Conservatives Cut Redress Funding

OTTAWA, May 9, 2008 -The Conservative announcement of Ukrainian redress funding actually represents a $2.5-million cut to funding allocated by the previous Liberal government and will now be split up between fourteen ethno-cultural communities, stated by Liberal Member of Parliament Borys Wrzesnewskyj.

“The previous Liberal government set aside $12.5 million in 2005 for the Ukrainian-Canadian community for a historical recognition program to commemorate discriminatory wartime measures inflicted on Canadians of Ukrainian descent and educate all Canadians about this historical injustice, but the Conservatives have cancelled that commitment allocating $10 million to be shared among 14 communities,” said Mr. Wrzesnewskyj.  “While the Conservatives claim to be reaching out to the Ukrainian-Canadian community, the cancellation of the ACE program along with these funding cuts shows the Conservatives’ failure to understand the impact of these historical injustices on the Ukrainian-Canadian community.”

The Conservative government confirmed the cancellation of the previous Liberal government’s $55-million Acknowledgment, Commemoration and Education Program (ACE) and its replacement with a more general $24-million community historical recognition program and a $10-million national historical recognition program.

In Budget 2005, the previous Liberal government committed $25 million over three years for acknowledgment, commemorative, and educational initiatives to highlight the contributions of ethno-cultural groups that were impacted by historic discriminatory wartime measures and immigration restrictions.

Between August and November of 2005, agreements in principle were signed with the Chinese, Italian and Ukrainian communities allocating an initial $2.5 million to each community for commemorative projects and subsequent verbal negotiations confirmed an allocation of $12.5 million to each of these communities, with the balance of the ACE fund to be used for other groups who suffered similar injustices.

A further $30-million allocation was then made to the ACE Program in the November 2005 Economic Update, bringing the total funding for the program to $55 million. 

“Now, to cover up this funding cut, Secretary of State for Multiculturalism Jason Kenney is claiming that the additional $10-million allocation to the Ukrainian-Canadian community never existed,” said Mr. Wrzesnewskyj.  “This is not only false, but is insulting to the groups that have come forward, some in writing,  to confirm that this agreement had been reached.”

Mr. Wrzesnewskyj went on to criticize the Conservative government’s handling of this file.

“It is sad that the Conservative government is perpetrating a campaign of misinformation about, and playing political games with, a program designed to recognize historical injustices suffered by the Ukrainian-Canadian community. The first waves of Ukrainian immigrants transformed the barren bush of Canada’s West into the golden wheat fields of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta. Notwithstanding the fact that they should be considered one of Canada’s founding peoples, during World War I they became victims of xenophobia and racist government policy. The latest   announcement, although disappointing in a number of ways, can be viewed by our community as a first step on the path of righting this historical wrong,” he said.

Borys Wrzesnewskyj is Liberal MP for Etobicoke Centre in Toronto