The budget’s gender-based analysis forgot to look at one thing — men: Neil Macdonald

2017/03/29 Leave a comment

Valid question to ask, as no reason why GBA could not also look at areas where males are struggling or disadvantaged.

However, assertion that “women own government” and citing the figure that women form 71 percent of the public service ignores that women are overwhelmingly concentrated in support and admin positions (see my analysis Federal Employment Equity).

In terms of executive-level positions, the chart above shows that while considerable progress has been achieved, not yet at parity for the most senior positions (DMs and ADMs):

Every liberal, after all, is raised to believe that male privilege is the anchor determinant in our society, and that being born male — especially a white male — confers possession of the keys to society’s ignition.

And yet.

Here are a few things the budget’s gender-based analysis ignores, and might be worth addressing next time:

Women do much better than men in school.

That wasn’t the case even 20 years ago, but as Statistics Canada puts it: “Today, the situation is completely different. Education indicators show that women generally do better than men.”

The gap begins in kindergarten, where girls earn better marks than boys, and continues right through university.

“More girls than boys earn their high school diploma within the expected timeframe, and girls are less likely to drop out. More women than men enrol in college and university programs. A greater percentage of women leave these programs with a diploma or degree.”

If that trend continues, and there is no reason to believe it won’t, it isn’t hard to see what lies ahead: an increasingly uneducated and unemployable male population.

“It is quite troubling that increasing numbers of young men are dropping out,” says Philip Cross, former chief economic analyst for Statistics Canada. “They don’t tend to do well in public school, and they’re constantly told that if you don’t go to university, you might as well not be in our society, and they know they probably aren’t going to university, so they just drop out. An increasing number of men are not in the labour force and not going to school. This is not good.”

Women have not yet caught up to men in the private sector, but they own the public service, by far the single biggest employer in the country.

According to Statistics Canada, women not only comprise 71 per cent of Canada’s 4.1 million public sector jobs at all levels of government, but“gender parity now exists in the public sector with respect to women’s representation in leadership positions.”

Meaning that while women are still a designated group for the purposes of preferential hiring in the public service, they now have most of the jobs and at least half of the most senior jobs.

Cross puts it rather bluntly: “Women are overrepresented in government, and government jobs are the best jobs. Best job security, best pension benefits, best everything.”

Further, he says, women now dominate the feeder positions for all the most senior jobs in government.

The overwhelming majority of people who have lost their jobs in the resource sector out west and the manufacturing sector, mostly in Ontario, are men.

As Springsteen sang, these jobs are going, boys, and they ain’t coming back.

“There is a certain type of man who you wanted in the oil sands, out of town, blowing things up,” says Cross. “Those people still exist, and now they are jobless, and what do we do with them now?”

Exact figures are difficult to find, but Janice MacKinnon, a university professor and former NDP finance minister in Saskatchewan, says it’s a “staggering number.” And those jobs that do come back will demand higher skill levels.

She notes there is absolutely nothing in the budget’s gender-based analysis about those jobs, or what to do about their disappearance.

“Where’s the strategy on that?” she asks. “If you are going to look at gender, that’s fine, but there are areas where boys and men are struggling, and they need to be documented, too.”

MacKinnon even goes so far as to say that being a white male entering the current job market is a disadvantage.

Cross puts it another way: “Historically, our economic system has favoured men, but the trend is in the opposite direction.”

He would dearly like someone to ask the government why none of its gender-based analysis addressed any of the forgoing.

So I wrote one of the prime minister’s senior advisers to ask.

The reply: “It is a reasonable question to ask.”

But, um, no answer.

Source: The budget’s gender-based analysis forgot to look at one thing — men: Neil Macdonald – CBC News | Opinion

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Nova Scotia tackles racial profiling in stores: ‘It’s about a societal transformation’

2017/03/29 Leave a comment

Helpful initiative:

More than a decade after racial profiling was identified as a festering problem among some police forces, it is now being addressed in another sector: retailing.

After years of complaints about retail staff who routinely follow, search, ignore, insult and provide poor service to visible
minorities, one province has decided to do something about it in a big way.

On Monday, the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission launched a free, online training program aimed at preventing a problem that has sparked a growing chorus of complaints across the country.

