Hon. Ratna Omidvar: Thank you, minister, for being here today. It’s good to hear about your successes. Everyone needs successes, and I want to congratulate you on them. However, I want to pivot our attention to the significant backlog of over 2 million people waiting in line for a response in every business stream of your department, from temporary work permits to renewals, to family sponsorships, to permanent residencies, to citizenship.

The complaint I hear most often is that there isn’t even communication with people waiting in line — not a peep. I want to ask you whether your government is making some effort to reach out to the customers — and I want to view them as customers — standing in line to let them know about the first response from you.

Hon. Ratna Omidvar: Senator Cordy, thank you for your sponsorship of the bill. Will you take a question?

The question of the drafting error, and fixing it, was raised in committee to the minister. Can you tell us what her response was and what her proposal and undertaking was to fix this error?

Senator Cordy: Thank you very much.

As you know, the minister explained that she did not want this holding it up. I know that some of the solutions that were provided — and I did read them in my speech — that we could have the solution in the next Miscellaneous Statute Law Amendment Act, through that process. We have done that. I know the last time was in 2017. When I hear that it was 2017, I think that we’re past due to have another one shortly. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was one very shortly.

We know that it could also be in the next budget implementation act. If it’s not there, and we don’t have the miscellaneous statutes, then perhaps you and I can get together and bring forward an amendment to the budget implementationact bill with that very item in it, or you could introduce another private member’s bill. Personally, I would rather go with either one of the first two that I mentioned.

Thank you for that.

Senator Omidvar: Senator Gold, yesterday we heard from Senator Simons about private sponsors being ready, willing, able, on standby and waiting for refugees to arrive. The issue is the caps on privately sponsored refugees that are put on by the government. In the last Syrian refugee crisis, the government lifted that cap.

Will the government also allow these caps to be lifted this time around? People are on standby and refugees are in need of help. It seems to be a simple, magical solution. Over to you, Senator Gold.