Advertisement

Apologize to illegal immigrants recorded by Border Security reality program, then cancel show, lawyer says

A man puts his hand over a CBC News camera lens at a construction site in East Vancouver. The CBSA is drawing criticism for allowing a TV crew for the series Border Security to film an immigration raid at the site Wednesday.

As Canada deports the illegal immigrants scooped up in the now notorious Vancouver raid recorded by a reality TV show crew, critics continue to slam the government for allowing in the cameras.

The Tyee news web site reports Tulio Renan Aviles Hernandez was put on a late-night flight back to his native Honduras this week without being allowed to say goodbye to his Canadian family.

He's the latest in a group of eight illegals arrested when Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) officers descended on a Vancouver construction site earlier this month to be sent home.

That in itself isn't unusual. But the fact agents were accompanied by a crew from the National Geographic Channel's Border Security angered civil rights advocates and immigration critics.

On Thursday, a lawyer for the detained men demanded an apology from the show's producers, the CBSA and Public Safety Minister Vic Toews, who defended the agency's involvement in the series.

[ Related: Immigrant advocates protest reality-show cameras along for CBSA migrant-worker raids ]

Immigration lawyer Zool Suleman said the presence of the show's cameras and the fact Toews had personally approved the CBSA's co-operation was "stigmatizing, demeaning and dehumanizing" to his clients, the Tyee reported.

"My clients are not here for the entertainment of other people," Suleman said.

"The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act allows the minister to enforce the conditions of the Act; we are not in disagreement about that. But nowhere in the Act does it say you can demean, humiliate, stigmatize, or broadcast that whole process on television."

Amnesty International Canada, in a March 21 open letter to Toews, warned the depiction of the detainees on television could endanger the lives of some of them in their home countries.

"Some of the individuals who are filmed in the course of these raids might have attempted to seek asylum in the past, or may be intending to seek refugee protection in the future," the letter says.

"If such individuals are subsequently removed from Canada, they may face an even greater risk upon return to the countries they were fleeing, because of the publicity of their case through the television broadcast."

Amnesty also raised concerns about privacy related to the program and questioned claims by the show's producers that three detainees had signed consent forms — provided in Spanish — allowing their arrests to be shown in the future. Such consent needs to be fully informed and freely given, the letter says.

"Did individuals understand what they were agreeing to, and the risks they were taking? Did the presence of TV cameras intimidate people into granting their consent? Were armed CBSA officers present when consent was sought?"

Force Four Entertainment, which produces the show, issued a detailed statement saying no pressure was applied to the detainees to consent and no agents were present when they signed.

No footage from the March 13 raid, shot as part of production for the show's second season, has yet been broadcast and just because cameras recorded something doesn't mean it will end up in the program, Force Four said.

Besides, the producers said, Border Security isn't a reality show; it's a "documentary."

"... in absolutely no way are any situations orchestrated for the cameras. We only film events that are already taking place — and that would be taking place if the camera wasn't present."

The Conservative government, for its part, is doing what it usually does when it comes under fire, hunkering down to wait out the critical barrage.

Toews stood up in the House of Commons to defend the show as a way of giving Canadians an insight into the CBSA's work on their behalf.

[ Related: Should raids on illegal immigrants be reality television? ]

“It is important to remember that illegal immigrants cost law-abiding Canadian taxpayers tens of millions of dollars per year and it costs our constituents thousands of jobs,” said Toews, according to the National Post.

“We expect the CBSA to enforce Canada’s immigration laws by removing individuals who take advantage of Canada’s generous immigration system by jumping the queue.”

The CBSA also defended its involvement.

"The CBSA respects and adheres to the provisions set out by Canada's Privacy Act," spokeswoman Maria Ivancic said in an emailed statement, according to the Tyee. "Any action taken by the CBSA is done in conformity with privacy legislation and in accordance with Canadian law.

"At all times, our foremost concern is to ensure that operational, legal and privacy considerations are met. At no time has the CBSA divulged the names, images or circumstances of the individuals involved in the enforcement action of March 13, 2013."

Critics of the show have delivered a 20,000-name petition to Force Four's Vancouver production office calling for cancellation of the show, the Tyee says.

The cynic in me wonders whether all the publicity, adverse or otherwise, simply won't draw more curious eyeballs to the National Geographic Channel to check out what all the fuss is about.