Refugee claimants 'political pawns' in N.B.-federal fight, advocates say
Federal minister says province could get more immigration spots if it’s ‘responsible’ on asylum seekers
Refugee advocates say that people fleeing desperate situations in their home countries are being turned into pawns in an immigration fight between the federal government and New Brunswick.
Ottawa slashed New Brunswick's allocation of so-called economic migrants in half earlier this month.
But the federal minister is offering to be flexible on those numbers with provinces willing to accommodate more asylum seekers while they apply for refugee status.
"Refugee claimants are yet again being used as a political pawn in conversations between different levels of government in our favourite Canadian game of jurisdictional hockey," said Aditya Rao, a founding board member of the Madhu Verma Migrant Justice Centre.
Last week's comments by federal Immigration Minister Marc Miller were "not necessarily the most productive way to talk about how we support refugee claimants," said Olivia Huynh, executive director of the Moncton-based New Brunswick Refugee Clinic.
"The conversation should really be about how do we provide people with the supports they need wherever they are in Canada, and not about exchanging refugee claimants for [Provincial Nominee Program] spots," she said.
While the federal government oversees immigration overall, it allocates some spots to provinces that they can use choose people for their job skills or because they can fill labour vacancies in some sectors.
Earlier this month, Miller cut New Brunswick's allocations in half in two such programs, the Provincial Nominee Program and the Atlantic Immigration Program.
In Ottawa last Friday, Miller said he could increase the numbers for provinces "that are willing to be responsible about taking on their fair share of asylum seekers."
The federal government has been looking for ways to help Ontario and Quebec cope with the disproportionate share of asylum seekers in those provinces by asking other provinces to accommodate more of them.
Last September, then-premier Blaine Higgs claimed Miller was trying to force New Brunswick to accept 4,600 claimants — beyond the province's ability to handle, he said.
Miller said at the time that Ottawa would provide funding and denounced Higgs's comments as "largely fictitious," though a federal document provided by Higgs included that figure.
The federal minister said last Friday that "a number of premiers have been irresponsible" and had "weaponized" the asylum seekers request, "whether it's for their own leadership campaigns or the elections that have been had over the last few months."
He did not mention Higgs specifically.
When Higgs made his comments last year, Susan Holt, then-leader of Liberals, said the PC leader was "trying to create division and fear … while playing politics with the lives of vulnerable people."
Now that Holt is in power, her provincial immigration minister, Jean-Claude D'Amours, has appeared cool to a deal with Miller on asylum seekers.
"We need to look at our capacity to have more people," he told CBC's Information Morning Moncton last week.
"At this time, what we are looking [at], and our need, it's really to have economic immigrants, and making sure that when we have someone in the province, it is to work in a field where we are in need."
A spokesperson for D'Amours said in response to Miller's comments last Friday that discussions are "ongoing" with Ottawa.
"While we wait to fully understand the federal government's proposal, it would be premature to offer any comment," Paul Bradley said in an emailed statement.
The back-and-forth is dismaying for the advocates who try to support refugee claimants.
"Some premiers think that they have the power to say they will accept no refugee claimants — which they don't have the power to do — and we have a federal government that thinks this is a chip they can use in larger political game," Rao said.
Huynh said it's easy to forget during political fights that the debate is about victims of torture, war, family and gender-based violence seeking a better life in Canada — and who are at risk if their refugee claims are not successful.
"It can be possible to lose sight of the fact that we are dealing with individuals and families who have experienced these really traumatic situations."
Rao and Huynh both said that any federal-provincial deal to have New Brunswick accept more asylum seekers would be moot, because the claimants are free to relocate to other provinces while their applications are adjudicated.
Often they move because they're able to find better support in larger centres, Rao said.
Huynh said her clinic in Moncton is able to meet the demand for legal aid services for the refugee claim process at current levels.
And it can meet even more demand provided it gets advance notice, accurate information about numbers and other key information, such as which languages the claimants speak, she added.
"I think it's unfortunate that the discussion about how we support refugee claimants has been tied to the PNP because they're two completely different streams of immigration," she said.
Rao said Canada has obligations under international agreements that all levels of government must respect.
"It's a less a question of who's right and more of a question of what's right?" he said.
"Refugee claimants have become a new political football, as if they are some sort of burden to be shared rather than a responsibility we have to protect."
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