6,000 Syrian refugees – is Quebec prepared to accommodate so many?
, Published on: November 8, 2015 | Last Updated: November 8, 2015 7:33 PM EST, Source
Since taking over as Canada’s immigration minister last week, John McCallum has reiterated the Liberal government’s intention to bring in 25,000 Syrian refugees by the end of the year.
He hasn’t said how, but experts agree it will be by military or chartered flights, or a combination of the two, from Lebanon, Turkey or Jordan, which together have taken in more than 4 million refugees.
It is hardly an impossible task — Montreal’s Trudeau airport, Canada’s fourth busiest, handles more than 44,000 passengers every day.
But what happens when they get here?
That is the question facing Quebec’s network of organizations tasked with housing, feeding, clothing, teaching and healing often traumatized refugees as they arrive in a foreign land at the beginning of winter with no fixed address.
If Quebec takes in 23 per cent of the 25,000 over the next eight weeks — or about 5,700, to match its proportion of the population in Canada — it will have to go into overdrive, says StÉphane Reichhold of the Table de concertation des organismes au service des personnes rÉfugiÉes et immigrantes (TCRI), an umbrella group for 140 community organizations in Quebec.
It may be a little rusty.
Over the last decade the total number of refugees resettled in Canada has dropped by about a third — from almost 36,000 in 2005 to 23,000 in 2014.
At the same time, both the federal and Quebec governments have strongly favoured privately sponsored over state-sponsored refugees. In the first case, family members or community organizations assume the responsibility — and expenses — of refugees. In the second, it’s the state that pays.
Nowhere is this trend more obvious than with the Syrians. About 650 privately sponsored Syrians have made it to Quebec this year, but only eight government-assisted refugees.
“For sure, Quebec has the capacity to absorb so many more refugees, but it’s been underused over the last few years,” said Reichhold, adding that 13 organizations across Quebec are mandated to take charge of government-assisted refugees.
“So if they get 5,000 Syrians over a few weeks they can’t do it alone. They need the help of public security, the Red Cross, the city and other organizations. And we have to deploy the resources.”
Lida Aghasi, the director general of the Centre d’aide social aux immigrants (CASI), the only Montreal-based organization that takes charge of government-assisted refugees, says it’s a daunting task, but it’s doable.
“We are preparing without knowing how many will come, or when they will come, or what kind of financing we will have. But we have the responsibility toward these people and we will do whatever it takes.”
Based on her experience bringing in waves of Kosovar refugees, then Afghans, then Iraqis, there will be no Christmas holidays for CASI staff.
“I remember when the Afghans came (in the early 2000s), I was in charge of research and was going to a conference,” Aghasi said. “My boss said ‘Cancel it — you’ll have to help with the moving. …’ This time around everyone will work. Even me.”
Aghasi said that it is not clear yet what proportion of the refugees coming to Quebec will end up in Montreal.
But there has been a recognition of late that in order for integration to be successful, refugees need to be able to count on family or community members who speak the same language — especially when so many arrive at the same time, with neither French nor English language skills. For that reason, Montreal received the biggest share of Iraqi refugees, she said, and will probably receive the most Syrians. Montreal has the biggest Syrian community in Canada — with about 17,000.
Now some of the Iraqis and Syrians who came to Montreal in recent months and years are working for CASI themselves, helping other Iraqis and Syrians settle in.
“We’ve trained them, but what’s more, they know the challenges,” Aghasi said. “They’ve been there.”
When government-assisted refugees (or GARs) arrive at Dorval, they are picked up by the YMCA, and housed temporarily at the YMCA residence downtown. The government also has agreements with certain hotels, which will provide rooms for refugees. But Aghasi says there are other options, too — abandoned schools and hospitals, for instance.
(The Vietnamese boat people were housed on army bases, as were the 5,000 Kosovars brought in under operation Parasol, who were split equally between Nova Scotia’s CFB Greenwood and Ontario’s CFB Trenton.)
Then the real work begins: finding an apartment, getting a social insurance number, getting a medicare card, moving the belongings, taking them on a tour of their new neighbourhood, going grocery shopping with the family, signing the kids up at school, signing the parents up for French classes, getting them a family allowance.
Many of them also need psychological counselling, Aghasi said, another reason to settle them in Montreal, where mental health services are available.
“We tend to get the most vulnerable clientele here,” she said. “With everything they’ve been through, the Syrian refugees will need a lot of help.”
Besides her own staff, there are about 100 organizations also mandated to help with integration services across the province, for privately sponsored and government-assisted refugees alike, including 18 in Montreal that offer services in Arabic. Aghasi said CASI has also received a lot of calls from Syrians and Quebecers wanting to help in some way, including many retirees.
She is working on putting together a central list of people who want to sponsor more refugees — over and above the 25,000 brought in by the federal government — or help by offering their time or donations, or even to house them temporarily,
“If we’re going to receive a big number of refugees, we’ll need the help of the community, especially to help with the language. We’ll need volunteers who can help them and reassure them.”
