Freda Hawkins

Canadian Immigration Policy and Management

Canada is now entering a new phase in immigration policy and management. This is due to a number of factors, most of which have affected other receiving countries, including anxiety about future population and economic growth, pollution, energy resources and ur? ban congestion, as well as the realization that present immigration policies and programs have very short-range objectives. In September 1973, the Minister of Manpower and Immigration, Robert Andras, an? nounced the creation of a Canadian Immigration and Population Study, whose staff would produce a Green Paper on immigration and population issues in the Spring of 1974 for Parliamentary and public discussion. This study is to be followed by a widespread public debate and a national conference on immigration leading, it is hoped, to a clearer public view of the options which lie before Canada in im? migration policy and population growth. It is also hoped that, as a fur? ther outcome of this study and debate, a new immigration act will emerge in final form. The outdated and inadequate Immigration Act of 1952 has, in fact, been redrafted by the bureaucracy a number of times without any decisive action being taken so far. As well as the Canadian Immigration and Population Study, an In? terdepartmental Committee is examining the proposals of a recent Task Force on Services and Programs for Immigrants, Migrants and Refugees and is expected to make recommendations to Cabinet in the near future. A significant amendment has been made to the Im? migration Appeal Board Act to enable the Board to function effectively, after being swamped by a mass of appeals. A major effort has been made to deal with the large illegal immigration movement, which has been building up since 1967, due to an unexpected loophole in the im? migration law and regulations. An amnesty was offered which brought in nearly 50,000 illegal immigrants who now have landed immigrant status. It seems likely that some useful adjustments will be made in the nine point immigration assessment and selection system in the light of recent studies. The Canada Manpower and Immigration Council created in 1967 ? a failure from the start, except for one active and in? dependent sub-committee known as the Advisory Board on the Adjust-

Canadian Immigration: A New Law and a New Approach to Management

The long-awaited Immigration Bill now before the Canadian House of Commons, together with a companion bill to create a Commission on Employment and Immigration, represent radical new departures in Canadian immigration particularly in the field of planning and manage? ment. The Immigration Bill is the immediate outcome of a three-year period of study and consultation by government on the desirable future directions of Canadian immigration policy. The new Commission, to be created through a merger between the present Department of Manpower and Immigration and our Unemployment Insurance Commission, is to be a central element in the Canadian governments new employment strategy. This strategy is intended to facilitate a more integrated approach to the planning and administration of employment, unemployment and immigration programs in Canada and thereby?among other objectives?to tackle in a more effective way the problem of persistently high unemployment in Canada, particularly in our less prosperous provinces. We have certainly waited a long time for this Immigration Bill. The idea of improving or replacing our basic statute in this field, the Immigration Act of 1952, has been on and off the agenda of successive federal governments for twenty years. The Act was a poor and illiberal piece of legislation which vested an embarrassing amount of undefined discretionary power in the hands of the Minister and his officials and provoked almost immediate disatisfaction on the part of those who had to administer it, the legal profession and others. In 1955, the then Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, J.W. Pickersgill, secured the approval in principle of Cabinet to make some substantive changes in the Act, but in the end no action was taken; and this was the first of a long series of half? hearted efforts to revise the law itself, all of which came to nothing. Since 1952, improvements in immigration policy and process?with very few exceptions?have always been made by regulation, since no government, minister or group of officials until recently has had the foresight or stamina to undertake the kind of review which began three years ago, or

Legislative and Judicial Developments: Canada's Green Paper on Immigration Policy

The Canadian governments Green Paper on immigration policy, mentioned in the Summer 1974 issue of this journal when its publication seemed imminent, was finally tabled in the House of Commons on February 3rd of this year by the Minister of Manpower and Immigration, the Honorable Robert Andras. As in Britain, Canadian governments produce green papers in order to initiate a national discussion on particular issues, and white papers when they wish to make specific policy proposals, often leading to legislation. According to tradition, therefore, this document has been presented as a discussion paper and does not make policy recommendations. Canadas Green Paper has appeared at almost the same time as the report of Australias National Population Inquiry, carried out during the past four years under the direction of Professor W. D. Borrie. Although the Green Paper comes in four volumes with eight supplementary studies, it has been written in a period of about fourteen months-the Cabinet originally envisaged a period of six months only-and is inevitably a document of less weight than its Australian counterpart. Nevertheless, both documents are vitally concerned with immigration as a factor in population growth and it will be exceedingly interesting to compare them. The purpose of this article, however, is to examine the contents of Canadas Green Paper and to reflect upon the circumstances in which it