Hon. Amina Gerba: Colleagues, I’m speaking from the traditional unceded territory of the Algonquin Anishinabe people. That land acknowledgement is very important in the context of this bill. We must always call to mind the presence of Indigenous peoples from time immemorial in the land that is now Canada.
In June, I had the honour of introducing my first bill, Bill S-286, An Act respecting National Immigration Month. I am deeply moved to speak to you about this initiative today. It is part of my own life story, of the life stories of many people in this illustrious chamber, and of the life stories of millions of other people, millions of our compatriots who came from all over the world to enrich our country with their experiences and their contribution to our history.
Let me begin with an anecdote, a little incident I witnessed at a gala evening in Montreal. It’s actually the genesis of the bill I’m going to talk to you about today.
My husband and I had struck up a conversation with a guest during the networking cocktail party that preceded a fundraising gala. Visibly surprised to hear my husband speak excellent French, the lady we were speaking to asked him where we were from. Mischievously, my husband acted like he didn’t quite understand the question and told her, in jest, that he was from Laval.
Faced with the woman’s puzzled expression — she didn’t seem to understand and wasn’t satisfied with the answer — my husband finally said that he was originally from Cameroon and asked the same question in return. Very confused, the woman asked him what he meant.
My husband gently reminded her that, as far as he knew, with the exception of Indigenous peoples, all other Canadians came from somewhere else. He suggested that she ask her parents and grandparents where their ancestors, her ancestors, were from. This little tableau and this kind of questioning happen frequently and are quite revealing. They prompted me to formalize a reminder of our shared history as “from elsewhere,” and to do so with a bill.
With its three sections, the text of this bill is very simple, and so is its objective. The aim is to dedicate one month every year to celebrating the essential role that immigration has played in building our country.
Canada has been shaped by its immigrants. They built the country we cherish today. They built our country, which is admired the world over. Whatever the field, it is clear that immigrants have played a decisive role in the achievements of which we are so proud.
I’d like to give five examples of immigrants and proud Canadians who have contributed to our country’s recent history.
Jean Augustine was born in Grenada. She was the first Black woman to be elected to the Parliament of Canada and the first Black Canadian woman to serve as a federal minister of the Crown. She played a critical role in the official recognition of Black History Month in Canada.
Dany Laferrière is a Haitian-born writer and academic, whose works have enriched Quebec and Canadian literature. He is a member of the Académie française, which contributes to Canada’s cultural visibility.
Abdoulaye Baniré Diallo was born in Senegal and is a renowned professor of bioinformatics and artificial intelligence at the Université du Québec à Montréal, or UQAM. He was the laureate of the 2018 Next Einstein Forum. Dr. Diallo is also involved in developing national research and innovation policy.
According to the National Research Council of Canada, Gerhard Herzberg was “one of Canada’s greatest scientists.” He was born in Germany, but he and his wife fled persecution in Nazi Germany and arrived in Canada in 1935. In 1971, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry for his contribution to the knowledge of the electronic structure and geometry of molecules.
Mike Lazaridis is originally from Greece and moved to Canada from Turkey. He left his mark on the communications sector with his famous invention, the BlackBerry, the mobile phone that became world famous in the 2000s.
Colleagues, these contributions must be fully recognized and celebrated, and the people who made them must receive their due. This is a direct and effective way to encourage the integration and retention of new generations of immigrants.
Before going into detail about why I want Canada to have a national immigration month, I’d like to set the record straight about something.
It will not have escaped your attention that there has been a lot of debate about our immigration policy on an almost daily basis. Some of these debates are useful, even necessary. Others come dangerously close to a philosophy of rejection and exclusion that has no place in our country. As a proud Quebecer and a Canadian of immigrant descent, I can’t hide the fact that this feels personal. I’m very concerned about the current extremist xenophobic rhetoric that appears to reject all types of immigration. Such hard-liners insinuate that immigrants are largely responsible for our country’s economic and social problems, and that’s dangerous.
I’d like to point out that our country was built by wave after wave of immigrants. To this day, immigration is essential to addressing the demographic and economic challenges we face. With an aging population and a growing need for skilled labour, Canada needs immigrants more than ever.
However, integrating these newcomers has to be a top priority. This requires efforts on the part of both the newcomers and the host society. These newcomers need help adapting to their new environment, learning the language and local customs, while allowing them to retain their identity. The process takes time but it’s achievable and beneficial for everyone.
It’s also imperative, honourable colleagues, to warn against xenophobic policies that seek to divide. Canada has to remain a model of tolerance and inclusion.
