Канада Жоғарғы Сотының «Синг ісі» және босқындар құқығы

Supreme Court of Canada constitutional case

Singh v Canada (Minister of Employment and Immigration), [1985] 1 S. C. R. 177 is a 1985 case of the Supreme Court of Canada. It determined that refugee claimants had a constitutional right to an oral hearing, by the principles of fundamental justice. The judgment was an early decision under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms and was also decided under the Canadian Bill of Rights. It had a significant impact on immigration law, human rights law, constitutional law, and administrative law in Canada. The Singh decision resulted in amnesty being granted to tens of thousands of refugee claimants and sweeping reforms which gave Canada one of the most liberal and most expensive refugee systems in the world. The anniversary of the ruling, 4 April, has been observed in Canada as Refugee Rights Day.

Canada took a strict view on immigration in the early 1970s. At this time the only way for a foreigner already inside Canada to become a permanent resident was through a claim to convention refugee status, and high numbers of claims led the Department of Employment and Immigration to believe that most were taking advantage of the system to stay and work in Canada. The department's resources were strained and there were delays in addressing legitimate cases. To alleviate this, the federal Parliament enacted section 71(1) of the Immigration Act, 1976, which stated that the Immigration Appeals Board (IAB) could refuse all claims that it believed did not have reasonable grounds on which to establish convention refugee status. Federal courts held that the applicant must demonstrate the probability of their victory in order to obtain a hearing, and this was upheld by the Supreme Court of Canada (SCC) in the 1982 case Kwiatkowsky v Minister of Employment and Immigration. Professor Julius Grey, the unsuccessful lawyer for the appellant in Kwiatkowsky, later stated that there had been immediate controversy over the Supreme Court's decision in Kwiatkowsky, refugee status being an area of law where life and death were concerned, and the summary removal of refugees could violate Canada's international obligations. The system favoured the interests of the government, and a series of government commissioned reports released in 1983–1985