Conservatives propose Bill C-12 amendment to stop mass extensions of visas

Conservative immigration critic Michelle Rempel Garner announced that Conservatives will be introducing an amendment to the Liberals’ Bill C-12 to ensure the federal government can’t use a loophole.

Source: Wikimedia Commons

Conservative immigration critic Michelle Rempel Garner announced that Conservatives will be introducing an amendment to the Liberals’ Bill C-12 to ensure the federal government can’t use a loophole in the act to mass-extend migration visas.

During a press conference in Ottawa on Wednesday, Rempel Garner laid out the Conservatives’ plan to add an amendment despite committee meetings on the bill having ended, and called for the Liberal government to reinstate in-person citizenship ceremonies for newcomers.

She said the amendment would “ensure that the Liberals cannot use extraordinary powers” set out in the bill to change, extend, or cancel visas or permanent residence cards on a mass scale, particularly to mass-extend temporary work visas.

“During the debate on C-12, officials were unable to provide concrete examples on how they intended to use the sweeping powers in Part Seven of the bill,” Rempel Garner said. “Conservatives successfully amended the bill to include a requirement for the Liberals to report to Parliament on how they use these powers and for the Minister to come to committee when they are used.”

She said Conservatives added a clause stating that the Liberals could not use their power to mass-convert temporary residence to permanent residence. Part Seven of the bill, as it stands, would allow the federal government to specify that certain immigration applications are “not accepted,” or to suspend or terminate their processing. It gives the government the power to cancel, suspend or vary certain immigration documents.

Rempel Garner said they are adding an additional amendment to ensure that this section couldn’t be used to cancel applications with the intent to extend visas or fast-track permanent residency.

She cited several recent stories for Conservatives’ concern over how the Liberals could mismanage the new powers the bill would grant them.

Statistics Canada recently revealed that it missed 38 per cent of non-permanent residents in its latest national census in 2021, and that the Liberals reported over one million temporary residents had expired visas and were expected to leave Canada voluntarily. Canadians are still left in the dark on how many temporary residents with expired visas left or were deported.

Another reason Rempel Garner cited as why Conservatives were adding an amendment after the committee study had already concluded was to guard against a repeat of concerns around the Liberals allegedly working to “speed up” citizenship applications to influence the outcome of a 1995 Quebec referendum on independence.

Conservatives and the Bloc Québécois voted to summon former prime minister Jean Chrétien for further questioning at the committee about the alleged use of immigration to sway the vote.

“Canadians need reassurances that those who are supposed to leave on expired temporary resident visas actually do. And frankly, the same goes for provinces whose healthcare systems and classrooms have come under great pressure after a decade of Liberal mass immigration,” she said. “If the Liberals have no plans to use the powers in C-12 to massively extend temporary resident visas, then they will support this amendment.”

The announcement comes after Conservatives proposed sweeping amendments to the border security act aimed at strengthening border security and disincentivizing immigration fraud.

Conservatives were able to pass several of the proposed amendments, including automatic termination of an asylum claimant who voluntarily returns to their home country, mandatory warrants for claimants considered to be security risks, and ending an individual’s claim if they’ve been deemed inadmissible.

Liberal and Bloc Québécois MPs voted against most of the Conservatives’ proposed amendments, such as automatically removing non-citizens convicted of serious offences and adding consequences for post-secondary institutions found to be facilitating false asylum claims.

“We put forward many proposals that I think that the Liberals will have to undertake eventually, proposals that have been put forward by experts and people across the country,” Rempel Garner said. “It was nice to see some cross-party collaboration with colleagues in different opposition parties to get some amendments forward. But again, we also saw the Liberals try to remove these, even the ones that we passed through procedural tactics in the House.”