By welcoming immigrants and facilitating their integration, we strengthen our society and ensure a prosperous future for all. But we must also invest to better welcome and retain our newcomers and to ensure their economic prosperity. We also have to invest in securing our borders and handing out harsh punishments to people involved in smuggling immigrants.
Honourable colleagues, immigration is not our problem, as some people sadly say. On the contrary, it is our ancient and recent history, and the driving force of our future.
The purpose of my bill isn’t to call for more or fewer immigrants to Canada or to take sides on this or that aspect of migration policy. It is at a completely different level and is in line with the times.
This project refers to the successive generations of immigrants to our country who have contributed to its development in the areas mentioned above. These generations have developed it as a multicultural society in the world’s image.
The main aim of this bill is therefore to remind all Canadians that we have almost all come from somewhere else, in different eras.
I’m not a historian, but I’d like to take this opportunity to tell you about the different waves of migration in our country. First of all, it is essential to recognize that Canada was not virgin and uninhabited when Europeans first came here over five centuries ago. The word “discovery” was wrongly used to describe this arrival.
Speaking of discoveries, there is a nuance to be added. According to a study published in 2021 in the scientific journal Nature, it has been proven that the Vikings were present in Newfoundland as early as 1021. Evidence shows that the Indigenous peoples, then estimated at between 350,000 and 500,000 people — although some estimates put the figure as high as two million — were in contact with the Vikings at that time.
According to The Canadian Encyclopaedia, a majority view estimates the arrival of the first waves of immigration from Northeast Asia between 30,000 and 13,500 BCE.
In 1604, French explorers Pierre Dugua de Mons and Samuel de Champlain founded the first European settlements. In 1608, Champlain founded the city of Quebec. French settlers then gradually began to populate what was then known as “New France.”
According to The Canadian Encyclopedia, between 1535 and 1763, approximately 10,000 French migrants, including 2,000 women, are believed to have settled in New France.
In 1763, when Great Britain took control of the region, the population had reached 70,000. It would be supplemented by the arrival of a large number of Americans who were loyal to the British Crown.
In the 19th century, large numbers of immigrants arrived in Canada, particularly from Europe. Most of them were Irish, and their arrival is considered to be the first major wave of immigration after the French and the Americans.
At the time of Confederation in 1867, Canada’s population totalled 3.6 million, one million of whom were descendants of French immigrants and 2.1 million of whom were descendants of American Loyalists, and British and Irish immigrants.
The need to occupy land, particularly in the West, and the fact that its population was relatively small led Canada to see immigration as an essential driver of the country’s development.
However, it would be a very selective immigration, which would exclude Asians and Blacks. It was only after the Second World War that the restrictive, discriminatory laws were gradually replaced with laws of general application.
This large-scale migration created a lot of friction with Indigenous peoples, including the Métis and First Nations, who were forcibly removed from their lands. This crisis culminated with the Northwest Rebellion in 1885.
At that time, according to the Discover Canada guide, an estimated one million British and one million Americans immigrated to Canada.
This was followed by the arrival of an increasingly diverse range of immigrants to meet the country’s development challenges. Working in strategic sectors such as industry, mining and construction, these immigrants were the architects of the new country that was Canada.
Throughout the 20th century, immigration to Canada continued apace, particularly in the West. These immigrants helped make the Prairies the powerful agricultural region they still are today.
At the end of the Second World War, the country became attractive to southern Europeans, who were going through times of great hardship. Most notably, they built the cores of our major cities.
Canada gradually grew to become a welcoming land. It put an end to its discriminatory laws and regulations, and received wave after wave of asylum seekers fleeing pariah states and people displaced by war. Many came from Eastern Europe and Southeast Asia. This sudden influx pushed Canada to take a creative approach to its immigration policy.
Thus, the first Private Sponsorship of Refugees program was set up, enabling Canada to bring in more than half of the Vietnamese, Cambodian and Laotian refugees.
As a result, by the early 1960s, an estimated one-third of Canadians had origins that were neither British nor French, according to the Discover Canada guide.
Successive waves of immigration in the 19th and 20th centuries gradually contributed to the rise of a multicultural society in our country, which has the highest proportion of immigrants among the G7 countries.
According to Statistics Canada, in 2021, more than 8.3 million people, almost one-quarter of the population, were or had been landed immigrants or permanent residents in Canada. That’s 23% of the country’s population.
Statistics Canada points out that this is, quote, “the largest proportion since Confederation, topping the previous 1921 record of 22.3%”.