National campaign planned

The 20-minute interactive course for front-line service staff — described as the first of its kind in Canada — has already attracted attention from businesses in other provinces and the United States, and plans are in the works to roll out a national campaign.

“As a proud African Nova Scotian and seventh-generation Canadian … I am acutely aware of the problems associated with navigating race relations in our society,” Rev. Lennett Anderson of the African United Baptist Association of Nova Scotia told a news conference at the Halifax Chamber of Commerce.

“The need for a campaign such as this is a desperate one … It is worthy of our celebration.”

Report showed poor treatment

The retail sector is Canada’s largest employer, with over two million people working in an industry that generated $59 billion in payroll in 2015.

Christine Hanson, CEO of the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission, said the need for such a training program was reinforced in 2013 when the commission released a groundbreaking report that concluded Aboriginal people and African Canadians more often reported being treated poorly by retail staff than did any other group.

“In fact, people from all racialized groups, including Asian, Latin American and Middle Eastern people, reported being treated poorly by staff far more than did white people,” the report said.

“In the focus groups, several participants commented on being made to feel ‘lower class’ or like ‘second-class citizens’ when shopping.”

Targets of offensive language

The report went on to say that Aboriginal people, African Canadians, and Muslims were all targets of offensive language and were treated as if they were physically threatening and potential thieves.

“A person who is a member of a visible minority group is three times more likely to be followed in a store, and four times more likely to be searched,” Hanson said.

The online program, called “Serving All Customers Better,” includes a quiz about immigration and visible minorities. It also cites statistics from the 2013 report and clearly spells out what the law says.

The course also cites some examples, at one point quoting a worker who said: “I worked for a retailer who said, ‘The eagle has landed,’ when a black person walked into the store. I quit my job over it.”

A cross-country issue

Examples of consumer racial profiling continue to make headlines across the country.

In October 2015, the Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario agreed with a woman who said she faced discrimination as a black person when she was confronted by a Shoppers Drug Mart employee who demanded to search her backpack on suspicion of shoplifting. The tribunal ordered the store to pay Mary McCarthy $8,000.

And in February 2015, Calgary university student Jean Ventose said he was racially profiled when he was followed by a security guard inside a local Walmart, apparently for no reason. He posted a video on the encounter on Facebook, which received more than one million views and 10,000 reactions in two days.

In August 2016, one of Canada’s largest grocery chains withdrew its appeal of a human rights decision that found an employee of Sobeys had discriminated against a black customer in May 2009 after falsely accusing her of being a repeat shoplifter.

Sobeys said it reached a settlement with the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission and would apologize to Andrella David, pay her $21,000 in compensation, and develop a staff training program on racial profiling.

The company faced a boycott by a group of 19 churches in the province.

Repeated racial profiling

As well, Nova Scotia’s first black lieutenant-governor, Mayann Francis, came forward to reveal that she, too, had been the victim of repeated racial profiling while shopping.

At the time, Francis said Nova Scotia was in a state of denial when it came to racial profiling, saying she had often been the victim of “shopping while black” since she left her viceregal post in 2012.

“It does not matter how successful you are, it still can happen to you,” said Francis, who had previously served as CEO of the province’s human rights commission.

“It’s just so wrong and so hurtful and I know how I feel when I’m followed in the stores … They’re stalking you.”

Source: Nova Scotia tackles racial profiling in stores: ‘It’s about a societal transformation’ – Nova Scotia – CBC News

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Lisée reproche à Couillard de faire le procès des Québécois

2017/03/29 Leave a comment

Denial or identity politics?

Le chef du Parti québécois, Jean-François Lisée, a livré une charge à fond de train, lundi, contre le gouvernement de Philippe Couillard, lui reprochant de mettre les Québécois au banc des accusés dans un procès sur le racisme.

M. Lisée réagissait à l’annonce, la semaine dernière, de la nomination d’un comité-conseil devant jeter les bases d’une consultation sur le racisme systémique.

M. Lisée a qualifié l’exercice de «procès en racisme qui va être organisé par l’État québécois contre les Québécois».

Selon le chef péquiste, le gouvernement libéral met en place tous les ingrédients pour faire ce qu’il appelle «une recette pour augmenter le racisme» en voulant se pencher uniquement sur le racisme et la discrimination, tout en refusant de mettre des balises sur les accommodements religieux et les signes religieux.

