November 21, 2022

2 • Challenging the expansion of powers for US customs and border agents and the CBSA at preclearance sites in Canada and at the border;2 • Opposing the closure of the Canada-US land border to asylum-seekers during the COVID- 19 pandemic;3 • Successfully suing Canada, alongside the John Howard Society of Canada, for laws governing administrative segregation that violated the Charter because they w. [...] Our joint position is that the agreements should all come to an end because of Canada’s international law obligations, the extensive evidence of harm caused by CBSA policies and practices, and the lack of independent oversight of the CBSA. [...] While CBSA makes the initial decision to detain, the decision to continue detention is under the jurisdiction of the Immigration Division of the Immigration and Refugee Board.27 Detention review hearings are quasi de-novo, which means that instead of reviewing previous decisions for potential mistakes, adjudicators take the findings of previous decisions at face value and only look for “clear and. [...] 7 and 9 Charter rights due to the unavailability of treatment.33 The audit also found that detention decision-making had strayed from CBSA’s mandate of ensuring public safety and the presence of persons for deportation purposes and called for greater transparency in decisions and rigorous detention reviews in alignment with the principle that release is the default position. [...] The treatment of vulnerable individuals in immigration detention demonstrates clear and inhuman violations to the rights to equality, liberty and security of the person, and the right to an effective remedy.