Justin Trudeau is sure getting a crash course on the theme of the impossibility of pleasing not just everybody but anybody!
On the same day that we heard those lobbying for doctor-assisted suicide oppose the idea of Trudeau asking for some extra time to respond to last February's Supreme Court ruling, we also had - of all people! - non-government organizations who work with immigrant settlement actually pressing for a slower rate of intake.
I won't go much into the former other than to say that the squawking against delays seems to miss the point that if the new government gets implementation wrong in any way at all, a large, vigilant and dedicated-enough lobby of opponents stand ready to head back to court leading to further delay.
I focus instead on the refugee issue and the demand NOT to take 25,000 Syrians in by year's end. This was the thrust of a recent Citizen editorial which was in line with the Canadian Immigrant Settlement Sector Alliance, a body that is now publicly calling for the intake timeline to be extended. Their concern and the editorial's is about lack of current preparedness, that if we move too fast public resources will be stretched and less than perfect conditions will await the newcomers.
Well, news flash: the conditions that Syrian refugees are in over there in southeastern Europe are even less commodious than anything imaginable here. I have a hunch that most of those sleeping along roadways, or being brutalized by Balkans and Hungarian authorities, or trying to survive the increasingly perilous fall seas of the Mytilini Strait or the Mediterranean, are not going to be too concerned about instead facing a few weeks or months in barracks or temporary housing in Canada.
Maybe the warm and well-fed NGO spokespeople now bellyaching about whether we are prepared enough to help, should do a quick study tour of Germany where the absorption rate of refugees is hundreds of times much higher. Or maybe they should try a week in Turkey or Slovenia, sleeping outdoors - and let them bring their kids too and see what it feels like to have no shelter or food for your family.
Canada is a rich and capacious country with a population that has rallied before to help those in distress. Indeed, I was somewhat bitterly musing, in this connection, on the Tofino tragedy: it's good - isn't it? - that the people of Ahousaht, on hearing of folks in urgent need of help, did not whine about needing more time to figure out whether they were fully prepared for a rescue operation.
That is what the Syrian refugees need and deserve and I can only hope that our new prime minister ignores the griping at home and heeds the suffering abroad.
Norman Dale
Prince George