Le chef péquiste soutient qu’on ne peut «faire reculer le racisme au Québec» sans agir sur ces deux axes en parallèle.

Jean-François Lisée se dit convaincu qu’une consultation sur le racisme systémique ne pourra qu’«attiser le ressentiment de la majorité et soulever la colère de la minorité, parce qu’il y en a du racisme au Québec».

«Que ce soit M. [Justin] Trudeau avec son islamophobie, M. Couillard avec ses déclarations que tous ceux qui sont en désaccord avec lui alimentent la xénophobie, (…) cela fait partie d’un contexte qu’on essaie d’imposer aux Québécois pour les culpabiliser, les stigmatiser», a-t-il dit.

Filed under Interculturalisme, Multiculturalism, Racism Tagged with ,

Canadians Adopted Refugee Families for a Year. Then Came ‘Month 13.’ – The New York Times

2017/03/28 Leave a comment

Good long and nuanced read on the challenges of one Syrian family and their Canadian sponsors:

One year after Canada embraced Syrian refugees like no other country, a reckoning was underway.

Ordinary Canadians had essentially adopted thousands of Syrian families, donating a year of their time and money to guide them into new lives just as many other countries shunned them. Some citizens already considered the project a humanitarian triumph; others believed the Syrians would end up isolated and adrift, stuck on welfare or worse. As 2016 turned to 2017 and the yearlong commitments began to expire, the question of how the newcomers would fare acquired a national nickname: Month 13, when the Syrians would try to stand on their own.

On a frozen January afternoon, Liz Stark, a no-nonsense retired teacher, bustled into a modest apartment on the east side of this city, unusually anxious. She and her friends had poured themselves into resettling Mouhamad and Wissam al-Hajj, a former farmer and his wife, and their four children, becoming so close that they referred to one another as substitute grandparents, parents and children.

But the improvised family had a deadline. In two weeks, the sponsorship agreement would end. The Canadians would stop paying for rent and other basics. They would no longer manage the newcomers’ bank account and budget. Ms. Stark was adding Mr. Hajj’s name to the apartment lease, the first step in removing her own.

“The honeymoon is over,” she said later.

That afternoon, her mind was on forms, checks and her to-do list. But she knew that her little group of grandmothers, retirees and book club friends was swimming against a global surge of skepticism, even hatred, toward immigrants and refugees. The president of the superpower to the south was moving to block Syrians and cut back its refugee program. Desperate migrants were crossing into Canada on foot. Stay-out-of-our-country sentiment was reshaping Europe’s political map. In a few days, an anti-Muslim gunman would slaughter worshipers at a Quebec City mosque.

Ms. Stark and her group were betting that much of the world was wrong — that with enough support, poor Muslims from rural Syria could adapt, belong and eventually prosper and contribute in Canada. Against that backdrop, every meeting, decision and bit of progress felt heightened: Would the family succeed?

Ms. Stark’s most crucial task that day was ushering the Syrian couple to a budget tutorial. Banks were new to them. So were A.T.M. cards. Because the sponsors paid their rent and often accompanied them to make withdrawals, the couple had little sense of how to manage money in a bank account.

Some of Canada’s new Syrian refugees had university degrees, professional skills, fledgling businesses already up and running. But the Hajjes could not read or write, even in Arabic. After a year of grinding English study, Mr. Hajj, 36, struggled to get the new words out. He longed to scan a supermarket label or road sign with ease and had grown increasingly upset about his second-grade education, understanding how inadequate it would prove in the years to come.

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The ‘yes, but’ solution to religious conflict: Marmur 

2017/03/28 Leave a comment

Good column by Marmur:

It shouldn’t have needed a massacre in a Quebec Islamic cultural centre in January to rouse Canadians to show that they care for the safety of their Muslim neighbours. Mercifully, the initiative of Yael Splansky, the senior rabbi of Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto, did that by getting people of all faiths to form rings of peace around mosques.

