LETTER

Migrants should get human rights protection

 

Kids of detained migrants shouldn't be in jail. In some cases, neither should their parents. Last year, University of Toronto researchers reported that some migrants are being jailed solely because the Canada Border Services Agency is waiting to confirm their identity. Some migrants who are suffering from mental illness are unable to access support, leading, in some cases, to tragic consequences.

What makes all of this worse is that if migrants feel their human rights are being violated by authorities, there's little they can do.

It is unclear whether the Canadian Human Rights Act can protect you if you are not "lawfully present" in Canada. The act only applies to those in Canada legally. It is unjust that the very law that Parliament intended to protect people from discrimination does not apply to some of the most vulnerable people.

Removing children from detention and providing access to human rights justice for foreign nationals held in detention centres require immediate redress - a situation we wish to raise with Parliament in the coming months.

In a compassionate country like ours, everyone, no matter their circumstances or how they ended up here, is entitled to basic human rights protection.

Marie-Claude Landry
Chief Commissioner, Canadian Human Rights Commission
Ottawa

NOTE: Ms Landry fails to consider that Canada and the provinces don’t provide adequate mental health services to anyone, including “proper” nationals.     – Ed.