National Identity Card
July 12, 2005
OCASI Submission to the Parliamentary Standing committee on Citizenship and Immigration on February 10, 2003.
Introduction
OCASI was formed in 1978 to act as a collective voice for immigrant serving agencies and to coordinate responses to shared needs and concerns. OCASI is a registered charity governed by a volunteer board of directors. Our membership is comprised of more than 150 community-based organizations in the province of Ontario.
Background
The United States has recently imposed visa restrictions on entry to Canadian permanent residents from specified countries. These countries and people have been labelled because the United States considers them to be high risk for the commission of security related crimes in the US.
Canada has extremely strong, I would say excessively strong, security type processes it uses against persons considered a security threat. Permanent residents of Canada can lose their status and be ordered deported through a number of procedures in the Act which apply the lowest possible standard of proof and involve processes in which the accused is not permitted to know the full range of evidence held against them.
Often, the allegations against a person emanate from U.S. intelligence sources.
So the question becomes, why, given Canada's use of U.S. intelligence information and tough, excessive, security measures under the Immigration Act, does the United States need to screen permanent residents of Canada from designated countries before they enter the U.S.?
The answer, I believe is twofold. First, they do not trust our system of law and order. For the United States, despite the elaborate screening done before the granting of permanent residence, a screening often involving CSIS relying on US sources, they believe that a US official reviewing a visitor visa application will do a better job.
Second, they are sending a message. The message is as follows: the U.S. would rather not have that person, from that country, in their country. The risk, in their view, is too high and not worth it. So, the long lines for visa applicants will simply discourage permanent residents from travelling across the border to go to visit family or shop.
Racial Profiling
Now how does this relate to the National Identity Cards?
What is the difference for United States officials between a permanent resident who they can clearly identify as being from a designated country, and a Canadian citizen, identified as being from that designated country? The National Identity Card, in including the biographical details, alerts the United States to that person's country of origin.
It is only a matter of time before the United States expands the visa requirement beyond permanent residents to Canadian citizens from designated countries.
When this happens, as it will, we will have acquiesced to the creation of both a second class permanent resident and a second class Canadian citizen.
Privacy Commissioner
Privacy Commissioner George Radwanski has found no justification for a national ID card since it is an absolutely useless anti-terrorist measure. He has warned Canadians that they face intense scrutiny and loss of privacy.
OCASI believes that through intention or practice, racialized Canadians and immigrants and refugees in particular will be subject to extraordinary scrutiny and control through fear.
Recommendation
Reject proposal to introduce national ID card.