It shouldn’t have needed the desecration of gravestones in Jewish cemeteries in American cities last month to move people to show solidarity with their Jewish neighbours. Mercifully, the impressive voluntary efforts by Muslims to restore the broken graves and their offers to guard Jewish burial places did that.

One of the explanations why Jewish-Muslim co-operation and mutual affirmation are so difficult in our time is because the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is in the way, however futile it may be for Jews and Muslims in North America to fight the battles of the Middle East.

Muslims and Jews here would do much better had they been acting according to the “yes, but” formula suggested by Peter Berger, arguably the most influential sociologist of religion in our time.

In an essay in The American Interest he writes that it’s possible to be religiously committed and yet have reservations, e.g., “I am Catholic, but …” In our context it should be possible to say, “I’m committed to Muslim-Jewish co-operation but I disagree with, or even deplore, the others’ attitude to and treatment of my co-religionists in the Holy Land.”

As much as I’d like all Muslims to publicly affirm that Israel is a Jewish state, I don’t need such declarations in order to co-operate with Muslim neighbours in Toronto or even in Jerusalem. After all, Christians and Jews have learnt to work purposefully together for the good of the society in which they live despite very different views about, for example, Jesus.

Yet disagreement on this and other issues that adherents consider to be fundamental doesn’t prevent them from working together in celebration of what they do agree on, and in the service of the society in which they live. They know that the perfect is the enemy of the good.

That’s why Jewish-Muslim dialogue needs Christians to show how, despite countless centuries of prejudice and persecution, it has become possible to co-operate and help protect each other. Christians are needed as catalysts in the Muslim-Jewish dialogue.

 The apparent absence of statements on behalf of faith communities in Canada in support of the motion M-103, which calls on the government to fight racism and religious discrimination, may have contributed to the opposition to it.

The sponsor of the motion, Liberal backbencher Iqra Khalid, is said to have received ominous threats from fanatical opponents and apparently now has special security protection. Some politicians also appear to be using Khalid’s effort as an excuse to rouse reactionary elements in society in the guise of legitimate opposition.

It’s possible the “Islamophobia” that figures prominently in the motion is too ambiguous and controversial a term. “Anti-Muslim bigotry,” as suggested by former Attorney General Irwin Cotler, might have been better.

Perhaps other language could have been used to clarify the intention of the motion. However, all parties could nevertheless support it by following Peter Berger’s “yes, but” principle: Yes, I disagree with certain words, but I fully support this effort to curb anti-Muslim bigotry.

More vigorous responsible religious voices might have injected much needed sanity into the debate. Surely, every effort to prevent attacks of the kind we’ve seen in Quebec, in American cemeteries and elsewhere is a religious imperative. M-103 can become yet another wholesome tool in the struggle.

Source: The ‘yes, but’ solution to religious conflict: Marmur | Toronto Star

Filed under Multiculturalism, Religion Tagged with ,

Job program for immigrants aims to fill labour gaps outside GTA

2017/03/28 Leave a comment

Good initiative:

Apoorvya Kapoor started applying for jobs in Canada even before she arrived from India last May, but none of the 200-plus resumes she sent out to GTA employers yielded a response.

Frustrated with the grim employment prospects, the new immigrant attended a job fair in Mississauga in November put on by the Peel Newcomer Centre and a staff member asked if she would consider relocating outside of Greater Toronto.

“You go to all these websites and 95 per cent of the job postings are within the GTA,” said Kapoor, who has an undergraduate degree in biomedical engineering and a master’s degree in hospital administration from India. “I just never thought about that.”

That’s the mindset the Peel newcomer service agency is hoping to change with an innovative program, called the Rural Employment Initiative, which aims to connect newcomers with job openings in smaller Ontario communities.

Currently, the program serves any employer outside the GTA, but ultimately it hopes to focus on communities with populations under 10,000.

“Youth from these communities are leaving for the big cities to study and when they finish school, they don’t go back,” said Oliver Pryce, the project’s co-ordinator.

“These communities have all these unmet labour market needs. We are hoping to fill these gaps with newcomers who are willing to relocate and work outside of Greater Toronto.”

The project is the brainchild of the Peel Newcomer Centre and the Ontario Association of Community Futures Development Corporation, a federally-funded group representing 61 rural communities. The employment initiative itself is funded by the Ontario Trillium Foundation.

