calgary.
2:30 When does IRCC have to send a procedural fairness letter vs. being able to refuse an application without one? 15:00 Specific issues with the Canadian visa offices in New Delhi and Chandigarh. 21:00 Racialized assessments of visa applications. 23:00 Why hunting for misrep can lead to misrep findings. 25:00 Misrepresentation as a deterrence policy. 35:00 Is there a specific focus on Punjabs? 44:00 Can you tell if someone is lying as soon as you meet them at the start of an interview? 46:00 Preet Bharara on investigations 50:00 When IRCC believes that a job is fake because no employer would wait as long as IRCC’s processing times to fill a position. 1:00 Procedural fairness letters in the citizenship revocation process. 1:06 Litigation as a way to achieve policy reform. 1:15 Procedural fairness and the bouncing of applications.
This episode is about the concept of a universal basic income and how it would work in Canada. We are joined by Sheila Regehr and Sameer Nurmohamed of Basic Income Canada Network.
We discuss which type of immigrants (permanent residents, workers, students, asylum claimants, people without status) etc. would be eligible, whether a basic income would impact other public funding for services like legal aid, whether it would cause inflation, and more.
5:30 What are different models of universal basic income? 9:00 How is the amount of basic income calculated? 10:45 What was the Ontario pilot project? 12:45 In practice is there a difference between an income guarantee model and a flat-payment model? 14:30 Do wealthy people get the same payment and benefit under a universal basic income? 15:30 How would a universal basic income be funded? 23:45 Would a universal basic income replace other services like legal aid? 28:25 A review of Motion 46 - GUARANTEED LIVABLE BASIC INCOME 30:35 Would international students, foreign workers, permanent residents, asylum claimants, people without status, etc. be eligible to receive a universal basic income? 42:00 What would the labour market interaction be with a universal basic income in terms of its impact on wages? 45:00 Would immigrants abuse a universal basic income system? 47:30 How have the impacts of the CERB impacted peoples’ perspectives on how a universal basic income would work? 56:00 Would a guaranteed basic income cause inflation or people gauging marginalized individuals? 1:03 Where can people learn more?
Sergio Marchi was Canada’s Minister of Citizenship and Immigration from 1993-1995.
3:00 – Does someone keep the Minister title their whole life?
4:50 – What was the political consensus regarding Canadian immigration at the end of the 1980s? How did the Reform Party impact things?
8:00 – The mix of immigrants between economic, family and humanitarian immigrants.
11:15 – What dictates whether IRCC meets its level targets?
14:30 – The Brian Mulroney government was considering moving immigration under Public Safety. Under Sergio Marchi it instead became it’s on Ministry. What prompted this?
17:30 – Canadian attitudes to refugee resettlements and misconceptions.
20:45 – Sources of resistance to refugee resettlement. Resettled refugees vs asylum seekers.
23:00 – Changes that Minister Marchi made to the refugee determination process.
25:00 – What was Minister Marchi’s approach to intervening on specific cases? When would Minister Marchi help Members of Parliament on constituent files? Did it matter which political party the MP was from?
32:00 – The impact of a police officer who was shot by an illegal immigrant on deportation policy.
36:00 – Whether the Canada Border Services Agency should be under the immigration umbrella.
37:30 – What Minister Marchi considers to be his main accomplishments and the implementation of the right of landing fee.
45:00 – Minister Marchi’s push to remove the Queen from the citizenship oath.
Syed Farhan Ali shares his Canadian immigration story. During the time that his spousal sponsorship application was in process he was denied temporary entry to Canada, missed the birth of his first child and missed her first steps. He recently arrived in Canada after a three year application process.
Chantal Dube is a Spokesperson for Spousal Sponsorship Advocates, a group with more than 5,000 members in Canada that argues for reforms to the family reunification process.
3:15 Said tells the story of his spousal sponsorship application. His application took 34 months to process. During the processing of his application Canada denied his visitor visa applications. He missed the birth of his children and their first steps, although he was able to reunite with his wife during brief trips to the United States, which did grant him a visitor visa. 21:00 We discuss the refusal of temporary resident visas for people with spousal sponsorship applications in process, people with frequent travel histories, people with American multiple entry visas, and judicial reviews. 25:00 How long a judicial review takes. 29:50 Assessing genuineness in a spousal sponsorship application, and the distinction between “low risk and high risk” in the checklists. 33:00 The strange quirk in the Family Class where people have to prove that their relationship is genuine but immigrants and foreign workers do not. The same is true for work permits, where the spouses of Canadians cannot apply for work permits from abroad, but the spouses of foreign workers can. 38:00 What are major issues that Sponsorship Advocates seeing? 39:45 What things can trigger genuineness concerns? 45:00 Processing times and approval rates. 55:00 Preventing abuse. 1:03 Is an overzealous hunt for marriage fraud in individual applications the solution to marriage fraud, or are there other measures that can be taken?
