Mr. Speaker, between 1885 and 1923, immigrants from China had to pay a tax to enter Canada.
By 1923 the Canadian government collected approximately $23 million from Chinese immigrants. After the tax was removed the government enacted the Chinese Immigration Exclusion Act which forbid the immigration of Chinese to Canada and as a result less than 50 Chinese entered Canada between 1923 and 1947.
The legislation applied only to Chinese separated families and imposed immense hardship on a community that built the railway, the national dream.
Both the Chinese Canadian National Council and the National Congress of Chinese Canadians have called upon successive Canadian governments to acknowledge the grave injustices and racial discrimination inherent in the head tax of the exclusion act.
I encourage the Canadian government to recognize the enormous contribution made by the Chinese to Canada and to resolve the problem of the tax and the Chinese Immigration Exclusion Act as soon as possible.