Over the past year, Pryce has been reaching out to municipal economic development departments, local business sectors and employment services in smaller communities. So far, the project has already established partnerships in Huron County, Owen Sound, Thunder Bay, Windsor and Woodstock.

While local employers and stakeholders are committed to offering leads for job openings, the newcomer centre will provide the communities with diversity awareness training — and more importantly, screen newcomers and refer suitable job candidates to them for consideration. The program will also connect relocated immigrants with newcomer services in their new community.

Since the project shifted into high gear in November, it has received more than 100 job leads, drawn 90 newcomers interested in relocating and made three successful matches.

The jobs, many in the manufacturing sector, include auto parts production, mining, information technology, health care, project management and marketing.

“When a client (immigrant) comes to us, we make sure they understand what it means by rural and what it means to move to these communities. We give them the tools where to look for those opportunities in smaller communities,” said Pryce.

“We look at their family structure. When you move, it’s not just one person, but your family and children are involved. We look at their resumes and credentials to ensure their job readiness.”

Source: Job program for immigrants aims to fill labour gaps outside GTA | Toronto Star

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Fewer Canadians being refused entry at U.S. land border

2017/03/28 Leave a comment

Always important to have the numbers and data to inform discussion and debate, both the numbers of refusals as well as overall numbers of people crossing the border:

Fewer Canadians are being turned away at the U.S. land border in recent months despite mounting concerns that Donald Trump’s immigration policies are making it much harder to cross, The Canadian Press has learned.

Refusals of Canadians at American land crossings dropped 8.5 per cent between October and the end of February compared with the same five-month period a year earlier, according to U.S. government statistics

The total number of Canadian travellers denied entry also dropped: 6,875 out of 12,991,027 were refused entry, a refusal rate of 0.05 per cent.

Between October 2015 and February 2016, 7,619 out of 13,173,100 Canadian travellers were denied entry to the U.S., a refusal rate of 0.06 per cent.

About 180,000 fewer people attempted to cross the border in the most recent figures.

The figures, confirmed by U.S. Customs and Border Protection, contrast with recent anecdotal reports of Canadians denied entry into the U.S., with many placing the blame on the policies of the Trump administration, including its controversial attempts to ban arrivals from several predominantly Muslim countries.

A further breakdown of the border data shows a sharp drop in Canadian refusals at the U.S. border in the first two months of this year as 2,600 Canadian travellers were denied entry, compared with 3,500 for the same two-month period of 2016.

‘Much more cautious about crossing the border’

But Canadian immigration and civil liberties advocates caution the numbers don’t tell the whole story.

Immigration lawyer Lorne Waldman said he is fielding more calls than ever from people planning a trip to the U.S. and wanting to make sure they have the paperwork they need. The decreased rate of refusal could be just that people are now better prepared than they used to be, and so fewer are being turned away as a result, he said.

“People in Canada used to take it for granted that they could just go to the border . . . but that’s no longer the case,” he said.

Source: Fewer Canadians being refused entry at U.S. land border – Canada – CBC News

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Douglas Todd: The narrow view from the migration sector bubble

2017/03/27 Leave a comment

Todd on his experience at Metropolis (I had the pleasure of meeting and chatting with him, as I always find his columns of interest).

His critique about the Metropolis bubble could of course be repeated with respect to most conferences. As could his critique of attendees being dependent of government cheques. Being dependent on private sector funding doesn’t make one more objective.

However, all that being said, it is a valid critique that Metropolis does not include a wide range of perspectives in both the plenaries and workshops, something that the conference organizers, as well as individuals like me who organize workshops, should keep in mind.

As well as the general point that one should be mindful of one’s bubble, and make efforts to get outside it, whether as Todd did by coming to Metropolis or ensuring that one’s media includes a range of perspectives (the main lesson that I learnt working under former Minister Jason Kenney as recounted in Policy Arrogance or Innocent Bias: Resetting Citizenship and Multiculturalism):

I just spent a few days with Canadians who work with immigrants, refugees, international students and other migrants.

The almost 1,000 people at the 2017 Metropolis Conference in Montreal are on the front lines of an effort central to a country with arguably the world’s highest per capita in-migration.

