Canada is fast tracking a law that will allow for the deportation of permanent residents who serve sentences for crimes of six months or longer. The Bill C-43 'The Faster Removal of Foreign Criminals Act' will also streamline the deportation of convicted criminals by limiting their access to appeals. It is an even more Draconian version of the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act passed in the United States in 1996.
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Many human rights advocates and immigration attorneys have been expressing concern over many years about the current US law which has wrenched away family members who have long established roots in the United States and banished them home with no hope of return. They have urged that special consideration be given to parents of American born children and to those who grew up here and consider America home. Supported by a fellowship from the Open Society Foundation in NYC, the team of Joel Medina, a deported immigrant, Erin Siegal and Beth Caldwell have been researching the impact of U.S. deportation policy, beginning with the effects on U.S. citizen children now living in Mexico. http://www.soros.org/...
Calls for ending the pain and suffering that immigrant families have endured for decades with more reasonable policies in the interest of family reunification have fallen on deaf ears. In the face of high joblessness in these metropolitan countries and the vilification of criminal activity among legal immigrants, governments and citizens of these countries have taken the view that criminals should simply be sent home. It has also proven to be very politically popular to simply ignore the basic humanity of any permanent resident who commits any crime at any age with a simple, permanent solution.
In a story written in the Toronto Sun by Tom Godfrey, Toronto lawyer Mendel Green called the proposal heavy-handed, claiming it will have a significant affect on the immigrant community since many do not take out citizenship.
"I am concerned about the monumental affect this will have on the immigrant community if it becomes law," Green said Monday. "This will be a life sentence for many people."
Andras Schreck, vice-president of the Ontario Criminal Lawyers Association, said the bill raises constitutional issues under Canada's Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
"I am concerned that there is no right of appeal for those being deported," Schreck said. "This is serious injustice in that cases should be heard on their own merit."
Lawyer Joel Sandaluk said if the bill becomes law, it will split up families.
"This will destroy families who've been here for a long time," Sandaluk said. "It will create more criminals if parents or other family members are removed from Canada."
Criminality is a phenomenon that has existed in the human race from time immemorial, yet people who speak and look different and are considered 'foreign' are expected to be morally perfect in order to enjoy the benefits of permanent residency. If they should ever run afoul of the law, everything they have ever worked for and all the people they love will be ripped away from them forever. Many believe that citizens should be sheltered from foreign criminals and they blame lax immigration laws and weak border security for any act of criminality by a foreigner. Foreign criminals in particular trigger extreme levels of xenophobia, paranoia and intolerance, resulting in inhuman punishment for even petty crimes with no relief under the law.
According to the Canadian Newswire:
Canadian permanent residents who have been convicted of a single crime will be exposed to cruel and unusual punishment by a new law being proposed by immigration minister Jason Kenney which will see them deported from Canada without any right to seek a humanitarian appeal to Canada's Immigration and Refugee Board.
The conservative government of Canada has now tabled a bill which proposes that these "permanent" residents be deported regardless of the age they arrived in Canada, the time they have spent here, the impact their removal will have on their spouses or children, their positive contributions to Canadian society, or the hardship they would face in their country of origin.
For decades, these factors have been the cornerstones in deportation appeals to Canada's Immigration and Refugee Board which will now lose its jurisdiction to hear the cases of any permanent resident who has been handed a sentence of imprisonment of six months or more regardless of the nature of the crime committed.
"Our government is seeking to return to biblical times when sinners were banished to the wilderness for their sins without the right to ask for mercy" said veteran immigration lawyer Mendel Green of Toronto's Green & Speigel.
"It is unconscionable that a country like Canada, which has always allowed for second chances, to now embark on a new 'one strike you're out' approach" lamented immigration lawyer Guidy Mamann who has won many such second chances for his clients.
The lawyers claim that bill C-43 entitled "The Faster Removal of Foreign Criminals Act" is named as such to give the impression to the public that it targets foreign criminals who are seeking to enter Canada when, in fact, its main targets are lawfully admitted permanent residents many of whom were brought to Canada at a young age and who have been raised here, educated here, and who have established families and businesses here.
One recently deported young man who spent most of his life in the US and was recently banished home leaving his family behind could only express his wrenching agony through the words of Miranda Lambert from the song
The House That Built Me:
I know they say you can't go home again
I just had to come back one last time
Ma'am, I know you don't know me from Adam
But these hand prints on the front steps are mine
Up those stairs in that little back bedroom
Is where I did my homework and I learned to play guitar
And I bet you didn't know under that live oak
My favorite dog is buried in the yard
I thought if I could touch this place or feel it
This brokenness inside me might start healing
Out here it's like I'm someone else
I thought that maybe I could find myself
If I could just come in, I swear I'll leave
Won't take nothing but a memory
From the house that built me
Mama cut out pictures of houses for years
From "Better Homes and Garden" magazine
Plans were drawn and concrete poured
And nail by nail and board by board
Daddy gave life to mama's dream
I thought if I could touch this place or feel it
This brokenness inside me might start healing
Out here it's like I'm someone else
I thought that maybe I could find myself
If I could just come in, I swear I'll leave
Won't take nothing but a memory
From the house that built me
You leave home, you move on
And you do the best you can
I got lost in this whole world
And forgot who I am
I thought if I could touch this place or feel it
This brokenness inside me might start healing
Out here it's like I'm someone else
I thought that maybe I could find myself
If I could walk around, I swear I'll leave
Won't take nothing but a memory
From the house that built me.