Canada needs to figure out a transparent and equitable approach to distributing asylum claimants, writes Michael Barutciski.Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press
Michael Barutciski is a professor at York University’s Glendon School of Public and International Affairs and a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute. He recently provided testimony on the interprovincial distribution of asylum seekers before the Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration at the House of Commons.
Some good news about Canada’s Parliament: As the dysfunctional aspects of the government’s asylum policy have continued to produce historic levels of claims, even after recent corrective measures, and as the Official Opposition focuses more on criticizing rather than being constructive, another opposition party is filling the gaps.
Bloc Québécois MP Alexis Deschênes is currently guiding an initiative through the House of Commons’ immigration committee to adopt a responsibility-sharing scheme that would distribute asylum seekers across the federation. The Bloc is pushing this initiative because Quebec has received a disproportionate number of asylum claimants in recent years, straining local services and resources and exposing a lack of solidarity from the other provinces – a reality that is becoming clearer to more Canadians now that Ontario has become the province with the most asylum seekers.
Today, a disproportionate burden falls on central Canada; tomorrow, it could be the western provinces or the Maritimes. It’s clear that we need to figure out a transparent and equitable approach.
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It makes sense for the Liberal committee members to support this initiative and show they care about Quebec’s concerns, thereby highlighting the value of a strong federation when the country is facing potentially existential challenges. But the Conservatives have proven less enthusiastic, preferring instead to criticize the misguided policies and weak enforcement that created the country’s current asylum problem in the first place. The equitable distribution of asylum seekers appears to be a secondary concern for them.
While it is normal for the Official Opposition to use every opportunity to criticize the governing party, there are risks associated with this strategy. By not engaging constructively, they are missing out on the chance to show Canadians that they offer a different approach to governing than the Liberals.
One basic legal question needs to be addressed if the committee is serious about a new policy, however: Is the government correct in maintaining that the Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees asylum seekers the right to live anywhere in Canada? Section 6 of the Charter only enshrines mobility rights for citizens and permanent residents, and given asylum seekers’ status as temporary residents, they should not benefit from these rights. The idea is not to use physical force in relocating asylum seekers, but rather to provide firm administrative incentives so that they will not always congregate in the big cities.
But if the immigration department insists that other general Charter rights can contradict the precision of section 6, as its officials argued before the committee, it would illustrate the overly generous interpretation of rights that largely explains our various immigration policy problems.
Empathy has to go both ways. Migrants must always be treated with dignity, but the generosity of host societies also has to be respected.
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The next step would be to determine a fair distribution formula, and on this, Germany provides a useful example. Following the arrival of disproportionate numbers of asylum seekers who converged in urban centres, the German federal government now calculates the shares of asylum seekers that each federal state must accept according to tax revenues and population size. When a migrant claims asylum, an algorithm automatically assigns a reception centre in a specific region. Berlin, for example, is supposed to get 5 per cent of all asylum seekers for this year. Thanks to this scheme, the Germans have managed to distribute migrants across their federation.
Ottawa can play a role in encouraging local participation so that we are not sending asylum seekers to areas without reception infrastructure and services. Indeed, the weighting formula does not have to be limited to fiscal and demographic capacity if the goal is to secure provincial buy-in. Criteria can be included to balance legitimate government interests with the dignity of migrants.
As the immigration committee prepares its report on the equitable distribution of asylum seekers, it should consider a factor that’s even more important than the precise distribution formula: the notion of solidarity, which undergirds Germany’s system.
While our southern neighbours exhibit the opposite dynamic, with polarized red and blue states using migration to deliberately provoke each other, Canada can distinguish itself through a functioning Parliament that shows how a federation is supposed to work. Not only would the noble idea of solidarity relieve pressure in a practical sense, it would also signal that Canada remains strong at a critical time in its history.