Each year, Canada spends roughly $1.2 billion on the so-called “settlement sector.” Its mission is to assist more than 300,000 new immigrants and refugees a year while supporting 325,000 foreign students and more than 300,000 temporary foreign workers.

Migration is a mass phenomenon in Canada, unlike in most nations. Many settlement workers live in the cities that draw most migrants: Foreign-born people make up 23 per cent of Montreal’s population, 45 per cent of Metro Vancouver’s and half of Greater Toronto.

Workers in the settlement-sector form an influential Canadian subculture. One person at Metropolis affectionately referred to them as “activists with pensions.” Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen spoke twice and told them they greatly influence public policy.

I began wondering, however, how much these upstanding people represent the Canadian population. Do their values correspond at all to opinion poll results or with the issues Canadians follow through the media?

The vast majority at the taxpayer-funded Metropolis conferences live on government paycheques or grants. They are in the Immigration Department, the Heritage Department, public research universities and taxpayer-financed non-profit organizations.

Their theme is humanitarianism. Metropolis participants repeatedly said Canada should bring in more immigrants, refugees and foreign students, migrants are a “vulnerable population” and taxpayers should spend more on them.

Borrowing from Canadian scholars Keith Banting and Will Kymlicka, it’s fair to say almost all at the 19th national Metropolis event would be among the one-third of Canadians who unconditionally support multicultural, refugee and immigration policy. I did not hear disapproval.

They would definitely not be among the slightly smaller proportion of people that Banting and Kymlicka found at the opposite end; those opposed to Canadian-style immigration and multiculturalism.

It’s also not likely many attendees would be in the middle group of Canadians — the roughly 40 per cent (domestic and foreign-born) who generally support official multiculturalism, but with conditions.

Given what I witnessed, and the titles of hundreds of Metropolis presentations, critical discussion was muted. Orthodoxy seemed to reign.

It’s understandable. A lot of livelihoods, research grants and vested interests are at stake.

And, anyways, most attendees seemed keen on what they do. A few, indeed, seemed boastful.

There were basically only two things attendees would criticize.

Immigration Minister Ahmed Hussen told Metropolis delegates they greatly influence public policy. But to what extent do they reflect a cross-section of Canadians?

One was the alleged shortage of funding for settlement organizations, refugee agencies and foreign students. As a keynote speaker said, “We always have to do more.”

The second thing subject to criticism was the “media” and, by extension, Canadians themselves. Each was occasionally referred to as “tolerant” but more often chastised for being xenophobic.

Source: Douglas Todd: The narrow view from the migration sector bubble | Vancouver Sun

Filed under Immigration, Integration, Multiculturalism Tagged with ,

‘Indescribably sad and depressing’: A gallery of letters from Canadian pioneers and immigrants who absolutely hated it here

2017/03/27 Leave a comment

Nice counterpart and reminder that life has always been challenging for immigrants, particularly the first generation in earlier times:

If you were born in Canada, chances are good that your family tree contains at least one person who spent much of their life absolutely hating this place.

Despite our treasured national mythos as a promised land of wealth and opportunity, our history is littered with tales of people crying or screaming with anguish after taking their first steps in the True North.

A gallery of examples are included below. While many would learn to thrive in the new country, history books usually leave out the part where the mere sight of Canada sparked utter horror in new immigrants.

“As we sped across Ontario with its rocks, hills and tunnels, we were afraid we were coming to the end of the world. The heart of many a man sank to his heels and the women and children raised such lamentations as defies description.”
Ukrainian immigrant Maria Adamowska, describing her train journey west in 1899.

“I became anxious when I wondered what kind of a person would be here to greet me. He had a good physique like I had seen in his photo, but he was simple-minded. I was so sad — I despaired.”
Japanese immigrant Ishikawa Yasu, who came to Victoria in the early 20th century as a “picture bride”; a woman paired with a husband in Canada purely through photographs.
— Excerpted from Good Wives and Wise Mothers: Japanese Picture Brides in Early Twentieth Century British Columbia.