The Honourable Chris Alexander served as Canada's Minister of Citizenship and Immigration Canada from July 2013 to November 2015. He represented the riding of Ajax—Pickering in the House of Commons of Canada from 2011 to 2015. Prior to that spent 18 years in the Canadian Foreign Service, serving as Canada's first resident Ambassador to Afghnistan from 2003 - 2005. Subsequent to being an Member of Parliament he ran for the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada.
As Minister of Citizenship and Immigration Canada, Mr. Alexander presided over the launch of Express Entry, the termination of the Immigrant Investor Program and the introduction of the Barbaric Cultural Practices Act, which prohibited forced and underaged marriages.
5:09 – If there was one misconception about Canadian immigration law that Minister Alexander would like to change what would it be?
15:00 – Bill C-24 and the revocation of citizenship for dual nationals convicted of high crimes.
16:00 – Whether there was a strong anti-fraud and anti-exploitation mandate during Minister Alexander’s time as Minister.
22:00 – Combatting forced marriages.
23:00 – Preventing foreign worker abuse by sanctioning the employers who abuse them.
26:00 – The Barbaric Cultural Practices Act
36:45 – Ending the Immigrant Investor Program
41:45 – Entrepreneurial immigration and self-employed program.
49:00 – Points inflation in Express Entry and the increased demand for Canadian immigration.
52:30 – The launch of Express Entry
55:30 – Moving towards online applications
57:15 – What it was like following Jason Kenney as immigration minister, and the challenges posed, if any, by Jason Kenney retaining the multiculturism portfolio, as well the immigration minister sharing immigration responsibilities with HRDC and the Minister of Public Safety.
1:02 – The role the Prime Minister’s Office played with immigration.
1:05 – Mr. Alexander’s immigration platform when he ran for the leadership of the Conservative Party of Canada in which he called for an increase in immigration, and whether he pushed this view when he was Minister.
1:10 – The importance of Canadian immigration and populism.
1:15 – Open work permits on demand for people from visa exempt countries.
1:18 – The need for immigration to adapt to changing circumstances and system racism.
1:22 – When Minister Alexander would intervene on specific files.
1:25 – If Minister Alexander were giving advice to a future Minister of Immigration what would the advice be?
The Honourable John McCallum served as Canada's Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada from November 2015 to January 2017. A Member of Parliament from 2000 - 2017, he also served as Defence Minister under Jean Chrétien, and Veterans Affairs Minister, National Revenue Minister, Natural Resources Minister and as Chair of the Expenditure Review Committee under Paul Martin.
As Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship in Justin Trudeau’s cabinet, Mr. McCallum led Canada's effort to welcome 25,000 Syrian refugees over a period of three months. He also increased the age of dependency from 18-22, repealed conditional permanent residency and reduced family class processing times.
5:00 – The resettlement of 40,000 refugees in Canada.
22:00 – The division of immigration repsonsibilities between IRCC, CBSA and ESDC. Should they be combined?
28:00 – What goes into reducing processing times.
33:00 – Abolishing conditional permanent residence.
39:00 – Mr. McCallum’s approach to being immigration critic towards the end of the Harper era.
42:30 – The Barbaric Cultural Practices Act and the Niqab ban.
44:00 – Caregivers
48:00 – Helping as Minister on individual files.
54:00 – What goes into levels planning?
Section 15 of Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms provides that every individual is equal before and under the law and has the right to the equal protection and benefit of the law without discrimination. Aidan Campbell joins to discuss the application of s. 15 of the Charter to Canadian immigration law and the implications recent Supreme Court of Canada decision in Fraser v. Canada.
Aidan Campbell is an Associate at Mahon & Company, a progressive firm which practices in Criminal Law, Immigration and Refugee Law, Public Interest & Constitutional Litigation, Sex Worker Rights, Prisoners’ Rights, Professional Discipline. Extradition Law and Tenants' Rights
In R v. Kattenburg Justice Stratas of the Federal Court of Appeal cautioned judges against giving "virtue signalling and populism a go." This prompted a largely philosophical discussion about the role of judges, a Toronto judge who wore a Make America Great Again hat in court, a Quebec judge who proclaimed herself a feminist before making statements about Quebec's ban on religious attire, Ruth Bader Ginsburg criticizing President Trump, and defining what virtue signaling even is.
Andrew Hayes is a US immigration lawyer who practices out of Vancouver.
In this episode we provide an overview of family law issues that immigrants and their Canadian sponsors should be aware of, inlcuding the recognition of foreign marriages, how divorce works, threatening to have an ex-spouse deported and the difference between common-law and marriage and getting a marriage anulled.
Ari Wormelli practices family law with YLAW Group.
Aris Daghighian is a senior associate with Green and Spiegel LLP in Toronto. He represented the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers as intervenors in Brown v. Canada, 2020 FCA 130.
