1st Session, 42nd Parliament,
Volume 150, Issue 133
Thursday, June 15, 2017
The Honourable George J. Furey, Speaker
Citizenship Act
Bill to Amend—Message from Commons—Motion for Concurrence in Commons Amendments and Non-Insistence Upon Senate Amendment Adopted
Hon. Mobina S. B. Jaffer: Honourable senators, I rise today to speak to Bill C-6.
I want to thank Senator Omidvar, the sponsor of Bill C-6. She has worked tirelessly on this bill; I thank you for your work, Senator Omidvar.
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I also want to thank Minister Hussen for working with us on our amendments. Honourable senators, this bill has been debated for a long time, and all aspects of it have been debated. Our work has been really thorough and there are two important amendments that were accepted. One was an amendment on the fairer process, and that the review would go to the Federal Court before your citizenship is revoked.
Second was the protection of children. I want to once again thank Senator Oh for the amendment he brought on children’s rights.
Senators, I want to remind you what I had said in a previous speech. I don’t even remember at which stage that was now, because we have had so many speeches. In one of my speeches, I spoke about the challenges children face.
I want to tell you the story of Mohamed, who was a young refugee child. He and his mother fled from Somalia. It is a long story, but when he finally arrived here after many years, his mother could not apply for citizenship because she did not know English.
Mohamed tried very hard to get citizenship. His mother was traumatized and she did not have a waiver for language. Unfortunately, Mohamed also had to wait until he turned 18, as he was not able to obtain a waiver. Now, as a result of the hard work done by all of us, Mohamed will not be in the same predicament, nor will other people who are in the same circumstances.
Honourable senators, I believe that we have made sure that there is a fairer process for revocation of citizenship, and we have empowered children.
Now, it is time to vote.