He is quite right. It was actually just an agreement in principle that was never fulfilled.
On November 12, 2005, Citizenship and Immigration stated:
The Government of Canada and the Italian Canadian Community have developed this Agreement-in-Principle, premised on the principles of ‘no compensation’ and ‘no apology’...It is the intention of both parties that a final agreement...will be concluded as soon as possible.
It adds that the Government of Canada plans to provide $2.5 million. This is from a government press release. Sorry, I'm not sure if I said it was November 12, 2005, from a previous government press release. It goes on to say:
This Agreement-in-Principle shall not be interpreted as a full and final agreement nor as constituting an admission by the Government of Canada of the existence of any legal obligation of the Government of Canada nor as foregoing/limiting any person(s) right to advance or initiate an action/claim against the Government of Canada, nor shall this Agreement-in-Principle be interpreted by any of the signatories as representing the interests of all Italian Canadians.
I'll read that again. It says, “nor shall this Agreement-in-Principle”--the one they're talking about is the one by the previous government--“be interpreted by any of the signatories as representing the interests of all Italian Canadians.” So what they're saying is that the NCIC does not speak for all Italian Canadians.
I found another article, actually, that was in an Italian Canadian magazine. Again it expresses the $2.5 million that was provided as part of the initial framework. They were excited because they were “'looking for worthy projects that will fulfil our mandate', Campione said. The timetable: a detailed and approved program ready for project submissions....” The money will be used, he went on to say, to acknowledge and educate people with respect to what happened during the internment.
I found another one about Italian Canadians in history. It's from a magazine called Fusion. Again it talks about the $2.5 million that was part of that potential agreement, and again, I quote from Mr. Campione:
“This is an historic day for our community: we begin the important task of educating present and future generations about the evolution of the Italian community in Canada,” says Dominic Campione, president of the National Congress of Italian Canadians. “The internment of Italians during the Second World War is a dark page in Canadian history, and this agreement-in-principle allows our community the ability to ensure not only that these events will never be forgotten, but that they will never be repeated.”
I will skip these pages. I won't table them. They're about donations to the Liberal Party, but I'll skip over that.
Canadian Heritage had a press release again on November 12, 2005, and again there is a quote from Mr. Campione for the NCIC that suggests that it was an historic day to have received an acknowledgement and some potential to have $2.5 million from the Government of Canada--an historic day that did not include an apology of any kind.
There's another one again on Saturday, November 12. This was in a Halifax paper. It said that Dominic Campione, president of the National Congress of Italian Canadians, said that the internment of Italians during the Second World War “is a dark page in Canadian history, and the agreement in principle” allows “our community” the ability to ensure not only that these events will never be forgotten, but that they will never be repeated.
Again, that was based on no apology, no compensation, and $2.5 million, as opposed to the $5 million that our CHRP program has actually put forward.
Then all of a sudden on March 23, the new president of the NCIC suggested that the original agreement--the $2.5 million--was what they were looking for. He said, of the government's new approach, which would see $5 million to community historical recognition, “The Italian Canadian community cannot accept a settlement that is less, both in monetary terms and in the modalities of implementation, than what was agreed upon through the ACE program.”
Again, there is no mention of an apology. So the new president was very specific. I disagree with him, because I think the $5 million that was announced through our CHRP program is more reflective than the $2.5 million. I think it can give us a lot better recognition than the—