Taxpayers will be footing a $16 million annual bill to house deportees in Canadian jails, according to the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA). Blacklock's Reporter says this expenditure covers "compassionate detention conditions," including access to daily medical and mental health services, as the agency moves forward with retrofitting jails to accommodate those awaiting deportation.“The Agency will need up to $82.2 million over five years to retrofit and temporarily operate the designated immigrant stations,” CBSA revealed in a submission to the Senate national finance committee. The temporary detention program is set to run until 2029.CBSA emphasized its commitment to detainee care, stating, “The Agency remains committed to improving detainee well-being by ensuring safe, secure, and compassionate detention conditions with improved access to essential medical and mental health services.” The report, Supplementary Estimates (A), did not specify which facilities were being converted for this purpose.The facilities will offer expanded services with on-site medical staff, including doctors, nurses, psychiatrists, and psychologists, available seven days a week, the agency added.Last year, CBSA reported holding 1,662 foreign nationals in custody, primarily those considered a “danger to the public” or “unlikely to appear” at their deportation hearings. Detention periods averaged 16 days. Under current legislation, any cellblock can be designated as a temporary immigration holding station to manage public safety risks.However, a larger issue looms with 28,145 foreign fugitives, including 646 known criminals, who remain at large in Canada, according to data disclosed in April.In response, the federal government has proposed regulatory changes to allow the use of vacant cells in federal prisons for high-risk immigration detainees.“The government proposed amendments to the Corrections And Conditional Release Act and the Immigration And Refugee Protection Act to enable the use of federal correctional facilities for the purpose of high-risk immigration detention,” CBSA explained.“They are mostly public safety related,” Immigration Minister Marc Miller said on April 30. “Frankly there are people who are not entitled to be in this country. They have received due process upon due process.”Canada’s federal prison system has thousands of vacant cells available for potential use, with 16,382 penitentiary cells and only 13,054 inmates in custody as of 2022.
