Don’t leave them behind

For Canada’s 5,500 “legacy” refugee claimants, uncertainty about the future has long been a fact of their lives. The majority of them filed applications to stay in Canada in either 2011 or 2012, and have been in limbo ever since — with no assurance they will be allowed to stay in Canada.

Despite some efforts by the federal board that hears applications to address the backlog, the problem of application delays is likely to get worse before it gets better, since new claims keep pouring in.

How bad could it get? A recent government analysis concluded that, left unaddressed, the backlog could eventually result in a wait-time of 11 years for a hearing on a refugee claim.

Clearly, Ottawa can’t allow that to happen. That means the federal government should work swiftly to clear the backlog — starting with a practical approach to the legacy claims that takes into account the many years applicants have been living as lawabiding residents of Canada.

The problem began in December 2012, when the Harper government changed the rules. It required new refugee claims to be heard within 60 days, and left existing claims on the back burner.

Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Board allocated $3 million to address the backlog of legacy claims this past spring. It plans to schedule hearings starting in September, with the goal of hearing all 5,500 cases within two years.

Action on the legacy claims is welcome, but the two-year timeline is hardly the immediate response claimants are hoping for. As the Star’s immigration reporter, Nicholas Keung, wrote last week, many of them say they should be granted amnesty by Ottawa, which would mean immediate permanent residency status. This position is also taken by the Canadian Council for Refugees and the Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers.

Amnesty is not an unreasonable suggestion with respect to the legacy claimants, most of whom have already made lives in Canada. And given the enormous pressure currently on the Immigration and Refugee Board, this course of action could provide some muchneeded relief.

But it would not be a sustainable solution. Although granting widespread amnesty may be able to sweep away much of the existing backlog, it would not fix the root of the IRB’s problem, which is that it simply does not have enough capacity to deal with the volume of claims it faces.

The federal government needs to equip the board with additional resources so it can deal with the legacy cases in an expedited way.

That seems to be the course of action the IRB itself favours. Keung reported in February that the board intends to hold short hearings for those cases deemed “straightforward” to speed up the process.

Despite the $3-million investment and sound approach to the backlog, the chair of the IRB, Mario Dion, told CBC News that the board is still struggling to “close the gap.” It needs more help with resources, since “there is a limit to how much you can stretch one person’s time.”

The first step Ottawa should take to this end is to fill vacant Governor in Council appointments, which include — but are not limited to — vacant positions on the IRB. A government website shows that 42 IRB positions are currently vacant, up from 32 vacant or expired positions as reported by CBC News in late March.

The opposition has accused the federal government of failing to appoint people to all kinds of Governor in Council roles — which range from full-time government agency jobs to seats on tribunals and boards — in a timely way. In the case of the IRB, the impact of the delay is keenly felt by those waiting to have their cases heard.

What’s more, the longer Ottawa delays action on this front, the worse the problem will likely become.

A new backlog of more than 37,000 claims is expected to be in place as of the end of this year, due in large part to the surge in refugees crossing the land border from the United States. This makes it all the more critical for the government to act now rather than later.

It was an omission by the Harper government that left the legacy refugee claimants behind. It’s now up to the Trudeau government, which enjoyed a positive public response to its approach to the Syrian refugee crisis, to do better by them. Not to do so would be both unjust and cast a shadow over the future of Canada’s refugee claims process.

It was an omission by the Harper government that left the legacy refugee claimants behind. It’s now up to the Trudeau government, which enjoyed a positive public response to its approach to the Syrian refugee crisis, to do better by them. Not to do so would be both unjust and cast a shadow over the future of Canada’s refugee claims process