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Ontario and the rest of Canada. For years Ontario had one of the most generous, but still very limited, funding for representation of refugee claimants in Canada.

Back in the early 1990s, when I started do refugee work, we had 16 hours to prepare the PIF's and an additional 16 hours to prepare for the hearing of the refugee claim. There also was additional time for administrative matters, 5 additional hours at each stage. This was a total of 42 hours to prepare a refugee claimant for their hearing. Time at the hearing was also covered as was travel time.

On February 16, 2012, Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism Minister Jason Kenney introduced legislation "to protect the integrity of Canada's immigration system." The Harper government minister proposed measures to" include further reforms to the asylum system to make it faster and fairer, measures to address human smuggling, and the authority to make it mandatory to provide biometric data with a temporary resident visa application."

Minister Kenney said in the prepared press release that "Canadians take great pride in the generosity and compassion of our immigration and refugee programs. But they have no tolerance for those who abuse our generosity and seek to take unfair advantage of our country."

There is a controversy raging in North America over Israeli Apartheid Week (March 1 to 7, 2010). A resolution was passed in the Ontario Provincial Parliament, which was unanimously supported (though only 30 MPPs voted), declared the comparison of Israel's treatment of the Palestinians to apartheid as "odious."

To quote an article in The Toronto Star, Canada's largest circulation paper:

"Progressive Conservative MPP Peter Shurman (Thornhill) tabled the motion Thursday to denounce the sixth annual provocative campus event that kicks off next week at universities and colleges in 35 cities around the world.

The Canadian Federal Court of Appeal, on June 27, 2008, reversed the Federal Court decision that had struck down the Safe Third Country Agreement with the United States. The Federal Court of Canada had overturned the "Canada United States Safe Third Country Agreement" in a judgment issued on November 29, 2007.

In his 124-page decision Mr. Justice Michael Phelan ruled that the Safe Third Country Agreement which came into effect on December 29, 2004 and regulated refugee movement between Canada and the USA violated refugee rights and that the United States did not meet the conditions required to be considered a "Safe Country" under the terms of the Agreement.