Senior immigration official Roula Eatrides told a Commons committee the Canadian government is processing a staggering 200,000 asylum seekers with a backlog of 14 to 44 months. Conservative MP Arpan Khanna grilled Eatrides, appointed deputy chairperson of the immigration department's Refugee Protection Division (RPD) by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in 2019, on the overwhelming influx of newcomers seeking refugee status in Canada. Khanna at the Commons Immigration Committee asked what is the average wait time for an asylum seeker to be processed. “Currently it's 14 months,” replied Eatrides. “We’re funded for about 60,000 finalizations this year, but with the intake right now at over 200,000 claims, the wait time for a claim that's coming in now will be about 44 months.”“Months? Wow. that’s a big number,” replied Khanna, asking if she expects it to keep growing.“If intake keeps growing,” she replied. “About 70% of our inventory is about a year old, less than a year. She said this is “the highest volume that the (Immigration and Refugee Board) has had.
