Public Safety committee  Thank you. I just wanted to say with regard to your first comment that we also deal with quite a lot of issues regarding temporary foreign workers, migrant workers, and we often see the abuse from employers. If people with closed work permits leave an abusive employment situation, they can very easily end up in detention and face deportation with no opportunity to make a complaint.

Public Safety committee  We work with vulnerable youth who may be suspected by CBSA of having been involved in gangs. In fact, a lot of people fear gangs, and sometimes these investigations reveal that the person is a victim and not involved. On things to do with organized criminality, does that meet the threshold of security?

Public Safety committee  We want a variety of solutions. We're very aware of the privacy issues and the difficulties associated with filing a complaint on behalf of someone without their consent. This would be done primarily when systemic issues are at play. People should be able to point out a tendency without necessarily naming anyone, particularly when a number of individuals see the same thing happening to our members over and over again.

Public Safety committee  Again, there can be a number of ways. Sometimes, it will be enough to shed light on practices senior management doesn't know about. Take, for example, the spit guard. When we raised the issue with people at headquarters, they were not aware of the circumstances under which this tool is used or how it's used.

Public Safety committee  In the case of a refugee claimant, whether they are detained or not, the Canada Border Services Agency has the power to intervene in the processing of their case to say that they aren't credible, among other things, which really amounts to challenging the substance of the claim.

Public Safety committee  Yes. As I mentioned, systemic racism is at the forefront of our concerns. Racialized communities are very much impacted by enforcement activities. Just from my own personal experience, when I do my work and we go into immigration detention, we see consistently a very high proportion of racialized communities, and particularly Black Africans, in immigration detention.

Public Safety committee  It depends on the outcomes we're talking about. I think that respecting human rights obligations is important for Canadians, as is respecting our own Charter of Rights, and not having intersecting oppressions of the most vulnerable and marginalized communities. I think there's a public interest in protecting the most vulnerable among us.

Public Safety committee  I have concerns, along with the other witness, about independence. While it could be beneficial to have greater internal reviews, I think what we need here is independent oversight and for the commission to take on many of these reviews. We're very concerned about whether the commission will be properly resourced.

Public Safety committee  Many of our members would certainly want to support individuals in making complaints when necessary and might have a role as an accompaniment or an advocate in helping somebody bring forward a complaint when they have consent. We see real limitations in the bill around, first of all, that requirement for consent, because of the many barriers, some of which I mentioned: fear of deportation, fear of detention, fear of not getting status and fear of being sent back for persecution.

Public Safety committee  Thank you to the committee for inviting me here today. I'm speaking on behalf of the Canadian Council for Refugees. It's a pan-Canadian umbrella organization of over 200 organizations that work in direct contact with refugees and migrants. Many of our members have lived experience of forced migration and intersecting oppressions.