Canada's immigration history one of discrimination and exclusion
The history of Canada's immigration policy has been one of exclusion. Today, the country continues to welcome some, but not others.
Debra Black, Immigration reporter, Published on Fri Feb 15 2013
Canada has a less than stellar record historically when it comes to immigration policy, having rejected or excluded Indians, Chinese, Jews and Blacks during various periods over the past century.
Today, the country no longer discriminates based on the colour of an applicant's skin or religion.
But simply having an immigration policy discriminates or excludes certain people in one form or another, says Harold Troper, an immigration historian at the University of Toronto and co-author of None is Too Many: Canada and the Jews of Europe.
The government rejects certain occupations, requires certain language skills, and makes immigration officers available in only certain parts of the world.
Without notice, in 2012, it also arbitrarily rejected a backlog of nearly 100,000 applications, representing 280,000 people, many of whom had waited years to come to Canada.
Every nation's immigration policy is written through an economic prism — it's all about what's good for the country economically, Troper says. That means someone will always be excluded or rejected.
“We don't have a turnstile and count people as they arrive and say ‘Keep an orderly line as you arrive,' “ he says.
“Certainly since Confederation, we've developed some kind of sense that, as our immigration ministers will tell you, admission to Canada is a privilege and not a right.”
Troper points to a series of notorious examples of past discrimination in Canada's immigration policy: the infamous Chinese head tax; the exclusion of black Oklahoman farmers from coming to Canada in 1910; the refusal in May 1914 of most of the 375 Indians aboard the Komagata Maru after landing in Vancouver, where the ship spent two months before it was ordered back to India; the exclusion of Jewish immigrants from the 1920s until after the Second World War.
These and other examples of discrimination paint a picture of a country — not unlike others around the world at the time — that was xenophobic and saw itself as an “Anglo-British outpost of British civility,” Troper says.
According to the Canadian Council for Refugees, specific measures taken by immigration officials included: an amendment to the Opium and Narcotic Drug Act to deport “domiciled aliens” with drug-related convictions (directed against the Chinese) in 1922; the prohibition of all Chinese immigrants in 1923; refusal of the ship the St. Louis, carrying 930 Jewish refugees, to land in 1939, forcing it to return to Europe — ultimately sentencing three-quarters of its passengers to death under the Nazi regime.
Perhaps the words of Canada's Director of Immigration Branch F.C. Blair — held responsible for the policy of not allowing Jews into Canada — best exemplifies the tone and atmosphere of the Canadian government in March 1938. Blair is quoted on the CCR website saying: “Ever since the war, efforts have been made by groups and individuals to get refugees into Canada; but we have fought all along to protect ourselves against the admission of such stateless persons without passports, for the reason that coming out of the maelstrom of war, some of them are liable to go on the rocks and when they become public charges, we have to keep them for the balance of their lives.”
Only after the Second World War did the doors to Canada begin to open — a least a little. According to Troper, officials in Ottawa were reluctant. Immigration authorities had “cut their teeth on the racist, racially-tinged immigration stuff of the 1920s and 1930s,” he explains. And they were in many ways supported by the Canadian public. Troper cites a Gallup poll in 1945 that asked Canadians who they didn't want allowed into Canada; their first choice was the Japanese, their second were Jews.
Despite these racist sentiments, there were cries for more labour from businesses to meet the needs of a postwar booming economy, forcing Canada to accept more immigrants.
After introduction of the 1952 Immigration Act, there was still room for discrimination. The act allowed for refusal of admission on grounds of nationality, ethnic group and geographical origin, and against homosexuals, drug addicts or drug traffickers.
Not until 1962 did the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration implement new guidelines removing most racial discrimination. In 1967, a points system was introduced and the last of racial discrimination was removed. Since then, the Immigration Act has been revamped and rewritten a number of times, including the most recent changes made by the Conservative Party last year.
That doesn't mean immigration laws welcome everyone.