“She and the children left her husband. She said: ‘You can keep your Saskatchewan, I’ve had enough!’ She was a beautiful woman. She came from around Montreal. She often came over. She ranted and raved about her husband. ‘Isn’t it appalling of him to bring us to country like this! Freeze … did we freeze!’”
Saskatchewan pioneer Rachel Périgny-Desmarais, describing the departure of a neighbour.
— Excerpted from “Other” Voices: Historical Essays on Saskatchewan Women

“The Canadian prairie with its long winters and impermanent rectangular houses conveys something indescribably sad and depressing.”
Montreal-based German consul Karl Lang in a 1913 report warning fellow Germans against further immigration to Canada.
— Excerpted from A History of Migration from Germany to Canada, 1850-1939.

“I came because my daughter is here and I wanted to be close to here … but I am not happy here … I keep hoping that once I learn the language it will be better for me here. But the language is very hard. Sometimes I just cry because it seems I will never get it into my head.”
A mid-1970s interview with a Polish immigrant identified as Ludwiga.
— Excerpted from The Immigrants, by Gloria Montero.

“I don’t look lonely, do I? And I’ve been on the land all my life.”
Canadian Minister of Immigration Robert Forke attempting to reassure British journalists in 1927. At the time, many British households were receiving troubling letters from recently immigrated family decrying the loneliness of life in Canada.

“There are all kinds in this army of the disappointed; the thin, peaked-faced, unhealthy-looking east-end Londoner; the brawny man from Battersea; the sallow mechanic; the city tradesman; the clerk.”
From a 1908 report by The Globe describing unemployed British immigrants who had come to Canada with visions of “easy wealth.”

“When it was difficult to find work he would be cross with the children, even with me. I tried to understand the changes in him. I knew he was worried. But one night I couldn’t stand it anymore and I started to scream at him, to scream and to hit him. And you know what he did? He cried. My husband cried like a child.”
A mid-1970s interview with an Ecuadorian immigrant identified as Angelina.
— Excerpted from The Immigrants, by Gloria Montero.

“He will find at first that the travel and change of life will raise his spirits; then will come a period of depression, under the rough task of beginning in a new country, to be followed by the feeling of security of home and subsistence, which is the most solid blessing to a man.”
From an 1873 immigrant guide to British Columbia. That same guide warned women and “men not accustomed to rough work with their hands” to stay away.

“If the people knew what poor emigrants have to go through, there would not be many come to Canada. Though, thank God, I have known none, yet I have seen plenty of their miseries.”
An 1837 letter by an unknown author published in Great Britain to warn away future emigrants to Canada.

“After they landed, Mrs. Patterson used to tell that she leaned her head against a tree, which stood for many a year after, and thought if there was a broken-hearted creature on the face of the earth, she was the one.”
From an 1877 history of Pictou, Nova Scotia describing one of the area’s earliest settlers.

“Three months ago a Hollander committed suicide due to despondency and poverty and there’ll be more … There are a lot here who would very much like to return to Holland.”
A 1928 letter written to a Arnhem, Netherlands newspaper in which Dutch immigrants to Canada attempt to warn others from going to Canada.

“The central government, the provinces, and the railroads are all trying as hard as possible to win immigrants. They distribute brochures that praise Canada to the heavens. Care, particularly with regard to these publications, is strongly urged.”
Another early 20th century German government pamphlet warning its citizens to stay away. This one warned that “the greatest part of Canada is uninhabitable for Europeans.”
— Excerpted from A History of Migration from Germany to Canada, 1850-1939.

“Our host … had written to us to boast of the prosperity he had attained in such a short time. He said that he had a home like a mansion, a large cultivated field, and that his wife was dressed like a lady … How great was our disenchantment when we approached that mansion of his … it was actually just a small log cabin.”
Another entry by 1899 Ukrainian immigrant Maria Adamowska.

Source: ‘Indescribably sad and depressing’: A gallery of letters from Canadian pioneers and immigrants who absolutely hated it here | National Post

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The Deported: Hundreds of B.C. criminals without citizenship shipped out

2017/03/27 Leave a comment

Underlying logic undermined by blind application to those who have spent most of their life in Canada, where their criminality developed:

The 2013 legislation means any permanent resident sentenced to six months or more can be deported with fewer avenues of appeal. The old threshold was a two-year court sentence and more chances to appeal.

