Good on Mr Burney (note the typically spinning headline; is wanting fewer immigrants “anti-immigration”? and note the “conservative movement”–there is one?–sliming):

Former ambassador lends support to new anti-immigration group

A pillar of the Canadian establishment, brushing aside the risk he could become embroiled in one of the country’s most sensitive political issues, is endorsing a new organization challenging Canadian immigration policy.

Derek Burney [a day job here] is a former senior corporate chief executive, ex-U.S. ambassador, the one-time chief of staff to Brian Mulroney, and served as the head of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s transition team after the Conservatives won the 2006 election.

Canadian society, he said, needs to stop treating immigration as an untouchable “third rail” that can’t be debated without prompting allegations of bigotry.

So he’s joined the advisory board of an organization being launched Tuesday on Parliament Hill in Ottawa. The Centre for Immigration Policy Reform will be headed up by Martin Collacott, a former ambassador who writes frequently on immigration and refugee policy at the Fraser Institute, and James Bissett, a former director general of the Canadian Immigration Service [more here].

The Centre for Immigration Policy Reform argues that the benefits of high immigration aren’t worth costs that include considerable government expenditures and higher housing costs, pollution and crowding in big Canadian cities.

“Unfortunately immigration and refugee policy is a bit like health care in Canada,” Burney told Postmedia News.

“It’s being denied rational debate at the political level, and this is despite the very clear evidence of abuse of the system, of fraud in the system and a lack of co-ordination in the country in terms of screening.”

He says his major concern is that Canada’s economy has been chronically plagued by relatively low economic productivity, yet the large number of unskilled workers and family-class immigrants weakens productivity further [see "Starry-eyed about immigrants to Canada"].

Burney said politicians of all stripes refuse to discuss such concerns because some immigrant communities that lobby for high quotas of family-class immigrants are “very active” in federal politics [see "Multiplying like…"]…

The Centre for Immigration Policy Reform is an organization dominated by academics and former senior bureaucrats, many with links to Canada’s conservative movement [emphasis added, evidence only provided for one person, see below], who argue that immigration levels are far too high and that refugee screening policy too lax.

Canada has in recent years brought in roughly 250,000 immigrants and refugees annually, and since 1990 has accepted more per capita than any country in the world, according to the Fraser Institute [bit of a slime there, it's "according" to everybody].

There are also 300,000 or so skilled and unskilled “temporary” workers currently in Canada, of which 192,500 arrived in 2009. And the government admitted 79,500 foreign students last year.

The critics say Canada’s policy is essentially hijacked by self-interested groups — employer groups seeking cheap labour even when there’s high unemployment, lawyers, advocates and consultants in what they call the “immigration industry,” and urban MPs from all parties who depend on immigrant groups for political support [see "A Liberal’s Divided Priorities"].

They also cite statistics and reports, including several from federal government researchers, showing that Canadian immigrants since the 1980s have struggled economically compared to the average Canadian.

Others backing the new group include Gilles Paquet, a frequent public commentator and professor emeritus at the University of Ottawa’s Centre on Governance [a very bright, "credentialed" and non-partisan fellow], and Salim Mansur, a University of Western Ontario political scientist, columnist, former federal candidate for the Canadian Alliance party under Stockwell Day’s leadership [emphasis added], and author of Islam’s Predicament: Perspectives of a Dissident Muslim.

Collacott said his group is trying to avoid, rather than import, what he calls the “xenophobic” hostility today in Europe against immigrants and minorities. To do that, mainstream parties need to debate the issue openly, he said [see "Adrian MacNair: Adding to the immigration boom"]…

A nasty example of all-too-typical Canadian reporting.

Update thought: On the other hand our major media almost never identify Prof. Michael Byers, one of their darling go-to “experts”, as a former federal NDP candidate (more here). Fair and balanced? My fat flipping foot.

Mark
Ottawa