Segacs's World I Know

Posts Tagged ‘immigration’

There are so many things wrong with this that I hardly know where to begin. At the beginning, I suppose…

The Quebec government today announced several measures to help immigrants better integrate into Quebec society.

Immigrants will now be able to take free French courses before they leave their home country – either online or at an Alliance Française.

Well, okay, free French classes aren’t the worst idea in the world. But it doesn’t stop there.

Starting next January, all immigrants coming to Quebec will have to sign a declaration saying they will respect Quebec’s common values.

They must promise to learn French and respect the fact that Quebec is a secular society where men and women have equal rights.

The declaration will be included in the application to immigrate to Quebec and anyone who refuses to sign it will not be permitted to move here.

Right, as if forcing people to sign a declaration that is nothing but a formality, completely unenforceable, and utterly lacking in context in most of their home societies is in any way relevant. And since when did we start legislating people’s thoughts and opinions, anyway?

“Coming to Quebec is a privilege, not a right,” Immigration Minister Yolande James said yesterday at a press conference.

Apparently, now, so is freedom of expression.

The province also plans to favour immigrants who have the job skills that the Quebec labour market needs.

Except in refugee cases, most governments do this to an extent, so there’s nothing new here. But what about all those foreign-trained doctors who are currently driving taxicabs? Our problem isn’t in attracting skilled immigrants; it’s in getting rid of the yards of red tape that prevent those immigrants from actually using their skills.

Once they arrive in Quebec, the government will ask immigrants to attend seminars on adapting to life here and will increase the amount of support it gives to immigrants who are having trouble finding work.

For more on the folly that is these seminars, see Yannic’s blog.

James said the government also wants to persuade businesses to hire more minorities and said the public service must also hire more minorities.

At present, minorities make up 19 per cent of the public service. The government’s goal is to reach 25 per cent.

Yes, because quotas always work so well, don’t they? Well, it’s a chance for new immigrants to learn a few quintessentially Quebecois values, like tokenism, and hiring based on ethnicity instead of based on merit.

Many of the measures announced today were suggested by the Bouchard-Taylor commission on reasonable accommodation.

That explains a lot, actually.

Someone I know well (if you’re reading this, you know who you are) often likes to say that to illustrate that democracy is flawed, all you’d have to do is call a vote in Quebec asking people if they believed that the Jews should pay twice the amount of tax as everyone else.

That vote, he claims, would pass in a landslide… and therein lies the problem with democracy: The people, quite often, are stupid.

Well, this isn’t quite the same thing… but it’s close:

Marois’s proposed Quebec Identity Act, with its loyalty oaths and French tests for office seekers, is cynically demagogic as well as discriminatory and demeaning. It has little chance of being adopted, and would probably be found unconstitutional if it were.

[. . . ]

And as with Bill 101 30 years ago, it seems everybody opposes the identity bill but the people.

Results of the latest monthly CROP-La Presse poll, published last week, suggest that the PQ has pulled into first place in popularity among the parties, with the ADQ slipping farther back into third.

And another poll commissioned by the strategist behind Marois’s bill, Jean-François Lisée, indicates overwhelming support for the bill.

In fact, it seems that most Quebecers would be willing to go even farther. Lisée tested the idea of requiring a “minimal knowledge” of French not only to run for office, but even to vote.

Seventy-two per cent of Quebecers were in favour of the requirement for future immigrants, and 65 per cent for people from other Canadian provinces moving to Quebec.

Yes, and in a lifeboat, two drowning people may vote to throw the third one overboard. That doesn’t make it right.

If the reasonable accommodation debate has only served to expose the deep-rooted xenophobia and racism of the vast majority of Quebec’s population, the proper response isn’t to cater to it, or to pass laws to enshrine it.

No, the proper response is to start working to change those attitudes. It won’t happen overnight. But at least it would be going in the right direction – something we don’t seem to be doing much of, lately.

The sweeping gains made by Democrats tonight only tell half the story. There were also a number of issues votes that, if nothing else, indicate that the country is feeling more anti-Bush right now than pro-Liberal. For example:

• Constitutional amendments to ban gay marriage won approval in South Carolina, Tenessee, Virginia and Wisconsin, with similar amendments on the ballot in 4 other states also expected to pass once the votes are tallied. This would mean that a total of 28 states – more than half – will have banned gay marriage in the U.S., delivering a serious blow to the hopes of people in favour of equality and civil rights.
• Arizona passed measures against illegal immigrants, including making English the state’s official language.

On the other hand:

• Missouri passed a measure to guarantee stem cell research would be permitted.
• South Dakota’s voters rejected an attempt to restrict abortion in the form of proposed legislation.

Some analysts have further noted that, though Democrats made significant gains, they may have done so at the expense of ideology, since many of the newly-elected Democrats are much more moderate than Liberal while many of the defeated Republican incumbents were on their party’s more moderate wing. So the House (and possibly the Senate) may have shifted to the left, but both parties actually shifted to the right in the process.

What will it all mean? Your guess is as good as mine.

This from Canadian Immigration Minister Jon Volpe, commenting on the newly-announced eased immigration restrictions:

“We become Canadians by doing that which Canadians do,” Volpe said at a news conference. “We manifest our identity as Canadians by fulfilling our obligations and responsibilities as Canadians.”

Huh???

This would be funny if it wasn’t so stupid. Palestinian protesters are urging the Canadian government not to deport Palestinian refugee claimants on the grounds that they face persecution back in Israel:

“Those who are victims of repression in refugee camps have the right to humane treatment when they come to Canada,” said Amir Khadir, a prominent social activist and an unsuccessful candidate for the left-wing Union des forces progressistes in last April’s provincial election.

Refugee claimants who come to Canada from Palestinian camps ought to be given asylum here, the coalition said.

Opponents of the deportations say the refugees would be sent back to what they contend is Israel’s “illegal and deadly” military occupation.

It of course fits the propaganda of these groups to claim that Israeli rule is so oppressive that Canada should grant refugee status to people facing deportation there. And of course it’s a ridiculously backward argument. Israel is a modern democracy with a justice system guaranteeing rights and protections to all, defending itself against terrorism trying to suck out its lifeblood.

The irony is that the people facing deportion are more likely to be dangerous to Israeli society than the other way around. And Canada, officially one of Israel’s allies, has been so morally blind lately, I wouldn’t be surprised if the government bought the argument. But then, Ernst Zundel claimed refugee status here too.