Canada should reach out to ‘Dreamers’

Over the last 60 years, Canada has occasionally benefited from the errors of others. The Russian suppression of the Hungarian revolt of 1956 sent thousands of highly trained individuals fleeing the repressive soviet regime. Many came to Canada and made a profound impact on the nation.

Virtually the entire faculty of the premier Hungarian forestry department moved to UBC.

In 1972, Idi Amin, the Ugandan dictator, expelled all Asians and a sizeable number came to Canada after we made a special effort to provide them a refuge.

Within 20 years they were playing leadership roles in the economy, government and academia.

Beginning in 1978 and continuing into the late 1980s the so called boat people fleeing Vietnam were sponsored by countless groups across the nation. They, too, were industrious and hardworking and have over time started businesses and sent their children to school; these children have gone on to universities and technical schools.

The common factor in these three examples is that Canada, by providing a refuge for these people, gained an almost immeasurable benefit that will endure long after the original refugees have passed on.

Now, we Canadians have another chance to reap a significant benefit from the errors of U.S. President Donald Trump and the Republican leaders in Congress.

Together they have put at risk people who were brought illegally to the United States as children and who, having been raised in the U.S., are virtually indistinguishable from native-born Americans.

Unfortunately, through no fault of their own, they have no documentation to show they have a right to live a normal existence in the United States.

These are the so-called Dreamers who, until a few weeks ago, due to an executive order — the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) — signed by former president Barack Obama, were granted a reprieve from deportation.

Registration for the program was voluntary and some 800,000 took advantage of this opportunity to gain some normalcy in their lives.

They voluntarily provided their names and addresses, the dates they entered the U.S. and their school information and signed up for Social Security.

This information could be used to find them for deportation. The U.S. government, when collecting the information said it would not be turned over to Immigration and Customs Enforcement or Customs and Border Enforcement.

But now that Trump has said DACA will be cancelled in six months unless Congress acts to provide the Dreamers relief — they fear the information will be used against them.

Given the recent abysmal record of achievement by Congress and the sharp divide within the Republican Party regarding immigration policy, few observers believe something will actually get done in time.

Of the 800,000 Dreamers, more than 200,000 are attending institutions of higher learning or are recent graduates.

It’s that group of Dreamers the government of Canada should target with an offer for a limited time to immigrate to Canada.

Notification of this special short-term policy (until, say, June 2018) should be widely distributed through accredited institutions of learning with the clear admonition that submitting false or fraudulent information would result in a permanent ban against ever coming to Canada.

The wisdom of such a program of recruiting the educated Dreamers is self-evident. Canada is facing a looming shortage of trained workers as baby boomers retire in ever greater numbers.

The only short-term solution to this worker shortage is to import them and the Dreamers are ideally suited to solving this problem. Moreover, they would pay taxes needed to fund the pensions of the growing number of retirees.

The Liberal government can, if desired, mount an effective program and it would be certain to enjoy the wide support of Canadians as a humanitarian policy.

It’s unlikely that all 200,000 educated Dreamers would come to Canada, but whatever number did come would increase the number of self-motivated workers who have survived and flourished under very trying circumstances in the United States.

David Bond is an author and retired bank economist. Email: curmudgeon@harumpf.com.