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Decentralized Democracy

House Hansard - 33

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
February 17, 2022 10:00AM
Context: House Hansard - 33 - Feb/17/22
Mr. Jasraj Singh Hallan (Calgary Forest Lawn, CPC)
  • Feb/17/22 3:00:36 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, 23 Liberal MPs' requests to help Afghan refugees were ignored. Liberal ministers were briefed months before Kabul fell. These warnings were ignored. My letters to the Prime Minister and the minister continue to be ignored. Afghan refugees write to the government every day pleading for help. They continue to be ignored. The Afghan crisis is another pattern of inaction and failure in leadership by the Liberal government. Why was an election plan and abandoning those that served Canada more important than the pleas of Afghan refugees?
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Context: House Hansard - 33 - Feb/17/22
Hon. Sean Fraser (Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, Lib.)
  • Feb/17/22 3:01:14 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, when that member first asked me a question about the success of our resettlement efforts in Afghanistan, there were 3,800 Afghan refugees in Canada. Today, there are more than 7,700. In the past few weeks, we have seen more than 460 arrive on 20 commercial flights. There are more flights arriving every week. We have made one of the most substantial commitments of any country in the world, not just on a per capita basis but in terms of the raw number of human beings that we are going to welcome and give a second lease on life. Canadians should be proud of the effort we are making and we will not waver until we are successful in resettling all 40,000 Afghan refugees who will call Canada home.
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Context: House Hansard - 33 - Feb/17/22
Hon. Sean Fraser (Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, Lib.)
  • Feb/17/22 3:02:31 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I think the hon. member will appreciate that, during the evacuation, there was an emergency situation and we responded as quickly as was humanly possible. One of the reasons, which I think the hon. member will appreciate, is that we no longer had a military presence with the logistics capability of moving thousands and thousands of people on our own because we had not had a military presence there since 2014. We worked with international partners to rescue thousands of people in the moments of the evacuation. I want to thank my predecessor, now the Minister of Public Safety, for his efforts to resettle thousands of Afghan refugees. I am going to finish the job.
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Context: House Hansard - 33 - Feb/17/22
Hon. Sean Fraser (Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, Lib.)
  • Feb/17/22 3:03:53 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I am the minister who has been appointed by the Prime Minister to lead this effort. We will collaborate with other ministers, including the Minister of Foreign Affairs, to help ensure we are successful in partnership with the global community to see this mission succeed. I heard members opposite heckling about the timing of the election when it came to the Afghan refugee resettlement effort, and I would point out how important that election was because we campaigned on a commitment to increase our level of ambition from 20,000 to 40,000. Their commitment on the other side, while they heckle, was to welcome precisely zero Afghan refugees. More than that, they campaigned to end the government-assisted refugee program altogether, which has been responsible for saving thousands of lives.
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