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Shameful. Seeking asylum is a fundamental human right under Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that Canada has voted for and signed. This supposed centrist government is literally trampling on the fundamental human rights and on Canada's own treaty obligations.
Shame shame shame shame on the minority Liberal government for proposing it and for any party that enables them to pass it.
Liberalism is only centrist when they decide to move left. Anyone who believes capitalism is a valid economic system worth protecting is right wing.
The number of new refugee claims Canada receives each year has surged in the last decade from about 16,000 to 190,000 in 2024, though it dropped significantly to 107,800 last year.
I know a lot of people are lamenting the change, but I can't help but read this line above from the article, and think about the findings from the recent auditor general's report related to Student Visa Frauds. The AG report noted that Canada's government had capacity to investigate 2000 fraud cases per year -- but that it received around 75000 such allegations per year.
A huge gap between how people 'wish' the country worked/functioned on that front, and the reality.
With a surge of more than 10x in a short period, our government is overwhelmed on this front. Just like our healthcare system is overwhelmed -- I've had relatives on wait lists for specialists for years at this point. Pretty much all of Canada's gov functions seem incapable of keeping up, even with bloated public servant numbers (under Trudeau, they hit a record of like 22% of working people working for public sector, iirc).
We need immigration of all sorts, but it needs to be managed at a level we can handle as a country. If our government can't even come close to processing their basic paperwork in a timely manner, it'd be crazy to think our other systems that require a whole lot more than pushing a button/admin paperwork, such as healthcare and housing, would be able to keep up with the increased demand. Putting in stricter conditions for refugee claims, given that the system is likely overwhelmed by the volume, makes practical sense.
At the risk of sounding like a tech bro...
I work for one of the largest banks in the world. The organizational inefficiency... incompetence... is staggering. That's a for profit hyper-capitalist enterprise. I used to wonder why banks keep needing bailouts. I don't wonder any more.
I don't want the government run like a business for 2 reasons:
governments are to provide services, not to make profit
BUISINESSES aren't even run well.
The operational waste, I can only imagine is staggering. I'd love it if actually smart people actually made improvements. Not just fucking McKinsey saying "fire 10% of people and necessity will breed efficiency"
It's my understanding that government run operations tend to be more efficient. Sure, you constantly hear about the waste, but who are you hearing it from? It's from capitalists who want to own it, because then they can profit from it, and them profiting from it implies that that money is being taken from the revenue of the operation.
Notice the Big 3 recommendations are always fire 10% and never cut C-Suite comp by 10%.
I can directly speak to the overwhelmed healthcare point. Conservative governments have consistently and deliberately underfunded and hamstrung healthcare in several provinces to make it easier to push for privatization. I have been in some of the meetings and heard it firsthand.
I was even in one meeting during covid where they planeed to announce creating a new long term care facility while explicitly telling everyone not to mention they were also closing two others.
I can directly speak to the overwhelmed healthcare point. Conservative governments have consistently and deliberately underfunded and hamstrung healthcare in several provinces to make it easier to push for privatization.
That's the exact same thing that's happening to the NHS in the UK.
Fuck globalization lmao, it doesn't even matter where you choose to live anymore everything's fucked. Welcome to Cyberpunk ~~2077~~ 2027
I can understand this, but I can't help but worry about friend of mine from Ukraine who came here through a work permit and has been trying to get refugee status since then at the risk of being sent back now that their permit has expired. They didn't apply as a refugee initially since they came here a few months before the invasion.
They've told me the struggles with the waitlists, and it just sounds so frustrating. I understand student visa fraud being an issue, but doing a blanket cutoff like this will put lives at risk.
Theoretically, the government canceling thousands of claims will reduce the waitlist for the claims they don't cancel. Hopefully they keep an exception for Ukrainian refugees, because Canada seems to be pretty good about supporting Ukraine if I'm not mistaken.
I hope your friend's claim doesn't get canceled and that they get to stay. It sucks for the rest of the people whose claims are getting rejected, but narrowing the scope might help Canada better serve a smaller, more manageable number of refugees.
Again, this is theoretical. I don't know the details. I just hope they're not rejecting any Ukrainians' requests for refugee status...
Bullshit. The government is wasting millions on defense, on oil and gas tax exemptions and subsidies, and on a whole host of other wasteful and pointless programs to benefit the capitalist class. Seeking asylum is a fundamental human right under article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. If claims have gone up, 10 times, hire and train more staff to handle them. There are communities in the Maritimes with staggering levels of unemployment, and the Trump tarifs are making us shed jobs. So the government could at the same time uphold Canada's moral standing AND give employment to Canadians.
Apparently whatever disease the US has is contagious.
I can definitely tell you that. The UK was fine up until a couple years ago. Now everyone seems more enraged about migrants here than those sensationalist stories I used to read about civil unrest in Sweden.
Major capitalist megacorporations are exploiting things behind the scenes in both countries. Canadian bureaucracy has just slowed it down more.
I am truly disgusted by this shit. What have we become?
The US, apparently.
With all the nonstop spewing about Nigel Farage over here, I am genuinely shocked you guys somehow got there so much sooner than we did.
So fuck the refugees but TFWs are fine? What the fuck, Carney? I don't care about how much the demand for refugee status has increase, those numbers can be directly subtracted from the amount of TFWs we bring in. They can complain about fraud all they like but IMO it's a ridiculous argument to make while ever corporations are allowed to scam our country with temporary foreign workers. I'd much rather high refugee numbers and immigration numbers than high temporary worker numbers.
Holy shit. Whaaaaaat?
Et tu, Bruté?
Most of the people seeking asylum are coming from places where U.S (and those that supported them, like Canada) are directly responsible for the economic instability. The civil wars. The dictators and corrupt governments that these people are fleeing from.
Why do they flee to other countries ?
Because we have a strong hand in creating chaos in theirs. Yet we deny them a place to live in peace.
Chickens always come home to roost.
I feel terrible for the people who were promised refugee status and now are thrown to the wayside. Why does this have to be retroactive? Is it really so important to ditch the last 6 months' refugees?
supported by Conservatives, backed by the Liberals, whispers from the NDP.
I've said it before and i'll say it again, our political system is a joke. We have conservatives, conservatives in sheeps clothing, and a party that hasn't had an original thought in its head since Jack Layton passed away.
Every time I go to the polls all I can think is "which type of shit am I more willing to tolerate eating this time?"
Hopefully the election of their new leader will allow the NDP to turn a new leaf
Wtf
Looking forward to seeing how the Carney supporters twist this one.
Quick edit to tell people to check out the Migrant Rights Network website and to get involved with them.
Something something PP would have been worse.
Which, yes, I agree, but this still isn't a good look.
The behavior of the liberals over the past decade or so made me wonder how and why did anyone think of liberals as being 'soft'. These guys have hearts of stone.
It's because what happened in the US is happening here. Both major parties are owned by the rich ruling class. We have two right-wing parties and neither of them care for actual people.
Stone? Whatever their hearts are, it’s something capable of being rotten. I just don’t understand why we thought electing the party that cancelled electoral reform, specifically because they’d lose if we had a real say, would actually give a shit about us. People get real aggressive with their speculation on what the NDP is and isn’t capable of but the Liberals keep showing us who they are those same people keep voting for them.
Embarrassing.
I voted liberal once and never again.
Wtf canada?