What’s more, given that Canada’s population is gradually aging and that its birth rate remains below the population renewal rate, immigration is now the country’s main driver of population growth.
According to Statistics Canada projections, immigrants could represent between 29.1% and 34% of Canada’s population by 2041.
Colleagues, through this brief look at the history of the Canadian people, I wanted to show you one thing: At different times, we all came from somewhere else, except for Indigenous peoples. A thousand years, five centuries, four generations, three decades, a month or a week ago, we all came from someplace else.
However, we must never forget that the land settlement and territorial occupation process have often led to the loss of Indigenous cultures, languages, traditions and lands.
Our country is therefore a product of the hopes and dreams of millions of immigrants arriving from the four corners of the planet to build a better life. Unfortunately, for Indigenous peoples, it has meant a tragic erasure of their rights and their tangible and intangible assets.
These two realities are two sides of the same coin. They make up our history. They create a demand for justice, reparation and compensation. And also a duty to remember that we must share with future generations.
There is another reason for this bill. It is about the multiplication of motions and laws concerning the celebration of the heritage of this or that community living in Canada. There’s no doubt that the aim of these various initiatives is legitimate and stems from the same observation as mine: the need to highlight the invaluable contributions of immigrants to our country.
I see national immigration month as a useful wake-up call, at a time when some people have no hesitation in blaming immigrants for certain complex and difficult social situations. It could act as a showcase, an opportunity for all our immigrant groups to highlight their contributions and their communities.
By bringing together the new celebrations, this national month, far from diluting them, would act as a forum for them. It would provide a common space to underscore the wealth of contribution by all immigrants, no matter the size or importance of their community.
Colleagues, I was able to gauge just how much support there was for the introduction of a national immigration month among the many groups to which I was able to present the bill. On May 15, my team and I organized a round table to get the views of organizations representing the interests of immigrants.
We contacted and brought together approximately 30 organizations and asked them to share their opinions on the initiative that I am putting forward. During this very productive meeting, we received feedback from stakeholders from across the country who represent the largest immigrant communities. The message that we received was clear: All of these stakeholders confirmed their support for a bill instituting a national immigration month.
Of course, this consultation was not intended to be exhaustive, but it did provide an opportunity to get a good idea of how receptive the organizations concerned were to this bill.
We also continued our consultations by telephone over the summer. I also asked the stakeholders about what month they thought should be chosen for this initiative. Many of them agreed on November, which is relevant in several respects.
First, November is already the month in which we celebrate National Francophone Immigration Week, which, according to the organizers’ website:
. . . brings together thousands of Francophones from across the country to celebrate the richness of cultural diversity and the contribution of immigrants to Francophone and Acadian communities.
Secondly, the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, which establishes the fundamental concepts and principles relating to immigration and refugee protection, received Royal Assent on November 1, 2001. I would like to reiterate the central importance of this legislation, which provides a framework for Canada’s modern immigration policy.
I’m going to go over the milestones of this legislation to show you why it’s so important. Our current immigration policy, which is based on objective and universal principles, has not always been part of the Canadian norm.
For a long time, Canadian immigration policy focused on White immigration, preferably from the British Empire, Central Europe and the United States. However, in response to the dire need for labour, the government drew up a list of “ideal settlers in a descending order of preference.” I’ll quote verbatim from The Canadian Encyclopedia:
British and American agriculturalists were followed by French, Belgians, Dutch, Scandinavians, Swiss, Finns, Russians, Austro-Hungarians, Germans, Ukrainians, and Poles. Close to the bottom of the list came those who were, in both the public and the government’s minds, less assimilable and less desirable, e.g., Italians, South Slavs, Greeks and Syrians. At the very bottom came Jews, Asians, Roma people, and Black people.
As you can see, colleagues, it’s an understatement to say that the immigration criteria at the time were discriminatory. What’s more, non-White would-be immigrants are even refused entry to the country on racist grounds.
For example, in 1911, Canada almost completely banned the immigration of Blacks and they were not the only ones affected. As early as 1885, Chinese immigrants were required to pay a special tax. Worse still, in 1923 they were virtually refused entry to Canada. Immigration from Japan and India was also extremely limited at the time.
In 1919, under revised immigration legislation, the government prohibited entry into Canadian by groups such as communists, Mennonites and Doukhobors. Additionally, people from countries that fought against Canada during the First World War met with the same fate.
