Thank you.
My name is Jacqueline Ellis Scott, and I am still a lost Canadian. I have been fighting for five years to be able to legally say I'm a Canadian citizen.
I was born in England in 1945 to a Canadian serviceman father and a British war bride mother. Mum and I joined my father in Toronto in January 1948, prior to the suspension in March 1948 of government-sponsored travel for war brides and children of servicemen. PC 858 allowed for deferred or delayed entry if a medical condition would prove dangerous or unsafe for an individual to travel. I had such a condition that was corrected just before leaving for Canada.
My crime is that I was born out of wedlock. I was never told of the circumstances of my birth. I found out on my own several years later. For my and my parents' generation, it was a stigma to have a child, or to be born, out of wedlock, and it was never a topic of discussion. It was kept secret.
My parents married in May 1948, and remained married until my father's death in 1995. Because of the discrimination of my birth, CIC is discriminating against me based on gender, labelling me “illegitimate” even in today's society, contrary to Federal Court orders issued in cases that have been appealed and won because of this type of discrimination. If the gender discrimination perpetuated by the marriage penalty is corrected, as ordered by the courts, then my citizenship is by right of descent through my father.
I grew up in Canada, was educated, worked, paid taxes, married here. My daughter was born in Toronto as a Canadian citizen, as are my grandchildren. My parents are buried here. I voted in Canadian federal elections. Tell me, don't you have to be a citizen to vote? By allowing me to vote, wasn't Canada affirming the fact that I am Canadian?
I never had any reason to doubt my Canadian citizenship. All my family, including my mother, who was naturalized in 1955, is Canadian. I was never told that I was anything but, and I was, and still am in my heart, a proud Canadian. I take pride when I hear the Canadian national anthem. Canada will always be my home. It's where my heart is and it's where I feel connected, yet CIC says I have no substantial ties to Canada. It should review paragraph 16(b) of the 1993 citizenship regulation criteria before it makes that statement.
In 2004 I applied for my citizenship certificate. In 2005 I received a denial of that application based on the fact that I was born out of wedlock. I wanted to hide that letter. The shock, the embarrassment, the shame I felt cannot adequately be described: it was demeaning. In 2008 I applied for a special grant of citizenship, and again, in a letter received in March 2009, signed by Stephane LaRue, was denied for the same reason.
Canada prides itself on not discriminating. Isn't this discrimination and denial of my rights under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms? Justice Mosley stated, in allowing Augier's appeal in 2004, that it is demeaning and prejudicial to deny benefit to citizenship through his Canadian father, simply because he was born out of wedlock. He declared paragraph 5(2)(b) to be unconstitutional. Why is CIC blatantly violating and discriminating, dismissing a court order?
In 2004 the minister did not comply with the order of the Federal Court to amend paragraph 5(2)(b) of the 1985 act, to include the words “or a father who is a citizen” and remove the phrase “born out of wedlock”. Since the minister at that time did not comply with the order of the Federal Court, will Minister Kenney remedy this omission?
Not until 2005, when I was first denied my citizenship certificate, had I ever been told that I was not a Canadian citizen. During that application process, I learned of and saw for the first time a landing document including me. In Benner, it was ruled that in applying section 15 of the charter, it's the time an application is first considered and right to citizenship is denied. That being the case, since I was first denied in 2005, my charter rights are being violated by CIC. Applying the charter is neither retroactive nor retrospective.
My situation is similar to that of Joe Taylor's. Where we differ is that I remained in Canada from the age of two until well after my 24th birthday, and he and his mother returned to England when he was still an infant. Therefore, I should not be subjected to the lost provision in the act, as he was. He was given a special grant of citizenship in 2008 with the passage of Bill C-37. I believe he is possibly deemed a Canadian citizen from 1947.
Why was I denied by CIC? Why is Joe Taylor now a citizen and I'm not? Why isn't Mr. Kenney honouring the promise made by Diane Finley to handle those cases not covered by Bill C-37 via subsection 5(4)?
Mr. Kenney recently said that he believes individuals want Canadian citizenship so that they will have the convenience of a passport. That word “convenience” is his and not mine.