June 2025

IRCC has more than 13,905 employees, with 42 offices across the country and 60 overseas offices. It is no surprise that transparency is difficult to achieve, both to the public and internally within IRCC. This month, however, we received the very first report from IRCC on its internal misconduct and wrongdoing. The report covers investigations completed in the fiscal year 2023-2024 into allegations of misconduct and wrongdoing by IRCC employees.

Based on the report, a total of 62 cases were found to have merit out of the 76 investigations completed. 37 out of the 62 cases were regarding ‘Administrative Misconduct’, which includes time theft, tardiness, absenteeism, unauthorized leave, insubordination, failure to carry out duties, and the misuse of government assets.

The other categories of misconduct cases, though fewer in number, are made up for by the seriousness of their nature. For example, one investigation reported that an IRCC case processing agent tried to bribe another employee to accept money in exchange for approving a study permit. Upon being informed that such a request violated IRCC’s Code of Conduct, the agent quickly fabricated a story to claim that another individual, to whom the agent owed money, had taken control of their laptop and requested the information. This agent’s reliability status (their security clearance) was revoked.

There were nine cases of harassment reported in the 2023-24 fiscal year. Three of these cases involve racist comments being made towards colleagues or during conversations. While racism is a grave matter in any context, in the context of a government department in charge of immigration, it is particularly disheartening and disconcerting.

One of the harassment cases was filed by a supervisor who filed a complaint several years after an incident where an employee made a death threat and coerced them into adjusting their performance appraisal, and accused them of being a liar. The supervisor, at the time of the incident, did not feel that the work environment was supportive enough to report the incident. In response to the harassment case, the entire branch, including employees and supervisory positions, received respective training.

In another case, an IRCC employee was found to have formed a social relationship with an individual they met at a residential facility for refugee claimants. It was found that this employee provided preferential treatment by coaching the claimant on how to engage with the Department and later co-signed the claimant’s car loan. IRCC suspended the employee without pay for creating a conflict of interest.

The report noted that 12 IRCC employees were found to have abused their system access privileges to check or request the status of files for themselves, family members, or friends. Some of these employees also attempted to expedite the processing of the file or requested that another employee make corrections to it. Some of these cases also involved serious privacy breaches.

IRCC states that the objective of this report is to “increase confidence in [their] systems of accountability, empower [their] employees to speak up, and to showcase the actions [IRCC] has taken to address misconduct and wrongdoing.”

The report undoubtedly exposes threats to the integrity and fairness of Canada’s immigration system. Still, it also encourages employees to feel empowered to report incidents of misconduct and wrongdoing without fear of reprisal. IRCC needs to strive for further transparency, not only internally but also to the public. Internally, it may be a misconduct, but behind each immigration application are hours of work, significant monetary costs, and families waiting anxiously for a response from IRCC.