Religious grounds have also been used to exclude specific groups of individuals. In 1939, for example, Jewish refugees fleeing Nazi Germany aboard the MS Saint Louis were refused entry to Canada.
The formal ban on Chinese immigration was lifted in 1947. On June 22, 2006, Prime Minister Stephen Harper officially apologized for the head tax imposed from 1885 to 1923 and the exclusion policy in force from 1923 to 1947.
Canada’s immigration policy was modernized in 1967, with the adoption of a point system to classify immigrants according to their eligibility. Skin colour or nationality were no longer used as criteria for selecting immigrants. Language skills, such as proficiency in English or French, education levels, professional skills and family ties were now given priority, paving the way for the immigration system we know today.
However, although Canada is a signatory to the 1951 United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Protocol, there would be no program governing applications for refugee status. Each application is considered on a case-by-case basis.
The 1976 Immigration Act represented a radical change in this area. For the first time, it set out clearly defined objectives for Canadian migration policy and priorities, such as family reunification, diversity and non-discrimination. It now protects refugees as a distinct group of immigrants in Canadian law, and requires the government to meet its obligations under international agreements.
In 1979, the famous private sponsorship program was launched. The only one of its kind, it has enabled over 327,000 refugees to be accepted in Canada over its 40 years of existence. Although there is room for improvement, it remains one of the great success stories of Canadian migration policy.
In 1980, five categories were created for entry to Canada. They are as follows: independent, meaning people submitting their own applications; humanitarian, including refugees and other persecuted or displaced people; family, that is, people who have immediate family already living in Canada; assisted relatives, meaning distant relatives sponsored by a family member in Canada; and economic, which refers to people with highly sought-after professional skills, or those prepared to open a business or invest significantly in the Canadian economy.
Finally, on November 1, 2001, the 1976 Immigration Act was replaced by the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act. The new law maintains many of the principles and policies set out in the previous law, in particular the different categories of immigrants. It also expands the family class to include same-sex couples and common-law relationships. This law is the cornerstone of Canada’s current migration policy.
The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, which was passed on November 1, 2001, provides an additional argument in favour of holding a national immigration month every year in November. I would also add that this month is a good one for organizing parliamentary activities, since the House of Commons and the Senate are generally in session at that time of year. What’s more, apart from Remembrance Day, Parliament’s event calendar is relatively light in November, leaving room for other national celebrations.
National immigration month would undoubtedly be an opportunity to highlight the contributions of our immigrant communities. The federal government has an important role to play in these celebrations, in particular, the Department of Canadian Heritage, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, and of course, our Parliament. We must also give our immigrant communities a place and make them more visible. Their involvement in our communities deserves to be better known and recognized.
Colleagues, I’d like to say a few words about my own immigrant background, if there’s enough time. I was born in Bafia, in a small village in Cameroon with neither water nor electricity. I was the 18th of 19 children, six of them girls. I was the only one of those girls who had a chance to go to school. I was also the only one who immigrated to Canada in 1986 thanks to my husband, a grant recipient from the now defunct Canadian International Development Agency, or CIDA.
After obtaining his PhD in communications, my husband was due to return to Cameroon and teach at the École supérieure internationale de journalisme in Yaoundé, but after he got his degree, we chose to stay in Canada to provide better living conditions for our four children, three of whom were born here in Canada. I’m proud to say that every member of my family is now contributing to our country’s prosperity through our entrepreneurial initiatives.
As you can see from my story, Canada is fundamentally a land of immigration. Immigration has shaped the country we know today. In fact, both Conservative and Liberal prime ministers have celebrated this fact in a non-partisan way over the last few decades. In a 2012 Globe and Mail article, the Right Honourable Stephen Harper said the following, and I quote:
This government believes Canada needs immigration, benefits from immigration and that those needs and benefits will become even greater in the future if this is done correctly.
Honourable colleagues, recognizing a month dedicated to immigration would send a powerful message to all Canadians and the international community.
Through this bill, we intend to recognize the builders of our country, celebrate our common heritage and continue to show our commitment to the values of inclusion, diversity and mutual respect. Immigrants are the past, the present and the future of Canada.
Honourable senators, that is why I’m urging you to vote quickly in favour of Bill C-286, which seeks to designate the month of November as national immigration month in Canada.
To this end, I sincerely believe that your contributions to this debate would be very valuable, especially if you were to answer the following questions: What is your personal immigration story or what are your origins? How has your community helped to build the Canada we know today? What can we do to improve the way we live together and change the way we look at immigration?
Thank you for your attention.
Hon. Senators: Hear, hear.