Mr. Speaker, it has been a week since the media broke the story about a leaked report on the Vegreville Immigration Centre which slammed the people of the town and the centre as racist and sexist.
The minister of immigration still refuses to offer a simple apology for the actions of her department which unfairly damaged the reputation of the people of Vegreville. The mistake was commissioning a third party study to deal with isolated charges of racism and sexism when these charges should have been dealt with quickly and firmly by management.
By calling for a study, her department was indicating that there was a widespread problem when that was not the case. The report verifies that there were isolated incidents only.
The deputy minister should have anticipated that a study which was as widely circulated as this study was, would be leaked and it was. The immigration department is responsible for unfairly tarnishing the reputation of the good people of Vegreville.
Will the minister show enough consideration for these people to apologize for the damage that her department has done?