Close Roxham Road border crossing within 30 days, Poilievre urges | 24CA News

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre is asking for the federal authorities to shut the Roxham Road border crossing inside 30 days amid a rising inflow of migrants getting into Quebec irregularly and spurring calls from Quebec leaders who say their communities can not sustain with the tempo.

Speaking to reporters in Ottawa on Tuesday, Poilievre laid the blame for the surge of migrants squarely on the ft of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who he accused of encouraging irregular crossings at Roxham Road and never addressing a backlog of refugee claims.

The Conservative chief argued that Trudeau had already demonstrated Roxham Road could possibly be closed with out violating the Safe Third Country Agreement with the United States in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, and urged the federal government to take action once more.

“If we are a real country, we have borders. And if this is a real prime minister, he is responsible for those borders,” he stated.

The Safe Third Country Agreement requires asylum seekers arriving in Canada or the U.S. to make their declare within the first nation they arrive in and forbids them from first arriving in a single nation after which making a declare in one other. However, migrants who cross the border between official posts can declare asylum after they’re intercepted by police as they’re already on Canadian soil.

Poilievre’s feedback come as Quebec Premier Francois Legault this week known as on Trudeau to make the Roxham Road crossings a prime precedence for subsequent month’s assembly with U.S. President Joe Biden and to renegotiate the settlement.

He reportedly informed Trudeau in a letter on Sunday the pact has pushed asylum seekers to Roxham Road, and {that a} renegotiated treaty ought to apply to all entry factors.

2:09Quebec calls on Ottawa to sluggish stream of asylum seekers at Roxham Road

On Tuesday, the Globe and Mail printed an English-language letter by Legault the place he stated the variety of would-be asylum seekers getting into Quebec “has exploded,” pushing the province’s social companies to their limits. The premier additionally pitched different provinces to absorb a few of these migrants.

The public letter didn’t embody considerations reportedly expressed by Legault in his letter to Trudeau that the inflow of migrants is threatening the French language in Montreal, or his request for extra money to pay for the prices of caring for asylum seekers.

Federal statistics present that greater than 39,000 individuals claimed asylum after they have been intercepted by the RCMP crossing Canada’s land border into Quebec in 2022, in contrast with solely 369 in the remainder of the nation.

In complete, round 64 per cent of all asylum claims in Canada in 2022 have been made in Quebec.

Last yr’s numbers have been a pointy improve from 2021, when 4,095 migrants have been intercepted on Quebec’s southern border.

2:11Quebec calls on Ottawa to resolve Roxham Road disaster

Poilievre didn’t supply specifics about how you can tackle the immigration backlog — presently sitting at greater than 910,000 functions — however did say cash might be redirected from policing the irregular crossing to bolstering the authorized immigration system, which he stated would assist cut back wait occasions.

“We probably have the best immigration system in the entire world. But Trudeau is breaking it,” he stated.

In response to Legault’s letter to Trudeau, the workplace of federal Immigration Minister Sean Fraser stated Monday that Ottawa had transferred hundreds of migrants to Ontario to take strain off Quebec, including that the federal government was working with different provinces and municipalities to search out different non permanent lodging.

It stated it’s also encouraging individuals who wish to enter Canada to think about different methods to enter the nation.

— with recordsdata from The Canadian Press

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