NDP using immigrants as a ploy

On April 19, 2012, the assistant deputy minister (ADM) for Manitoba Immigration and Multiculturalism took it upon himself to send a call to action to a bunch of not-for-profit agencies in Winnipeg to come and, in his words, "witness a very important event!"

The event was the tabling of the resolution by Minister Christine Melnick at the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba to call on the Government of Canada to "immediately reverse its decision to cancel the Settlement Annex of the Canada-Manitoba Immigration Agreement with the provincial government." This, the ADM mentioned, was to "maintain the successful Manitoba immigration model."

What the ADM did was to overstep his responsibility as a senior civil servant. This was a demonstration of the "staff-activist" phenomenon endemic to the NDP-dominated civil service in Manitoba. The staff-activists are a growing number of NDP loyalists whose job is to enforce party policies at the ground level. They often hold junior or senior positions in government departments, or occupy staff and board positions in the not-for-profits agencies the province funds.

The NDP government has been unapologetic about its politburo style of governance, where its ideologically charged policies are imposed through "political commissars" and/or enforced by the so-called community activists operating within the ranks of staff and boards of the funded agencies.

The NDP style of governance in Manitoba over the past 12 years has undermined democracy. Democratic governance requires a non-partisan civil service that provides objective advice to the government of the day regardless of its political stripes. Injecting the ranks of the senior and mid-level civil servants, as well as the staff and the boards of the funded agencies, with party loyalists has more to do with building constituencies than with delivering objective and responsible public administration.

The summons issued by the Immigration and Multiculturalism ADM to mobilize opposition against the proposed changes to the Canada-Manitoba Immigration Agreement is a good example of the politically charged nature of the Manitoba civil service.

What's more disappointing about this affair is the Manitoba government's perpetuation of the myth that the Settlement Annex and the Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) Annex of the Canada-Manitoba Immigration Agreement have been successful. The PNP's success in skills recruitment is not true. The program has been most successful in attracting and retaining applicants with family connections to the province (the family stream).

When it comes to skills recruitment, the PNP has been described as a "lure and abandon" program. Qualified candidates to Manitoba often leave for employment elsewhere in Canada, due to scarce job opportunities in their field of expertise. The PNP candidates' inability to secure gainful employment is further worsened by lack of adequate and affordable housing throughout the province.

The NDP government's claim that 100,000 immigrants have come to Manitoba since 1999 may be a sign of a successful recruitment campaign, but it is not a proof of retention. The 25,000 new immigrants choosing to settle in rural Manitoba in Winkler, Morden or Steinbach are a result of a targeted recruitment by ethnic enclaves in rural settings, not a sign of a thriving and inclusive model of immigration.

As for the settlement-services component of the agreement, the Manitoba model of service delivery has been inefficient and wasteful. There are many overlaps in services, with the bulk of the financial resources sucked up by an overgrown Immigration and Multiculturalism branch, while the not-for-profit service providers are asked to deliver more and more with fewer resources.

The federal announcement to cancel the Settlement Annex and the PNP Annex of the Canada-Manitoba Immigration Agreement is not the end of the PNP or the settlement services in Manitoba.

It is simply transferring the responsibility back to Citizenship and Immigration Canada.

The Manitoba government's reaction to the announcement is nothing but fear-mongering by a group of entitled bureaucrats who aim to justify their own employment using the immigrants as a ploy.

Allan Wise has served with a number of settlement agencies in Winnipeg, and is a former executive director of Immigrant & Refugee Community Organization of Manitoba (IRCOM)

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition April 25, 2012 A11