In this episode we discuss the issues raised in the case, including how immigration detention works in Canada, what the disclosure obligations should be on the government in an immigration detention proceeding and whether there should be a maximum time that someone can be held in immigration detention.
R v. Zora is a 2020 Supreme Court of Canada decision involving the criminal offence of breaching bail conditions. It is relevant in the Canadian immigration context as individuals who are convicted of this crime in Canada, or who are convicted of or commit an equivalent offence abroad, are inadmissible to the country.
Steven and Deanna are joined by Sarah Runyon, who was counsel for Mr. Zora at the Supreme Court. We discuss how bail works in Canada, the offence of breach of bail conditions, and the implications of the Supreme Court decision.
Andrew, Deanna and Steven discuss the closure of the Canada - US border during COVID-19 and how the agreement has been implemented in the two policies, recent Executive Orders regarding immigration, and the United States Supreme Court decision in Department of Homeland Security et al v. Regents of the University of California et al.
Andrew Hayes is a US immigration lawyer who practices in Vancouver. His website is http://www.usborderlaw.com
2:00 -The closure of the Canada - US border
25:00 - Recent Executive Orders pertaining to immigration in the United States
45:00 - The DACA decision
Deanna Okun-Nachoff and Steven Meurrens discuss how COVID19 has caused havoc to Canada's immigration system, including border closures, operational slowdowns and the suspension of litigation proceedings.
Vavilov v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration)is a 2019 Supreme Court of Canada decision in which the Supreme Court of Canada outlined a new framework for the standard of review in Canadian administrative law.
François Crépeau is a Professor at the McGill Faculty of Law and the Director of the Centre for Human Rights and Legal Pluralism. He was the United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Human Rights of Migrants from 2011 to 2017.
Peter Edelmann and François discuss migration issues generally, the Compact for Migration, and its implication for Canadian immigration and refugee law.
This episode was recorded before Peter Edelmann was appointed to the British Columbia Supreme Court.
An overview of the immigration platforms, and general historic policies, of Canada's political parties.
1:45 - Where do the parties stand with regards to letting provinces decide who immigrates? 13:28 – Immigration levels 23:30 – What are the promises with regards to border security and the Safe Third Country Agreement? 36:00 – Temporary Foreign Workers 42:00 – Application fees 46:00 – Settlement services and values tests 48:00 – Where parties can work together on and general trends.
Andrew Hayes is a US immigration lawyer who practices in Vancouver.
In this episode we discuss how the immigration systems of Canada and the United States each deal with the issue of immigrants and social assistance.
How similar is the "public charge" rule in the United States and "financial inadmissibility" in Canada? What is a sponsorship bar? Can permanent residents be deported for imposing a fiscal burden on the state?
Sean Rehaag is an Associate Professor at Osgoode Hall Law School. His academic research focuses on empirical studies of immigration and refugee law decision-making processes.
Sean, Deanna, Peter and Steven discuss his quantitative research which has used large data-sets to study extra-legal factors that influence outcomes in Canadian refugee adjudication. Does immigrating to Canada, getting refugee status or winning a judicial review simply depend on the luck of who decides your application?
Jamie Chai Yun Liew is a law professor at University of Ottawa and an immigration lawyer. She acted for the Canadian Council for Refugees as intervener before the Supreme Court of Canada in Kanthasamy v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration).
Jamie, Peter, Deanna and Steven discusses humanitarian & compassionate considerations in Canadian immigration law, including the Supreme Court of Canada decisions in Baker and Kanthasamy. We also discussed Regulation 117(9)(d), which excludes unexamined family members from future sponsorship, and the recently announced pilot to mitigate the impact of this exclusion.
Molly Joeck and Erica Olmstead are lawyers with Edelmann & Co. They, along with Peter Edelmann, acted for the Canadian Council for Refugees as interveners before the Supreme Court of Canada in Canada (Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness) v. Chhina.
In Chhina the issue before the Supreme Court was whether immigrant detainees have access to habeas corpus. We discuss Chhina, how immigration detention works in Canada, habeas corpus and issues going forward.
Natalie Drolet is the Executive Director / Staff Lawyer for the Migrant Workers Centre.
We discuss the history of Canada's caregiver programs, current issues and what the future looks like.
Civil forfeiture is a process in which the government seizes assets from persons suspected of involvement with crime without necessarily charging the owners with wrongdoing. Did you know that in British Columbia the government can seize and forfeit your car if you speed? Or that police can "seize first ask later" for property that is less than $75,000? This was a fascinating look at an area of law that receives little scrutiny, especially in how it can relate to immigration.
Bibhas Vaze is a criminal defence lawyer in Vancouver.
Robert Tibbo is a Canadian lawyer previously based in Hong Kong, where he has an active human rights and refugee law practice. He has served as counsel in many notable cases, including Edward Snowden, a former contractor for the United States government who copied and leaked classified information from the National Security Agency in 2013.