“There are administrative policies (such as how many visa officers are assigned to different posts and how the processing is done) that may have the impact of excluding, although the policy intent is never expressed to exclude,” said Naomi Alboim, a Queen's University professor who specializes in immigration policy.
Regardless how many applications Ottawa receives, a set quota allows for about 250,000 new immigrants each year. Immigration policy-makers have to juggle who they let in and under what categories — skilled worker or professional, family member, skilled tradesman, live-in caregiver, sponsored spouse — within those confines, explains Alboim. Sometimes the number of immigrants allowed in under each category fluctuates, depending on the country's needs. She said recent changes by Ottawa — ending the Federal Skilled Worker Program with a plan to revamp it; closure of the Business Class; replacing parent and grandparent applications with a super visa; applying conditions to permanent residency for spouses; introduction of higher fluency and language skills in English and French — all point to a tighter border for certain immigrants.
“More or less the 250,000 figure has remained constant; but who is comprising that 250,000 is a much more exclusive group and it's not including a lot of people who would have been eligible to come to Canada in the past,” says Alboim.
Applicants from a lot of non-English-speaking countries will be excluded and Alboim questions that strategy. “I think it is very much a short-sighted policy of looking at immigration to fill immediate labour market needs. It's looking at immigration as a kind of employment agency process rather than a longer-term nation-building process.”
She points to Chinese immigrants, for example, many of whom will be excluded because they don't speak English well. “Do we really want the number of Chinese immigrants to go down significantly when trade with China is so important?”
Alboim believes the kind of people Canada needs are not just those who can fill a job now, but who can “adapt and develop to fill different jobs as they evolve and, most important, will stay in the country and have children and grandchildren and contribute.
“When you allow people to bring in their spouses, their parents, it means they will stay here, spend money here, invest in the country and the future of the country, and they will look to their children as their future here rather than abroad.”
http://www.thestar.com/news/immigration/2013/02/15/canadas_immigration_history_one_of_discrimination_and_exclusion.html
The history of Canada's immigration policy has been one of exclusion. Today, the country continues to welcome some, but not others.
Debra Black, Immigration reporter, Published on Fri Feb 15 2013
Canada has a less than stellar record historically when it comes to immigration policy, having rejected or excluded Indians, Chinese, Jews and Blacks during various periods over the past century.
Today, the country no longer discriminates based on the colour of an applicant's skin or religion.
But simply having an immigration policy discriminates or excludes certain people in one form or another, says Harold Troper, an immigration historian at the University of Toronto and co-author of None is Too Many: Canada and the Jews of Europe.
The government rejects certain occupations, requires certain language skills, and makes immigration officers available in only certain parts of the world.
Without notice, in 2012, it also arbitrarily rejected a backlog of nearly 100,000 applications, representing 280,000 people, many of whom had waited years to come to Canada.
Every nation's immigration policy is written through an economic prism — it's all about what's good for the country economically, Troper says. That means someone will always be excluded or rejected.
“We don't have a turnstile and count people as they arrive and say ‘Keep an orderly line as you arrive,' “ he says.
“Certainly since Confederation, we've developed some kind of sense that, as our immigration ministers will tell you, admission to Canada is a privilege and not a right.”
Troper points to a series of notorious examples of past discrimination in Canada's immigration policy: the infamous Chinese head tax; the exclusion of black Oklahoman farmers from coming to Canada in 1910; the refusal in May 1914 of most of the 375 Indians aboard the Komagata Maru after landing in Vancouver, where the ship spent two months before it was ordered back to India; the exclusion of Jewish immigrants from the 1920s until after the Second World War.
These and other examples of discrimination paint a picture of a country — not unlike others around the world at the time — that was xenophobic and saw itself as an “Anglo-British outpost of British civility,” Troper says.
