Critics wary of migrant surveillance
Fear border agency plan for alternatives to detention could lead to privacy abuses
Wanted: An operator who can supervise migrants released from detention.
According to a tender notice posted on a government website by Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA), the successful bidder must also be able to enforce bail conditions, offer substance abuse programs, provide accommodation and hook up clients with jobs and education.
“The CBSA has been engaged in discussion with stakeholders on program renewal for alternatives to detention,” said CBSA spokeswoman Line Guibert-Wolff. “Our goal is to identify non-government areas of interest and expertise that may be able to provide enhanced alternatives to detention in the form of communitybased services and programming.”
Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale has been under fire in recent months after a series of deaths of detainees held in immigration custody, including Chilean Francisco Javier Romero Astroga, 39, at Maplehurst Correctional Complex in Milton; Melkioro Gahungu, 64, a Burundian migrant at Toronto East Detention Centre; and an unnamed 24-year-old man in Edmonton Remand Centre.
More than 50 immigration detainees at Lindsay’s Central East Correctional Centre and Toronto East began a hunger strike on July 11, demanding a meeting with Goodale.
So far, Goodale has refused to hear from the inmates and said his office has been exploring other alternatives to detention and trying to reduce the use of maximum-security jail to hold immigration detainees. However, he has been mum about the alternatives under consideration and the tender notice provides a glimpse into the minister’s vision.
While critics welcome the alternatives to detention, concerns have been raised over the broadening use of surveillance on migrants without status who are awaiting deportation.
“Though clearly better than detention, electronic monitoring remains an infringement of liberty and privacy. And I hesitate to embrace this alternative when the CBSA remains without independent oversight,” said Toronto lawyer Subodh Bharati, who has represented more than 50 immigration detention cases.
“What mechanisms will safeguard the potential for abuse and overuse, especially since it is easier to implement than detention? How will we ensure that vulnerable persons are not further stigmatized with electronic ankle bracelets currently reserved for criminals on parole?”
The End Immigration Detention Network has been asking Goodale to impose a 90-day limit on immigration detentions and an end to maxi- mum-security imprisonment.
“The only alternative to detentions is freedom,” said Karin Baqi, the advocacy group’s spokeswoman. “Electronic monitoring or bail program assumes that detentions are legally fair and judicially rigorous. They aren’t. Minister Goodale must meet with the detainees now, not allow CBSA to go off and create a private out-of-jail prison system.”
CBSA runs three of its own immigration holding centres in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver, but uses provincial jail facilities in the event of an overflow, or if an inmate is a flight risk, poses danger to others, has medical needs or is not likely to be deported anytime soon.
On any given day, some 400 migrants are held in detention in Canada, including more than 200 in Ontario jails.
Currently, immigration detention is costing Canadian taxpayers $239 per detainee per day and alternatives to imprisonment will be at a fraction of that cost.
A study by the National Immigra- tion Forum cited the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s own estimates of the alternatives as costing between 70 cents and $17 (U.S.) per person per day, compared to the $159 detention cost.
However, critics note that finding an operator to monitor released migrants is a tall order, hence the CBSA had to issue a second procurement notice after an earlier call made in May yielded no results.
The challenge, said Canadian Council for Refugees’ Janet Dench, is securing a service provider that has a national reach as stipulated in the tender, which closes on Friday.
While immigration detainees can currently access the Toronto Bail Program as an alternative, it is only available to those in the GTA and the acceptance rate is low.
“We welcome any alternative to detention, but we are concerned more measures will be used to put constraints on the liberty of migrants, with more reporting requirements, more curfews and surveillance,” Dench said.