Duane Hicks
Allows more
U.S. tourists
into Canada
In an answer to area tourism operators’ prayers, the Tourism Facilitation Action Plan announced Friday will make it easier—at least temporarily—for Americans who have minor criminal records to cross the border into Canada.
Starting March 1, Americans with a single indictable offence in their criminal histories, for which they served less than six months in jail, are less likely to be turned back at the border.
“If you were to look at what has been detrimental to the industry in the past decade, since 9/11, the criminal inadmissibility for minor criminality has been the number-one issue, even moreso than any kind of economic swings,” said Gerry Cariou, executive director of Sunset Country Travel Association, who was among the stakeholders on a conference call with Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism minister Jason Kenney, who announced the plan to them.
“It has been responsible for a number of things,” he noted. “Some businesses have been forced to close as a result of losing parties that were turned back at the border.
“It was enough to make the difference between being able to make the bank payments and not being able to make the bank payments.”
If a U.S. tourist meets the criteria under the Tourism Facilitation Action Plan, the direction for CBSA officers is to let that person into Canada after they fill out a temporary resident permit form.
There will be no fee.
“The way I see it is before they were looking for a reason to let them in. Now they have to look for a reason to not them in under this policy,” Cariou explained.
“The final decision is left up to that border official, but that border official is now guided by the new policy.”
Cariou said he feels the policy could change 70-80 percent of the turnbacks at the border for people who now qualify.
He noted the issue of criminal inadmissibility has been affecting not only tourism operators locally but the convention industry in big cities, and this certainly has helped draw political attention to the issue.
“We maybe weren’t being heard long enough,” Cariou admitted. “But once you add in the big cities and their convention business is affected, that was enough to reach a critical mass for the government, thankfully.
“It doesn’t change the law, so there is no increase in any kind of security risks here or anything,” he stressed. “It’s just sort of acknowledging that these admissibility laws were never meant to cause economic harm.
“Now, this hopefully will address that.”
Tom Pearson, owner of Camp Narrows Lodge on Rainy Lake and president of the Northwestern Ontario Tourism Association, agreed the plan is welcome news.
“We’re very happy the federal government has taken this seriously in Northwestern Ontario,” he remarked. “It’s been a huge detriment to our tourism industry.
“From what we’ve heard from Minister Kenney, it sounds like it’s good news.
“Hopefully, it will help a lot of people who have had trouble coming through at the border,” Pearson added, noting he feels “the laws aren’t there to keep the people out that have made one mistake.”
Kenora MP Greg Rickford has been instrumental in the new plan, and Pearson said he’s grateful to him.
“For 20 years, I’ve been talking to politicians and either they don’t listen to us or they don’t care,” he charged.
“Then Greg came along and it’s become an issue, and he’s been working hard on it.”
Pearson said he’s already seen the positive effects from the new plan. After Friday’s teleconference, he made a call and a deer-hunting party he had booked grew from four to seven hunters in size.
“That’s $6,000 more just from one phone call five minutes after that,” he remarked.
“Boom, one [call], three guys who had one offence in the last five years, and they haven’t been able to come for two years, boom, they’re on their way.
“It already starts.”
Kenney is expected to confer with the U.S. government, the Tourism Industry Association of Canada, NWOTA, the Ministry of Tourism, and local outfitters this fall to ascertain how effective the plan was.
