Mr. Speaker, I would like to begin by thanking the members who spoke in favour of my bill. The hon. member for Eglinton—Lawrence already mentioned a few of them. The member for Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie said he would be in favour of the bill, as did the members for Vancouver Kingsway, Beaches—East York, Notre-Dame-de-Grâce—Lachine, Thunder Bay—Rainy River, my colleague and friend, the member for Eglinton—Lawrence and, more recently, the member for Sudbury.
I would also like to thank the Bloc Québécois, the NDP and my colleagues in the Liberal Party who have indicated their support for this bill.
I have some prepared notes, but I am going to try to summarize this. I know it is an emotional bill for people of my origin. I am a Canadian of Italian origin. I was born in this country, so I have a different perspective on how this bill is going to affect my community.
There has not been any contradiction of whether the internment ever occurred, so at least that is clear in everybody's mind. We do not have the actual numbers of how many times they were actually interned because the record keeping was never properly controlled. We are not really sure how many were interned. We know how many were interned in Petawawa, but there were three other prison camps, and we are not sure of the numbers. There were various studies done by different organizations and the actual number never came to light. There were a lot of people arrested when the internment started. They were imprisoned in different jail cells around the country, such as in Hamilton and mainly in the area of Montreal.
This is a regrettable chapter in Canadian history, and basically the bill is to provide for an official apology in the House of Commons for the injustices visited upon persons of Italian origin and the Italian community in Canada during World War II.
I would be remiss if I did not point out that there is a precedent for the Government of Canada to offer apologies in the House of Commons for past injustices that have occurred under previous governments. The immediate examples that spring to mind are the apologies offered to Chinese Canadians for the head tax, to first nations Canadians for the treatment of their people in residential schools, and a strikingly similar example of the apology offered to Japanese Canadians for the internment of persons of Japanese origin in World War II. It is roughly in the same time frame and circumstances that persons of Japanese origin and Italian origin were subjected to similar persecution by the same government for the same reason, namely their ancestry.
In one case, that of Japanese Canadians, an apology was offered in the House of Commons for the transgression. In another, that of the Italian Canadians, we are still debating whether or not an apology in the House of Commons is necessary or desirable. What makes one group deserving of an apology and another group less deserving?
I was talking with a member of the Italian community, Dominic Campione, who worked quite hard, and he said, “All you have to say is that it is a double shame”. The issue is a double shame because it was a shame that this actually happened then, and it is a shame now if we do not recognize what happened and we do not come to terms with apologizing. I cannot choose any better words than saying it is a double shame. It was a shame then and it is a shame now.
I am requesting an apology. There is no dollar amount in the bill, so if people are scared about dollar amounts, I do not think they have to be afraid. There is a clause for some type of restitution for educational purposes. That is up to the Italian communities. There are representatives. We had an agreement that was signed by the four major organizations: the National Congress of Italian Canadians, the National Federation of the Canadian Italian Business and Professional Association, the Order Sons of Italy of Canada, and la Fondation communautaire canadienne-italienne du Québec.
