On Parliament Hill

As we head into an election year one of the top concerns I hear about from constituents is the mess at Canada’s border and how it is undermining our immigration system.

Since Justin Trudeau threw open his arms to the world some 40,000 migrants have illegally crossed Canada’s border.

Justin Trudeau has created a two-tier system and turned the chaotic situation at Canada’s border with the United States into a permanent feature of Canada’s immigration system and (as usual) Canadians are paying for his mistakes.

To date, the Prime Minister has offered precisely zero solutions to reduce the flow of illegal border crossers into Canada and has instead chosen to spend $1.6 billion of your money to facilitate this abuse of Canada’s generous asylum system.

At every turn, Justin Trudeau has prioritized illegal border crossers over legitimate refugees fleeing violence, terror, and oppression abroad: people who desperately need Canada’s compassion and accommodation. As a result, the wait time for a refugee claim hearing has increased by a third, up to nearly two years.

This crisis has monopolized and backlogged the system, forcing the thousands of people following the rules, waiting to come to Canada the right way, to take a back seat.

Justin Trudeau has no problem putting a cap on the number of people being privately sponsored to come here. Last week hundreds of thousands of new Canadian families were outraged when they tried to sponsor their loved ones, but the Liberal Government shut down the sponsorship window on their website after only ten minutes.

It is shameful that the Trudeau Liberals continue to penalize and throw up road blocks for Canadians and permanent residents who are following the rules while at the same time granting amnesty and (literally) building a road for those who are coming here illegally.

Media outlets are now reporting that, starting this week, many of the more than 64,000 asylum seekers in Canada could be eligible for a new fast-tracked approach to processing refugee claims.

The Liberal Government claims the Immigration and Refugee Board’s new procedures include paper-based handling of claims – meaning the claimant wouldn’t need to appear in person before a refugee judge – and a new “short-hearing” process, which is supposed to take two hours or less.

The goal of the IRB should be to ensure full diligence in the review of asylum claimants, not to fill a quota.

Justin Trudeau wants to fast track processing for illegal migrants, but he slams the door on Canadians after ten minutes.

Moreover, recent reports have shown just how slipshod the processing of asylum seekers has become. There have been numerous reports of individuals who present a very real threat to Canadians entering Canada, being released and those under deportation orders being allowed to stay. This is in no way a negative reflection on our hardworking RCMP and CBSA members but rather an understandable, if not inevitable, biproduct of the chaos Justin Trudeau has created.

My office works with people trying to sponsor family members on a daily basis. Often, they have to wait months, even years to get a response from the Government.

Why is Justin Trudeau accommodating people coming from a safe country like the US rather than those who are truly vulnerable and in need?

Canada’s Conservatives will continue to hold the Liberals to account, to ensure this new shortened process doesn’t create a greater pull factor to Canada and prevent any further delegitimization of Canada’s asylum claim process.

If elected, we will stop the illegal border crossing crisis.

Conservatives support an orderly, fair and compassionate immigration system that both protects the world’s most vulnerable, and the integrity of our borders.

We will close the loophole in the Safe Third Country Agreement, regain control of our borders, and prioritize the world’s most vulnerable. We will continue to advocate for an immigration system that is planned, orderly and compassionate: A system that is worthy of the promise that is Canada.