Peter and Robert discuss what it is like to practice refugee law in Hong Kong and about Robert's representation of Edward Snowden, which at one point included arranging for Mr. Snowden to stay with other asylum claimants in Hong Kong to avoid being detected by the authorities.
The Government of Canada, as well as several provincial governments, have introduced several measures to protect temporary foreign workers and maintain the integrity of Canada's foreign worker programs.
Meera Thakrar is a Canadian immigration lawyer whose practices focus on helping companies recruit and retain foreign workers.
Meera joins Peter Edelmann, Deanna Okun-Nachoff and Steven Meurrens to discuss various measures that different levels of government have introduced to protect foreign workers, challenges do governments face in this task and how employer compliance inspections work.
The Temporary Foreign Worker Program, also known as the Labour Market Impact Assessment, is the main program through which Canadian companies hire temporary foreign workers. We discuss numerous aspects of obtaining Labour Market Impact Assessments, including prevailing wage, recruitment, transition plans, processing times, job match, the Global Talent Stream and the Owner - Operator LMIA.
Kyle Hyndman and Meera Thakrar are both Canadian immigration lawyers whose practices focus on helping companies recruit and retain foreign workers.
Marshall Rothstein served as a Justice on the Supreme Court of Canada from 2006 - 2015. He previously was a Judge on the Federal Court of Canada and the Federal Court of Appeal.
Garth Barriere is a criminal defence attorney in Vancouver. He was counsel in Khosa v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration, a major Supreme Court of Canada immigration decision in which Justice Rothstein wrote a concurring opinion.
In this episode Justice Rothstein provides tips for written and oral advocacy. While the focus is on appellate litigation, anyone interesting in strengthening their advocacy skills will benefit from what he has to say. We also discuss the Supreme Court of Canada's decision in Khosa v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), and its impact on administrative law in Canada. It is a frank conversation.
R v. Wong is a 2018 Supreme Court of Canada decision in which the Supreme Court of Canada had to determine whether a person could withdraw a guilty plea if they they did not know that their pleading guilty would lead to deportation.
Erica Olmstead is an Associate at Edelmann & Co. She and Peter Edelmann represented the accused at the Supreme Court. Lobat Sadrehashemi represented one of the invervenors, the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers.
Darryl Larson practiced immigration law in Vancouver, British Columbia for almost thirty years. He was a former Chair of the Canadian Bar Association of British Columbia's Immigration Section, counsel to both individuals and corporations, at one point represented China's most wanted fugitive, and successfully implemented a succession plan when he retired in 2018.
In this episode Peter, Steven, Deanna and Darryl discuss Darryl's career as an immigration lawyer in a candid discussion about what practicing immigration law is like.
Deanna and Erin Roth discuss issues in Canadian medical inadmissibility law. When can someone be inadmissible to Canada because they are sick? How does one confront such an allegation? What changes are upcomming?
Erin Roth is a Lawyer with Edelmann & Co. Her work involves court proceedings regarding Extradition and Mutual Legal Assistance requests from foreign states and civil litigation on behalf of government agencies.
Amanda Lord is a lawyer in the Criminal Law and International Assistance group at the Department of Justice of Canada. Her work involves court proceedings regarding Extradition and Mutual Legal Assistance requests from foreign states and civil litigation on behalf of government agencies.
In this episode we discuss Extradition and the State of Law.
The Supreme Court of Canada in October issued its decision in R v. Tran, a case which Peter litigated. Deanna, Peter and Steve discuss the issues that the Supreme Court addressed in this landmark decision, including whether conditional sentences are terms of imprisonment for the purposes of deportation and retrospectivity in law.
This was the first of two Supreme Court cases that Peter arguedin Ottawa this year. While he was in Ottawa for the second case, he joined Michael Spratt and Emilie Taman, the creators of the Docket, a fantastic podcast about criminal law in Canada. Peter, Emilie and Michael discussed all sorts of issues regarding the intersection of immigration and criminal law, and Peter even explained how he got into practicing immigration law,
The Liberal Government of Canada has introduced legislation that will expand the use of preclearance facilities by United States border officials in Canada, and authorize Canada to set up such facilities in the United States.
Michael Greene, Q.C. is an immigration lawyer in Calgary. He served as the National Chair of the Canadian Bar Association’s Citizenship & Immigration Section in 2000-2001.
Michael joins to provide an overview of Bill C-23, the Preclearance Act, and resulting issues including the presence of armed US border officials in Canada, detention, the application of the Charter and the potential denial of entry to Canadian permanent residents.
In this episode we discuss the history of the immigration consultant profession in Vancouver and current issues that the profession faces from a regulatory and governance perspective.
Ron McKay is a past Chair of the Immigration Consultants of Canada Regulatory Council's Board of Directors. He is a former Immigration Officer who spent ten years at the Canadian Embassy in Tokyo, Japan. He is also a past National President of the Canadian Association of Professional Immigration Consultants.
