Canadians are increasingly told that tougher immigration rules equal a safer country. With Bill C-12, the Strengthening Canada’s Immigration System and Borders Act, now law, we are about to find out whether that is true.

We believe the opposite. The bill’s most consequential provisions will not stop insecurity at our borders. They will push it underground, where it is harder to see and harder to stop.

C-12 has two main issues that need to be corrected:

It grants the immigration minister and department broad new powers to cancel immigration documents based on an undefined “public interest.”

It denies a refugee hearing to anyone who crosses the border irregularly and fails to file an asylum claim within 14 days or who waited more than a year after first entry to claim asylum — retroactive to 2020. They may be shifted instead to a paper-based pre-removal risk-assessment process (PRRA), where successful applications are less likely.

Furthermore, PRRA decisions have never been subject to appeal before any specialized tribunal. As a result, judicial review in the Federal Court is the only avenue for challenging the decisions. The denial of hearings in C-12 is thus likely to increase the volume of cases in the Federal Court, placing additional pressure on an already strained judicial system.

There are four key steps that need to be taken to fix these issues: amend C-12 to define the “public interest,” thus replacing ministerial discretion with a rules-based framework; restore the right to a refugee-protection hearing; create an internal risk-removal appeal mechanism; and suspend the retroactive application of the one-year rule.

The problems are widespread

Bill C-12 grants the government broad new powers to cancel immigration documents held by students, those on temporary and permanent resident visas, electronic travel authorizations and temporary work permits — on the basis of an undefined “public interest.”

Immigration Minister Lena Metlege Diab has acknowledged that the lack of definition is intentional. The legislation deliberately avoids specifying when or how these powers will........

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