Canada’s Asylum System is Outdated, says Authors of “Flight and Freedom”

This excerpt from the Toronto Star discusses the book Senator Ratna Omidvar co-authored with Dana Wagner in 2015, Flight and Freedom: Stories of Escape to Canada.

“Many refugees, like myself, live perfectly ordinary lives, until their home becomes the mouth of a shark that they need to flee,” summarizes Ratna Omidvar on the book she co-authored with Dana Wagner in 2015, Flight and Freedom: Stories of Escape to Canada.

Today, a member of the Senate of Canada, Omidvar had to flee Iran in 1981, a few years after the overthrow of the Pahlavi dynasty. Drawing from her own experience of flight, she wanted to capture the overwhelming fear refugees endure when fleeing persecution but also their perilous quest for freedom.

Composed of 30 short stories of refugees from all over the world, the book is a “historical sweep” that celebrates Canada’s history of refuge but is also a critique of Canada’s restrictive asylum policies in 2015. The authors point out that the asylum system has since opened up but is still outdated, rigid and discriminatory to a certain category of refugees.

To reinsert the personal into the political

The authors decided to write the book when Stephen Harper’s government implemented several immigration policies that closed doors to asylum seekers, including the Protecting Canada’s Immigration System Act (or Bill C-31). At that time, anti-refugee rhetoric was growing and asylum seekers were suspect.

Omidvar’s idea was to raise awareness and understanding of what refugees can go through.

“I wanted to reinsert the personal, which often gets lost in the political and the policy,” she says. “Even the most hardened people will react to the personal narrative of individuals and that may lead them to thinking differently about refugee policies.”

For Wagner, basing the book on individual stories allowed the readers to better empathize with the refugees’ hard choices, which sometimes included breaking the rules.

“There’s not one thing that I heard from these refugees that I wouldn’t have done for myself or my family,” she shares.

Instead of praising public figures of refugees, the authors wanted to shed light on the ordinary people, the “unsung heroes,” says Omidvar. They aimed to show that refugees are part of Canada’s national fabric — be it your neighbour, your teacher, or even your favourite musician.

Not a burden, but an opportunity

In their book, the authors highlight the contribution made by refugees in Canada, thus criticizing the image of refugees portrayed as a social and financial “burden” to the country.

“Each one of the characters has found their roots in Canada. They’re all out active in the life of our country, whether it’s culturally like Robi Botos or financially like Andrew Hidi,” illustrates the senator.

Wagner explains that hearing all these incredible stories of escape shaped her current works with Talentlift. The non-profit agency she co-founded aims to connect hiring managers with refugees that possess skills needed by Canadian companies and communities. According to her, refugees constitute a wonderful human capital that is highly underestimated.

“You can imagine the courage, ambition, and problem-solving skills that it takes for someone to have made a journey like that,” she says. “Refugees have been tested as a person in a sense that the rest of us have not been. They are accomplished people and it’s going to set them up for success,” she stresses.

Wagner says that a majority, if not all, of the refugees profiled in the book would have been excellent candidates for skilled worker visas, which would have avoided life-threatening journeys to Canada. She points out that new immigration pathways need to be built in order to create safer opportunities for refugees.

A better system in 2022?

Wagner says the asylum system is more open than it was when they wrote the book, as some restrictive policies and proposals are no longer in place. For instance, in 2019, the government ended the Designated Country of Origin practice, which added barriers to refugees from certain countries that were arbitrarily considered unsafe.

Omidvar adds that Canada’s response to the Syrian crisis was an unprecedented moment in Canadians opening their “hearts and minds” to refugees. Since the end of 2015 more than 70,000 Syrians have been welcomed to Canada.

“Ordinary people became private sponsors. It was just an overwhelming response,” remembers Omidvar.

The government also temporarily waived the refugee status determination requirement for Syrians, which is often a hurdle to obtaining asylum in Canada.

“We demonstrated that we are able to put aside old norms and patterns of protocols to switch to new, nimble forms,” says the legislator. “It shows that where there is a political will, there is a way,” she says pointing out that the government response to the Syrian crisis was an important part of the federal elections.

Click here to read the full article in the Toronto Star