3:30 – We discuss the history of immigration consultants in Canada, including an in depth discussion of the Mangat case, in which the Supreme Court of Canada determined that the federal government could allow non-lawyers to practice immigration law. We also discussed the Canadian Society of Immigration Consultants ("CSIC"), the first regulatory body of immigration consultants in Canada.
24:00 – We get into governance issues at regulatory oversight issues at both CSIC and the ICCRC.
38:30 - We talk about ghost consultants and what the immigration consultancy profession can do about it.
50:00 - We discuss how the immigration consulting profession needs to be regulated yet at the same time be independent of the government.
53:00 - Steven asks how the ICCRC determines how many consultants there should be. Are we reaching a saturation point? Should there be limits as to which aspects of immigration law they can practice?
Xun (Sunny) Wang was a ghost consultant who is estimated to have made $10 million by filing fraudulent immigration applications for clients of his two firms, New Can Consulting and Well Long Enterprises. Mr. Wang, who is currently serving an eight year jail sentence, and his staff, apparently put fake passport stamps in peoples' passports in order to lie about having spent sufficient time in Canada to qualify for various immigration programs. The Canada Border Services Agency is now endeavouring through what the Department is calling Project New Can to remove over 1,500 former clients of his for having committed misrepresentation to obtain Canadian permanent residency and/or maintain it.
Gordon Maynard is a Vancouver based lawyer who practices exclusively in Canadian immigration law. He is a past Chair of the Canadian Bar Association's Immigration Section.
All of the lawyers involved in this podcast have and are representing some of his clients in these removal proceedings.
In this episode we discuss how to overcome systemic barriers in LGBTQ asylum claims. Much of this episode is dedicated to establishing how LGBTQ asylum claimants must prove their sexual identity during their refugee claim. How does someone from a country where being gay is illegal and who has been a closeted homosexual for their entire life prove that they are gay? What do Immigration and Refugee Board members expect? How can counsel assist? Finally, we discuss whether LGBTQ asylum claimants should even be required to prove their sexual orientation as part of their asylum claim.
Sharalyn Jordan is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of Education at Simon Fraser University. She works with with community agencies that support LGBTQ and refugee mental health as they develop and assess their counselling practices and programs.
The Safe Third Country Agreement between Canada and the United States requires that persons seeking refugee protection must make a claim in the first country they arrive in unless they qualify for an exception to the Agreement. In other words, an asylum seeker who wishes to seek refugee status in Canada will typically be denied the ability to do so if they attempt to enter Canada by land from the United States.
Efrat Arbel is Assistant Professor at the Allard School of Law at the University of British Columbia. She is an executive member of the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers. A list of Dr. Arbel's recent publications can be found here.
During this podcast we talk about three areas that Dr. Arbel has recently focused her research on. These include the distinction between physical borders and legal borders in the refugee context, how interdiction works, and the Safe Third Country Agreement.
This episode was recorded before President Trump's recent Executive Order imposed a moratorium on asylum claims in the United States. President Trump's decision has only intensified and magnified many of the issues that Dr. Arbel discusses in this podcast.
The Honourable Alan S. Diner is a judge with the Federal Court of Canada. Prior to his appointment, Justice Diner headed Baker & McKenzie LLP’s immigration practice. He was also involved with managing the establishment and implementation of Ontario’s Provincial Nominee Program for the Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration.
We are grateful to Justice Diner for the time that he took in preparing for this podcast about tips and best practices in appearing before the Federal Court of Canada, including in providing a customised powerpoint, which can be found on our website at http://www.borderlines.ca. As Justice Diner notes, many of the tips and strategies contained in this episode are applicable beyond judicial review, and will be beneficial to anyone preparing written submissions or making oral presentations.
Some topics include: - tips for oral advocacy. - does being a solicitor make one a better litigator? - should counsel prepare visa applications with litigation in mind? - how many errors should counsel identify in visa refusals? - how much should lawyers explain "basic legal principles" in their arguments? - the importance of preserving one's reputation
We discuss three topics. The first is the oversight of police, CBSA, and immigration officers in Canada. How do we ensure that there is political oversight and accountability without politicizing the day to day operations of individual officers? The second topic is a discussion of Charter rights and Charter values in the immigration context. Finally, we talk about whether it is OK that in Canada individual immigration officers can create an apply their own standards of the law.
Lorne Sossin is the Dean of Osgoode Hall Law School. Prior to his appointment, he was a Professor with the Faculty of Law at the University of Toronto. Dean Sossin also serves on the Boards of the National Judicial Institute and the Law Commission of Ontario. He has also acted as Research Director for the Law Society of Upper Canada’s Task Force on the Independence of the Bar.
This episode contains an overview of the history of national security law in Canada, starting with the MacDonald Commission and the October Crisis of 1970, the formation of the Canadian Security and Intelligence Service, the Air India bombing, the Arar Inquiry, 9/11, and Bill C-51.
