Liberals cheapen citizenship
It’s time for some clear-eyed thinking about our immigration policies
The Toronto Sun
BY GORDON CHONG
FIRST POSTED: SATURDAY, MARCH 19, 2016 05:13 PM EDT
Canadian citizenship is the gold medal sought by global immigrants.
Now, our newly-elected Liberal government in Ottawa wants to have a bargain basement medal sale!
The sad spectacle of Immigration Minister John McCallum, a former senior bank economist, prostrating himself before the idol of identity politics, was infuriating and demeaning.
The Liberals want seniors exempt from citizenship language and knowledge requirements; the definition of a senior lowered from 65 years of age to 54 and the “family reunification” category of immigrants increased, while providing them with access to our social services and health care.
The Liberals are shamelessly pandering for votes in immigrant communities while ignoring the current 10-year visa which allows elderly family members to remain in Canada for up to two consecutive years at a time.
When I was a citizenship court judge, seniors were helpfully and leniently accommodated by using interpreters.
But this new soft-headed federal government wants to demonstrate its soft-heartedness by easing the rules to obtain our most treasured commodity, citizenship.
But should newcomers self-segregate and be functionally illiterate in English and French?
Should we establish a multitude of solitudes in addition to our “two solitudes”?
Should we discourage newcomers from “throwing their lot in with us”, as former federal court judge Francis Muldoon described unconditional commitment to Canada?
We need Canadians of conviction, not Canadians of convenience!
If citizenship is to be made irrevocable, a true “until death do us part” contract — unlike the Order of Canada, or an Olympic medal — then we should make the requirements reflect the unalterable nature of that contract.
Serious standards should be de rigueur.
When Paul Martin Sr. brought in Canada’s first Citizenship Act in 1947, he did not do so lightly.
He had visited the battlefields of Europe and solemnly recognized the contributions of French Canadians and others, including Japanese Canadians, Chinese Canadians, Italian Canadians and German Canadians, even though some were not recognized as “Canadians” in the same way as those of British descent.
Martin Sr. corrected that glaring oversight because so many had volunteered to fight for Canada — some on the battlefields, others in intelligence gathering — in World War II.
By 1947, Chinese inhabitants of Canada could finally vote.
In my family, there had been a dichotomy before that.
My British mother could vote, but my Chinese father could not!
The then Liberal government thought Canadian citizenship sufficiently precious that five years of residency was required prior to applying — with no flexible interpretations of “residency”.
In the 1960s, the residency requirements were shortened to three years with a looser interpretation of “residency”, to accommodate the business interests of those with international ties.
As their families were settling in, the business class immigrant (usually the husband] could leave the country and still be considered a “resident” because he had established a residence in Canada.
Our new-age Liberals are now proposing a change in the requirements for someone to be physically present in Canada from four out of six years to three out of five.
Why? The present rules are hardly onerous when granting something so valuable.
How much is Canadian citizenship worth? How much are we willing to devalue it? How soft-headed are we going to be?
Admittedly, revoking citizenship is challenging.
However, if the federal government is determined to keep dual citizenship, then those convicted of terrorism or other treasonous crimes against Canada should face the death penalty.
One way of extracting a seed of good from the psychotic nihilism that permeates terrorism would be to harvest the organs of convicted terrorists sentenced to death for transplantation and medical research.
Some faint-hearted souls may think this extreme. Many Canadians will not.
Serious, hard-headed, utilitarian leadership is the sine qua non for this debate. Who will lead it?
If patriotic Canadians willingly sacrifice their lives fighting terrorism, should traitorous Canadians not have to sacrifice theirs?
Then our policy will truly be once a Canadian, always a Canadian, irrevocably, right up to, “until death do us part!”
