Immigration Minister Jason Kenney: No Apology for Abuse of Home Children
Canadian Immigration Minister Jason Kenney has made a statement that Canada will not be apologizing to child migrants for our participation in the programs that shipped children from Britain. They were also known as “home children” and were forced to emigrate to British colonies, and although the programs were well-intentioned, many of the children were abused and essentially treated as slaves.
So, Australia has officially apologized for their role, and Britain has announced that they will make an official apology in 2010. And Jason Kenney, our dearest Immigration Minister, has stated that Canada will not be participating in this moral recall.
According to his statement, Canada is already doing enough. Parliament is going to make 2010 the year of the home child, Canada Post is issuing home child stamps, and the Pier 21 Museum is going to be displaying exhibits about home children. But is it enough? Kenney points out that it isn’t an issue on the forefront of the public mind. No, but it’s probably on the minds of over 100,000 people who came to Canada as home children.
To me, it seems like Kenney doesn’t want to apologize because he isn’t really sincere, but that’s not really the big issue. It’s about how immigration policies can affect people 70 years later, all across the globe. It’s about how public policy can effect the most vulnerable, and the only time we hear of it is years after the fact, and still then it’s only an echo.
I think the right thing to do is make a sincere apology. Because it’s really about the symbolism of the event, not whether it will repair any damage. And it’s a way of acknowledging that others matter once they become Canadians, not decades later.
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Tags: home children, immigration, immigration minister, Jason Kenney
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March 12th, 2010 at 4:22 pm
Brown refused to extend apology
I recently wrote to Gordon Brown to request the apology he made to child migrants sent to Australia and Canada from the 1920s to the 1960s be extended to children in care in this country at the time.
As one of those children in care at that time and now a consultant child psychologist I am personally and professionally aware of the decades of sexual, emotional and physical abuse.
The reply to my letter from his office made no such mention of an apology to what were the UK’s children, bereft of their own loving families. Rather, it only chanted the mantra of government safeguards today.
My disbelief, frustration and ruinous hope of gaining an apology has only been matched by Barnardo’s chief executive Martin Narey’s comment on Radio 4 that, as far as he and his organisation were concerned, to consider past abuse of our nation’s most vulnerable children is now idle concern.
He has failed to recognise, as other governments have recognised (witness Ireland and Australia), the impact an apology has in the healing and rebuilding so imperative in victims’ lives.
Dr Peter McParlin, consultant child psychologist
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Letter: What about UK abuse victims?
By Dr Peter McParlin
Children & Young People Now
9 March 2010
Clearly if our Prime Minister can apologise for those we shipped away to former colonies to be abused in care he can also apologise for those left on UK soil who were abused.
I am launching a campaign called Nobody Says Sorry to bring about an apology to those who suffered all kinds of failures of the care system.
While the need for an apology is needed to quieten their damaged reflections of the past, it is also needed to restructure families and relationships, where parenting skills have been affected by abuse.
Dr Peter McParlin, child psychologist, associate fellow British Psychological Society
UK 0113 2323928
March 14th, 2010 at 5:38 am
NOBODY SAYS SORRY ( THE NO APOLOGY RECEIVED)CAMPAIGN
NEEDS THE INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT OF CANADA AND AUSTRALIA AND NEWZEALAND
AS THIS AREA OF INHUMANE TREATMENT TO OUR NATIONS ( SEVERAL) OWN CHILDREN SHOULD NOT BE JUDGED ON GEOGRAPHICAL REMITS
NOT SHOULD IT BE JUDGED MY THE INABILITY AND LIKE OF INSIGHT OF VARIOUS WORLD LEADERS TO RECOGNISE OUTRAGEOUS AND CULPABLE BEHAVIOURS
IF SAID LEADER CANNOT GET THERE OF THEIR OWN VOLITION- WE AS A NATION AND PEOPLE HAVE TO DEMAND FAIOR TREATMENT FOR ALL OUR PEOPLES AND THE ABILITY TO APOLOGISE WHEN THIS EVIDENTLY HAS NOT TAKEN PLACE
FROM BARRACK OBAMA TO IAN SMITH TO DESMOND TUTU MENS REALISE THE NEED TO APOLGISE TO SET RIGHT;TO HEAL; TO RECOVER TO GROW AS A NATION
DR MCPARLIN
CHILD CONSULTANT PSYCHOLOGIST
UK LEEDS
0113 2323928
PETER.MCPARLIN@MYPOSTOFFICE.CO.UK
March 14th, 2010 at 11:57 am
INTEREST IS NOW STARTING FROM VARIOUS AGENCY AND POLITICAL AND LOBBYING GROUPS
THIS CAMPAIGN BY DR PETER MCPARLIN IN THE UK IS STARTING TO GET MOMENTUM
AND IT SHOULD DO-AS THIS IS A CONCERN THAT GOES RIGHT TO THE VERY HEART OF SOCIETY AND HOW WE TREAT ARE MOST VULNERABLE GROUPS
INDEED THE WAY TREAT THOSE IN MOST NEED OF CARE COLOURS THE VALUES OUR SOCIETY HAS BOTH REAL AND ASPIRANT
IF AS A SOCIETY WE GOT IT WRONG IN THE PAST AND WE SURELY DID IT BEHOVES SOCIETY TO SAY SO
SAY SORRY
AND BE THE SOCIETY IT SHOULD BE CARING AND BIG ENOUGHT TO RECOGNISE FAULT
NOBODY SAYS SORRY CAMPAIGN
March 17th, 2010 at 1:16 pm
MCPARLIN TO TEAM UP WITH CARELEAVERS UNITED UK
TO FORWARD NOBODY SAYS SORRY CAMPAIGN
March 18th, 2010 at 11:11 am
Ulster bishop Hegarty’s ‘secret deal’ on sex abuse case
BY THE TIME A PRIEST GET TO SWEARING CHILD VICTIMS TO SECRECY SO OTHER CLERICS ARE NOT NABBED YOU GOT TO ASK WHO ARE THESE GUYS?
THIS IS NOT A SHEPARD WITH HIS LAMBS- BUT SOME SELF INTERESTED CLERIC THAT NOW HE IS CAUGHT OOUT RED HANDED WONT MOVE OUT
WHAT ARE WE TO DO?
CONSULTANT CHILD PSYCHOLOGIST SURVIVOR OF CHURCH ABUSE
March 27th, 2010 at 2:57 pm
NORTHERN IRELAND ABOUT TO REVIEW WHAT IT HAS DONE -THE CHURCH THE STATE
THE MOMENTUM GOES ON TO SET THE RECORD STARIGHT ON CHILD ABUSE BY STATE AND CHURCH
WHEN TO THE UK JUST ACROSS THE IRISH CHANNEL
PART OF THE UNION WITH IRELAND