We also discuss the roles of CSIS, the Communication Security Establishment, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and the Canada Border Services Agency, in administering Canadian national security legislation.
Finally, Professor Roach provides an in depth analysis of several controversial elements of the previous Conservative Government of Canada's Bill C-51, and the current Liberal Government of Canada's response under Prime Minister Trudeau.
Kent Roach is a Professor of Law and the Prichard-Wilson Chair of Law and Public Policy at the University of Toronto. He is a Member of the Order of Canada and is considered to be one of the foremost experts on national security legislation in Canada.
Garth Barriere and Eric Purtzki joins Peter Edelmann and Steven Meurrens to discuss the constitutionality of laws that are retroactive or retrospective.
Garth and Eric are both criminal defence attorneys in Vancouver. Both have appeared before the Supreme Court of Canada on numerous occasions.
Peter and Steven also discuss the recent election of Donald Trump as the 45th president of the United States.
Lobat Sadrehashemi joins Peter Edelmann, Deanna Okun-Nachoff and Steven Meurrens to discuss issues in Canada's citizenship revocation and refugee determination processes. The recent controversy around Maryam Monsef guides our discussion.
Lobat Sadrehashemi is an Associate Counsel at Embarkation Law Corporation. She is also the Vice President of the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers ("CARL").
There are sound quality issues at some points in this episode. We're still getting the hand of this equipment.
CARL's reform proposals for Canada's inland refugee determination system and other aspects of the immigration system, which we recently submitted to the Ministers, their staff, IRCC, and the Immigration and Refugee Board can be found here.
Lobat's paper on Refugee Reform and Access to Counsel in British Columbia can be found here.
A discussion of the role of immigration on the Vancouver housing market.
Tom Davidoff is an Associate Professor at the University of British Columbia's Sauder School of Business. He is frequently cited in the Vancouver media as being an expert on Vancouver's housing market, and was part of a team of nine academics who created the B.C. Housing Affordability Fund proposal.
David Eby is the Member of the Legislative Assembly for Vancouver-Point Grey, and was previously the Executive Director of the British Columbia Civil Liberties Association. He is a passionate advocate for making Vancouver a more affordable place to live.
The questions that we discussed in the podcast are:
What has been going on in the Vancouver housing market? How fast have prices been rising?
Is there evidence that foreign investment / foreign funds has been the cause of the increase in Vancouver housing prices?
What data is there regarding the amount of foreign home ownership in Vancouver?
What is the property transfer tax, and what are the new rules on how it applies to foreign buyers?
Is there evidence that high housing prices impacts the rental market? Does it matter if the landlord is a Canadian or a foreigner?
Why should high housing prices matter? Why should people think that they should be able to live in a market that they cannot afford?
Should we move beyond the paradigm of valuing single detached homes?
What role do international students play in the increase in housing prices?
Does the fear of being accused of racism prevent government from addressing the issue of high prices?
Is real estate such an integral part of the British Columbia economy such that high prices are now "too big to fail?"
Should we move beyond the paradigm of valuing home ownership?
Dani Willetts joins Peter Edelmann and Steven Meurrens to discuss the decision making process at Canada's immigration department, her experience transitioning from a career working for CIC to being an immigration consultant, some recent cases impacting international graduates in particular with regards to the Post-Graduate Work Permit program, a recent Parliamentary report on the Temporary Foreign Worker Program, and the discovery that Canada has started negotiating an extradition treaty with China.
Dani Willetts is an immigration consultant at TDWImmigration. From 1989 - 2012 she worked in numerous capacities with Canada's immigration department, including as a Supervisor in Vancouver.
Marilyn Sanford joins Peter Edelmann and Steve Meurrens to discuss whether the Canada Border Services Agency can search people's electronic devices.
In addition, we discussed the recent stay of proceedings in the Nuttall decision, a well publicised case in which two individuals were charged with attempting to blow up the BC legislature. Marilyn was counsel to Mr. Nuttall, and provided her insights on the case.
Finally, Peter and Steve touched on recent developments in Canadian immigration law, including the Owner Operator Labour Market Impact Assessment recruitment exemption, a puzzling case in which the Federal Court upheld an officer's determination that people who extend their visitor status in Canada cannot complete short term courses during that extension without first leaving Canada, and the Supreme Court of Canada dismissing leave in the Torres case.
Jenny Kwan is the Member of Parliament for Vancouver East and is the New Democratic Party of Canada’s Immigration Critic.
2:30 – 16:13 – We talk about Bill C-6, the Liberal Government of Canada’s reforms to Canada’s Citizenship Act. Ms. Kwan both talked about what she likes and dislikes about Bill C-6. A specific concern that she has includes the procedural fairness afforded to those facing citizenship revocation due to misrepresentation. During this portion of the discussion we also briefly discuss the topic of language testing requirements for grants of citizenship, which Ms. Kwan believes is too stringent.
