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Parliamentary Committee Demands Action On Canadian ‘Border Crisis’

REUTERS/Christinne Muschi

David Krayden Ottawa Bureau Chief
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OTTAWA — Conservative Member of Parliament (MP) Michelle Rempel came to an emergency session of the House of Commons immigration committee Monday with both barrels blazing. She ridiculed the Trudeau government’s apparently ad hoc approach to the growing “border crisis” and insisted this is not why Canadians elected the Liberals in 2015.

“This is a big departure from any immigration policy this government ran on,” she told the committee.

Rempel insisted the government produce a fully costed immigration plan that does include accepting illegal immigration as a fact of life. Although Liberal members of the committee defended the Trudeau government’s handling of the immigration file, Rempel may have won the day.

The committee agreed to hold two sessions over the summer and will invite key ministers in the Trudeau government to discuss federal immigration policy.

“I think it is completely unacceptable for us to normalize the government being able to expend hundreds of millions of dollars in a piecemeal fashion without having that broader conversation,” Rempel said.

Rempel also discussed how the illegals are showing up in large Ontario cities like Toronto and Ottawa, jamming the homeless shelters and crowding into university dorms that students will require within a month.

Federal Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen was not at the committee meeting. On Friday he accused the New Conservative government in Ontario of being “un-Canadian” because it objected to the influx of illegal immigrants and demanded Ottawa pay for a crisis it has created.

(RELATED: Trudeau’s Immigration Minister Objects To Calling Illegals “Illegal Border Crossers”)

In an email to CBC News, Hussen’s office dismissed the notion of a border crisis and said the government had a “clear plan” to deal with the ongoing issue of people crossing into Canada “irregularly.”

“Last month saw [the] fewest number of asylum seekers crossing the border irregularly in the past year. While these numbers are promising, Canadians expect all levels of government to work together to live up to our international and humanitarian obligations.”

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