CBSA statistics show that the new rules have had the intended effect.

The total number of criminals deported from the Pacific region in 2011, 2o12 and 2013 was 174. Over the subsequent three years,  276 people were deported from the region for their criminal history.

Some have been high-profile gangsters like Barzan Tilli-Choli, of the United Nations gang, who was sent back to Iraq in January after serving almost eight years for plotting to kill the Bacon brothers. He came to B.C. as a teen in 1999.

Others, like Van Heest, suffer from serious mental health issues that contributed to their criminality.

Many of those affected have been in Canada since early childhood, but their caregivers never obtained citizenship for them.

“Somebody dropped the ball, whether it was the parent or the state if they ended up being a ward,” Golden said.

In Van Heest’s case, his family thought he was automatically a Canadian.

“By the time he was an adult and could have (applied for citizenship), he couldn’t because he had the (criminal) record and he was also dealing with a mental illness that was untreated,” Golden said.

Critics say the new rules are unforgiving and don’t look at the individual circumstances of those ordered out of Canada for criminality.

Conservative MP Michelle Rempel said she supported the legislation in 2013 and still supports it today. And she thinks the majority of Canadians do, too.

“The primary responsibility of legislators is to keep the Canadian population safe, so that’s really … why we made these changes in 2013,” she said.

Focusing on any specific case, including Van Heest’s, is the wrong approach, Rempel said.

“Where I think we go off the rails is when we look at one case in a vacuum, or talk about taking away the personal responsibility component from criminal actions.”

CBSA communications officer Kristine Wu said the agency places “the highest priority on removal cases involving national security, organized crime, crimes against humanity and criminals.”

“Everyone ordered removed from Canada is entitled to due process before the law,” she said. “Our position is clear: Once all avenues of recourse are exhausted, the person must leave Canada or be removed.”

One of those the CBSA is currently trying to deport is long-time Kelowna resident David Roger Revell, a former Hells Angel associate convicted in 2008 of conspiracy to traffic cocaine after a massive RCMP undercover operation targeting the biker gang. He was sentenced to five years.

Then in 2013, he pleaded guilty to two assault charges in a domestic violence case involving a former girlfriend and was sentenced to two years probation.

Revell, a father and grandfather who now works in Alberta, was born in England and was brought to Canada as a 10-year-old in 1974. Like Van Heest, he never got Canadian citizenship. Unlike Van Heest, his convictions are unrelated to mental illness.

Revell argued to the Immigration and Refugee Board last year that he never would have pleaded guilty in the assault case if he had known it would lead the CBSA to renew a review of his admissibility that had been on hold after the 2008 conviction.

“According to Mr. Revell, he pled guilty to simply put an end to proceedings that were requiring him to travel back and forth from Fort McMurray to Kelowna,” Immigration and Refugee Board member Marc Tessler noted in a July 2016 ruling. “According to Mr. Revell, if he had received a warning letter, he would never have pled guilty.”

Tessler agreed with Revell’s evidence that his deportation to England would have a “profound” impact on him.

“He has lived in Canada for 42 years and has only known Canada as home,” Tessler said.

But Tessler rejected Revell’s claims that his Charter rights had been violated and ordered him deported.

Revell has now asked the Federal Court to review Tessler’s decision. A hearing is set in Vancouver for May.

Revell’s lawyer Lorne Waldman said he plans to again argue that his client’s Charter rights would be violated by his deportation and that “Canadian jurisprudence should begin to acknowledge that it is just unacceptable to remove someone from the only country he’s ever really known.”

“The issue now that is coming before the court is: Are there circumstances in which it might be a violation of a person’s right to life, liberty and security of person to send that person away from a place where he has lived most of his life?”

Waldman, who is based in Toronto, said he has been inundated with calls from people living in Canada for decades who now find themselves in a similar situation to Revell and Van Heest.

“What they’ve done is they have significantly increased the number of long-term permanent residents that are being deported because the threshold now is so low,” he said. “It has had a fairly dramatic impact and that’s why we are seeing such a large number of cases now moving forward.”

Source: The Deported: Hundreds of B.C. criminals without citizenship shipped out | Vancouver Sun

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