16:13 – 31:48 – Ms. Kwan explains that one thing that she hopes is urgently changed in Canadian immigration law is the current situation involving the cessation of refugee status. Ms. Kwan has introduced into Parliament Bill C-294, which calls on the government to end the automatic loss of permanent resident status when a refugee’s status as a protected person is revoked.
31:48 – 40:37 – Another topic that Ms. Kwan is passionate about is whether the Canadian government should let American war resisters / dodgers / conscientious objectors remain in Canada. Jenny believes that they should.
40:37 – 55:23 – As a member of the House of Commons Standing Committee of Citizenship and Immigration, Ms. Kwan shared her thoughts on whether certain vulnerable groups should be given immediate, and some would say preferential, access to refugee resettlement in Canada. Jenny proposed five actions that she believes Canada can immediately take.
55:23 – 1:03:08 – Peter and Steven discuss about Ouedraogo v. Canada (Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness), 2016 FC 810. In this case the Federal Court determined that an individual can be removed from Canada both during the 90 day restoration period and that they could be removed even after they have applied for restoration.
1:03:08 – 1:05:51 – Peter briefly mentions the BC Supreme Court decision in R v. Nuttal, 2016 BCSC 1404. This case involves a stay of proceedings being ordered after the court determined that police had entrapped two individuals into attempting to bomb the BC legislature.
1:04:41 – Finally, we wrap up by briefly talking about Pokemon Go.
Raj Sharma joins Peter Edelmann and Steven Meurrens to discuss marriage fraud.
Raj Sharma is the managing partner of Stewart Sharma Harsanyi. He is a well known commentator on immigration law. In addition to his active blog and numerous presentations that he has given at immigration conferences and seminars, he has written numerous op-eds on immigration, diversity and multi-culturalism that have been published in many manjor Canadian newspapers. He has debated Martin Collacott of the Fraser Institute and Centre for Immigration Reform on whether Canada accepts too many immigrants; Deepak Obhrai (MP and Parliamentary Secretary) on additional and stricter language requirements for citizens; David Seymour of the Manning Centre on whether Canada's new immigration policy is too exclusionary; Imam Syed Soharwardy on honour crimes in Canada; and a CSIS agent on the profiling of Muslims.
2:33 - 44:20 - We discuss marriage fraud, and how the previous government introduced several measures to try and prevent it. These measures included introducing a disjunctive test in which a marriage would not facilitate immigration if the marriage was not genuine or if the marriage had been entered into primarily for the purpose of immigration. It also included the introduction of conditional permanent residency, in which immigrants who immigrate to Canada as a result of a marriage or common-law relationship would lose their permanent resident status if the relationship broke down within 2 years of immigrating. Finally, the previous Conservative Government of Canada also introduced a five year spousal sponsorship bar, in which a permanent resident who immigrated after marrying a Canadian could not sponsor a new spouse or common-law partner for five years after immigrating.
Raj was a fantastic guest to have for this topic, given that he represented a Canadian citizen who sued the Canada Border Services Agency to compel them to complete an investigation into whether that person had been the victim of a marriage fraud. Raj during the podcast provided an overview of this case, Zaghbib v. Canada (Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness), 2016 FCA 182. Peter then raised the difficult question of “where do you draw the line?” If a Canadian can compel CBSA to remove someone from Canada for marriage fraud, can a company compel CBSA to do the same for a competitor where the Canadian company knows that that the competitor has engaged in foreign worker fraud? What about an average citizen trying to compel the Vancouver Police Department for visiting the Amsterdam Café and smoking marijuana?
44:20 - 49:30 - Peter discusses the ongoing detention situation in Canada, where immigration detainees are often held in provincial prisons. Minister Goodale recently wrote an article in the Huffington Post in which he set out a number of goals in immigration detention, but at the same time also provided justification for the ongoing detention. Peter also showed us a recent tender that CBSA has put out in which they are seeking feedback on alternatives to detention. After providing a brief overview of why people would be detained in Canada, we discuss what possible alternatives there could be. The word “Kafkaesque” makes its first appearance in the podcast, although I’m sure not it’s last.
49:30 – 55:13 Continuing with the theme of detention, we discuss the Federal Court’s recently certified question in Canada (Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness) v. Lunyamila, 2016 FC 324, in which the Federal Court asked whether it can usurp the powers of the Immigration Division to either order release or continue detention.
51:13 – 56:00 – Finally, we conclude by providing a statistic of how what percentage of people who submitted applications to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada had representatives.
Jennifer Bond joins Peter Edelmann and Steven Meurrens to discuss refugee resettlement and ensuring that legislation is Charter compliant.
