Integrating immigrants: too little too late

Last week in Calgary, Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, Jason Kenney, stated that immigrants to Canada are expected to learn either French or English if they wish to become Canadian citizens. Kenney stated, “Newcomers have a right to be different, but a duty to integrate”. The Minister complained that only about 25 per cent of new immigrants are taking government-funded language courses.

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Canada should count itself lucky that its immigrants are as integrated as they are. The country has been spared the type of immigrant enclaves that have essentially become no-go zones for everyone else in some major European cities. Nevertheless as admirable as Kenney’s integration hopes are, it is too little, too late. Since the 1970s and the introduction of multiculturalism by Pierre Trudeau, it has become exceedingly difficult to determine exactly what the Canadian identity is. While the province of Quebec has certainly retained a unique culture, the same cannot be said for the ROC (rest of Canada). Since multiculturalism took hold in Canada, any vestige of a Canadian culture has disappeared. If Mr. Kenney sincerely wants immigrants to adapt to a Canadian identity, he’s going to have to tell all of us; immigrants and those who are Canadian citizens by birth, exactly what that identity is. And if this Canadian identity is in any way tied to the country’s historical roots to Britain, well, good luck Jason. It is much too politically incorrect to mention the role that the English played in the founding of Canada. Any notion of an identity apart from multiculturalism will not be tolerated by the left in Canada. Multiculturalism rules the day and our culture is nothing more than everyone else’s culture. Last month the Dominion Institute issued a Canadian history report card. As far as grades go, four provinces received an “F” and no province received an “A”. Only four provinces; Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba and Nova Scotia require high school students to take a course in Canadian history. Most provinces teach “social studies” and with the exception of British Columbia, these courses do not mention the history of Canada. To demand that immigrants learn an identity that we can’t bother to teach most of our kids is ludicrous. Canadian citizenship doesn’t mean much anymore and too many immigrants become merely citizens of convenience. This first became noticeable during the 1990s when Hong Kong was about to revert to China. Many Hong Kong residents took steps to become Canadian citizens without any intentions of living in this country; they merely wanted an easy way out should life in Hong Kong become unbearable under Chinese rule. And we all remember the 2006 war between Israel and Hezbollah when Canadian citizens who were living permanently in Lebanon demanded that “their” government get them out of the war zone. The diminishing of what it is to be a Canadian citizen is not limited to those who were born outside of the country. Recently David Miller, the mayor of Toronto proposed that non citizens be allowed to vote in municipal elections. While Miller was born in England and used the tragic story of his mother who came to this country and couldn’t vote, his suggestion had a lot of support. The theory is that non citizens pay taxes and other user fees and should therefore be entitled to vote. It will only be a matter of time before non citizens are given the vote, not only municipally but provincially and federally as well. Jason Kenney’s comments about the integration of immigrants and their adoption of a Canadian identity sound good; it just has no basis in reality. Until we give up multiculturalism as a defining characteristic of Canada, what it is to be a Canadian will continue to decline.

Czechs withdraw their ambassador from Canada

Prague - The Czech Republic is withdrawing its ambassador from Canada, Czech PM Jan Fischer said on Tuesday morning. Canada has taken steps to curb the flood of asylum seekers from the Czech Republic. As of this morning any Czech citizen travelling to the country is obliged to obtain a visa. For the first 48 hours, Czech visitors will be able to apply for visa on arrival at Canadian airports. After that Czechs will have to travel to Vienna, Austria to apply for visa there, since there is no consular section in Prague. More...

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