Mr. Speaker, I thank the member across the way for a very enlightening and well researched speech. He made some very good points which I agree with.
I do not agree with the basic premise that the Mac-Paps were going across on some kind of a flawed premise that they were doing something noble and honourable and then found out they were actually pawns or were being used by a larger power.
When the group went over to fight fascism they were right. A couple of years later the Canadian government agreed and declared war. That group recognized the fear of fascism in Europe earlier and chose to take up arms. If the group can be criticized for being aligned with the communists by working with the republic of Spain then so can any of the allies as we joined forces in the second world war to do what we thought was right, which was to smash fascism.
The purpose of the motion as it was worded was to investigate ways to grant some form of recognition to these noble and heroic Canadians. It did not limit us to any particular course of action although first and foremost the goal was to have these people declared and treated as veterans with the full status that veterans enjoy. There are other options which I think we should be talking about today as well.
In my own research on this subject I was very interested to note that the Mac-Paps were named after Mackenzie and Papineau who led the 1837 Rebellion in Upper and Lower Canada. In fact the year the Mac-Paps were formed, 1937, would have been the 100th anniversary of that uprising. I presume that is how the name was chosen.
The member who spoke on behalf of the government was correct. My research shows that 1,300 volunteer soldiers banded together from all parts of Canada to go abroad. Approximately half of them came home. Not all of them died. Some were missing in action. Some actually settled in Europe and did not choose to return to Canada.
The point I would like to dwell on is that ordinary Canadians have to be diligent just as those young Canadians were diligent. When the extreme right wing raises its ugly head, ordinary working Canadians have to be aware of the risk and the threat to democracy as well as the threat to the treasured institutions we value and which make our country great.
I would like to think that is what those people did. In the 1930s those young people were watching the newsreels in their local movie houses and saw the jackboot storming across Europe, the rise of fascism. Canadians travelled overseas to see firsthand what it was like. Tommy Douglas was one in the mid-1930s to visit Europe to see whether it was true. He wanted to find out if the rise of Hitler and the rise of fascism was as threatening as they were hearing. People read about it in the newspapers and came to the very logical conclusion that fascism was the greatest threat they faced.
Rather than talk about it and rather than wait for the government to act, because the Canadian government could have been quicker in getting on board to smash Hitler and smash fascism, that group of people saw fit to put their own lives aside, leave their homes and loved ones and hike off to Europe unsanctioned in a formal way by the Canadian government.
We gave them thanks by making them outlaws. We threatened them with two years jail time for having the temerity to get involved in the battle. It was a battle which we knew at that time to be just and right because within 18 months we were in the same boat as a country leading the fight as one of the early countries in the great struggle of World War II.
These young men and women realized the danger. Instead of being criticized and threatened with legal action they should be recognized and championed and given the full status and full rights other veterans enjoy. They gave their youth for the fight for democracy against fascism.
A parallel can be drawn today in the need for us to be vigilant as pockets of the extreme right wing surface again across Canada. Even within political parties in Canada the right wing is rising up in circumstances similar to what we saw in the 1930s. Many parallels can be drawn. Fascism in Europe really grew out of a period of very poor economic times, tight fiscal policy, high unemployment, and general dissatisfaction. That is when working people and otherwise decent people seem to seek out these extreme alternatives.
Regarding the rise of fascism in Germany, when Eichmann was interviewed in his prison cell he was asked what did he think Adolf Hitler would be remembered for most. His answer was the great way that he solved the unemployment problem. He said nothing about the killing of six million Jews. It was the great way that he solved the unemployment problem. They were really desperate for some kind of relief in the miserable lives they were living.
We saw the recent rise in right wing populism coming out of a period of tight money and economic fiscal policy. The Bank of Canada was trying to fight inflation with high interest rates and screwed it up. It resulted in truly desperate times for a lot of people, especially where I live in western Canada. They sought out extreme right wing solutions. This is what led to the rise of the new right wing populism. As I say we have to be ever on guard and ever vigilant because looking toward those kinds of options brings us all down and threatens the institutions that make Canada great.
The Spanish civil war in many ways acted as a dress rehearsal for the second world war. When Canada saw the international brigades mobilizing, taking action and doing what was necessary, it probably served to inspire Canadian leaders and other world leaders to become motivated and get active.
We are aware that it was not just Franco they were fighting. The Spanish fascists were being backed heavily by Mussolini and by Hitler. They were pouring money in.
This courageous rather ragtag group went over there on dimes and nickels. They passed the hat around to pay their way over. They were poorly armed. We can imagine how much courage it took to go into that kind of armed conflict against some of the greatest world powers of the time. That should be recognized.
Norman Bethune's name was mentioned. He was certainly one of the more famous persons to go over during that period. He was an honourable and noble man. He dedicated his life to elevating the standards of the poor. In health care he broke new ground in terms of transfusion techniques some of which actually was learned on the battlefield in the heat of battle doing triage.
The only valid criticism I have heard against Motion No. 75 is if we do it for this group, how many other groups are we going to have to recognize in some way and apologize for? Nobody is asking for apologies. We are just asking for some serious second consideration in this case. We are looking at a situation where we believe there should be some kind of recognition. If people cannot see fit to grant the full veteran status that we are asking for, then surely they can do two things.
One was made reference to by the Minister of Veterans Affairs. In a letter about this recently he came back reminding us that an order in council was passed at the time making it a criminal offence for Canadians to serve on either side of the Spanish civil war. No charges were actually laid but technically these people committed a crime against Canada by going to fight the fascists on our behalf. The very first and foremost thing we should be doing is striking that, eliminating that stigma which these 40 or so living Canadian veterans of the Spanish civil war still have to wear.
The other thing we can do, and I think there is interest in this and in fact we have some interest on the government benches, is to put up a monument to the Mac-Paps on the grounds outside the House of Commons. That would be a popular move. It would be the very least we could do.