According to the Canadian Council for Refugees, specific measures taken by immigration officials included: an amendment to the Opium and Narcotic Drug Act to deport “domiciled aliens” with drug-related convictions (directed against the Chinese) in 1922; the prohibition of all Chinese immigrants in 1923; refusal of the ship the St. Louis, carrying 930 Jewish refugees, to land in 1939, forcing it to return to Europe — ultimately sentencing three-quarters of its passengers to death under the Nazi regime.
Perhaps the words of Canada's Director of Immigration Branch F.C. Blair — held responsible for the policy of not allowing Jews into Canada — best exemplifies the tone and atmosphere of the Canadian government in March 1938. Blair is quoted on the CCR website saying: “Ever since the war, efforts have been made by groups and individuals to get refugees into Canada; but we have fought all along to protect ourselves against the admission of such stateless persons without passports, for the reason that coming out of the maelstrom of war, some of them are liable to go on the rocks and when they become public charges, we have to keep them for the balance of their lives.”
Only after the Second World War did the doors to Canada begin to open — a least a little. According to Troper, officials in Ottawa were reluctant. Immigration authorities had “cut their teeth on the racist, racially-tinged immigration stuff of the 1920s and 1930s,” he explains. And they were in many ways supported by the Canadian public. Troper cites a Gallup poll in 1945 that asked Canadians who they didn't want allowed into Canada; their first choice was the Japanese, their second were Jews.
Despite these racist sentiments, there were cries for more labour from businesses to meet the needs of a postwar booming economy, forcing Canada to accept more immigrants.
After introduction of the 1952 Immigration Act, there was still room for discrimination. The act allowed for refusal of admission on grounds of nationality, ethnic group and geographical origin, and against homosexuals, drug addicts or drug traffickers.
Not until 1962 did the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration implement new guidelines removing most racial discrimination. In 1967, a points system was introduced and the last of racial discrimination was removed. Since then, the Immigration Act has been revamped and rewritten a number of times, including the most recent changes made by the Conservative Party last year.
That doesn't mean immigration laws welcome everyone.
“There are administrative policies (such as how many visa officers are assigned to different posts and how the processing is done) that may have the impact of excluding, although the policy intent is never expressed to exclude,” said Naomi Alboim, a Queen's University professor who specializes in immigration policy.
Regardless how many applications Ottawa receives, a set quota allows for about 250,000 new immigrants each year. Immigration policy-makers have to juggle who they let in and under what categories — skilled worker or professional, family member, skilled tradesman, live-in caregiver, sponsored spouse — within those confines, explains Alboim. Sometimes the number of immigrants allowed in under each category fluctuates, depending on the country's needs. She said recent changes by Ottawa — ending the Federal Skilled Worker Program with a plan to revamp it; closure of the Business Class; replacing parent and grandparent applications with a super visa; applying conditions to permanent residency for spouses; introduction of higher fluency and language skills in English and French — all point to a tighter border for certain immigrants.
“More or less the 250,000 figure has remained constant; but who is comprising that 250,000 is a much more exclusive group and it's not including a lot of people who would have been eligible to come to Canada in the past,” says Alboim.
Applicants from a lot of non-English-speaking countries will be excluded and Alboim questions that strategy. “I think it is very much a short-sighted policy of looking at immigration to fill immediate labour market needs. It's looking at immigration as a kind of employment agency process rather than a longer-term nation-building process.”
She points to Chinese immigrants, for example, many of whom will be excluded because they don't speak English well. “Do we really want the number of Chinese immigrants to go down significantly when trade with China is so important?”
Alboim believes the kind of people Canada needs are not just those who can fill a job now, but who can “adapt and develop to fill different jobs as they evolve and, most important, will stay in the country and have children and grandchildren and contribute.
“When you allow people to bring in their spouses, their parents, it means they will stay here, spend money here, invest in the country and the future of the country, and they will look to their children as their future here rather than abroad.”
http://www.thestar.com/news/immigration/2013/02/15/canadas_immigration_history_one_of_discrimination_and_exclusion.html