Jennifer is a professor at the University of Ottawa's Faculty of Law, and is also a Special Advisor to Minister of Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship. Jennifer sat on the founding national executive of the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers (CARL) and is founder and current co-director of the University of Ottawa’s Refugee Assistance Project (UORAP), a multi-year, national initiative aimed at mitigating and researching the access to justice implications of Canada’s new refugee legislation. She is also the Faculty Coordinator of the University of Ottawa’s Refugee Hub, supervisor of the Refugee Law Research Team (RLRT), and a member of the Public Law Group.
00:26 - 21:31- We discuss international refugee resettlement law. Specific topics include whether countries are obligated to resettle refugees, Canada's commitment to resettle 25,000 Syrian refugees, and the role private sponsorship programs in the global refugee resettlement effort. Jennifer also explained the security screening that Canada undertakes when it resettles refugees, and how this security process compares to Canada's other immigration streams. Finally, we asked Jennifer for her take on what we discussed last week, which is in the wake of the BREXIT vote, the asylum crisis in Europe, the rise of protectionism and isolationism in the United States, and now the coup in Turkey, whether Canada can continue to buck global trends and remain a nation that loudly announces its intentions to continue to welcome a record number of immigrants and refugees.
21:31 - 35:50 - We discuss Jennifer's 2014 paper titled "Failure to Report: The Manifestly Unconstitutional Nature of the Human Smugglers Act," as well as the ongoing case involving the whistleblower Edgar Schmidt, who sued the Department of Justice for allegedly failing to report to Parliament whether new laws might be so inconsistent with the Charter of Rights and Freedoms they would trigger constitutional challenges.
35:50 - 39:47 - Peter and I discuss the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration's current exploration of Immigration Measures for the Protection of Vulnerable Groups. I pose the question of how history will judge us if, in the interests of not being seen to favour one group of refugee claimants over others, that group faces a similar result to the Jewish people during World War 2.
39:47 - 42:50 - Peter Edelmann and I discuss the recent misrepresentation decision in Lamsen v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration). There, the Federal Court affirmed that a visa application must be considered in its totality and that applications cannot be compartmentalized, particularly when making a finding of misrepresentation carries such serious consequences.
42:50 - 46:20 - The Government of Canada is currently proposing changes to NEXUS eligibility and what will lead to the cancellation of a NEXUS card. After providing an overview of the changes, we discuss how Canadians may soon be privileged travellers domestically within the United States.
46:20 - 49:30 - We wrap up by discussing the recent Supreme Court of Canada decision in Wilson v. Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd., and what it means for the ongoing standard of review debate.
In this introductory episode the three of us discuss recent developments in Canadian immigration law, as well as some recent news items and a specific case.
00:30 – 8:39 – We discuss how immigration policy in general has changed under the Liberal government, with a specific emphasis on the Liberal’s repealing the portions of Bill C-24 which revoked the Canadian citizenship of certain individuals convicted of certain offences related to national security.
8:39 – 19:03 – The conversation shifts to Donald Trump, BREXIT, and whether Canada under the Liberal government is bucking an international trend towards increased protectionism.
19:03 – 25:06 – In discussing immigration policy under the new Liberal government, we note that unlike under the Conservatives, where Jason Kenney seemed to be directly or indirectly responsible for all government departments related to immigration law, the Liberals are providing autonomy to the Ministers of each Ministry, and what impact that this may have.
25:06 – 38:50 – Peter Edelmann leads off a discussion on Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada’s current consultations regarding immigration levels planning in Canada. The discussion becomes a very philosophical one about whether centralised planning is necessary, what Canada’s population should be, and how Canada attempts to meticulously control permanent resident numbers while at the same time does not have an overall plan for how many temporary residents are admitted.
38:50 – 41:25 – Steven Meurrens provides a case summary of Sendwa v. Canada (Citizenship and Immigration), 2016 FC 216. In this decision the Federal Court greatly broadened the ability of Canadian permanent residents and citizens to sponsor their relatives. Canadian immigration law provides that a relative of a sponsor, regardless of age, can be sponsored by a Canadian citizen or permanent resident, if that sponsor does not have a spouse, a common-law partner, a conjugal partner, a child, a mother or father, a relative who is a child of that mother or father, a relative who is a child of a child of that mother or father, a mother or father of that mother or father or a relative who is a child of the mother or father of that mother or father. Traditionally IRCC interpreted this as requiring that the Canadian sponsor not have a living spouse, child, parent, grandparent, etc. However, the Federal Court clarified that this is too stringent, and instead stated that the law only requires that the Canadian sponsor not have a sponsorable child, parent, grandparent, etc. The distinction will likely be important for Canadians who either do not meet the income requirements for the parents and grandparents program, or whose parents may be medically inadmissible.
41:25 – 53:16 – Deanna Okun-Nachoff comments on how John McCallum, Canada’s Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, recently committed to “getting rid of silly rules.” She discusses some of the rules that she finds silly, including the Temporary Resident Permits issued to victims of human trafficking, and numerous quirks of Express Entry.