1. Canada was built by the blood, sweat and tears of hard working “uneducated” immigrants.
   Who made peace with the aboriginal communities and colonized the East Coast?
   Who built the Trans-Canada railway?
   Who created the worlds largest auto parts manufacturing?

   The fact is that in its infancy, Canada was built by poor, hungry, and uneducated immigrants from all over the world. They worked hard, very hard. Sometimes at the cost of their own lives. They worked together and with others outside their own communities. The uneducated dreamed of one day giving their own children and grandchildren a better life in Canada. Free from persecution, starvation and suffering.

   By changing the immigration system to the Express entry that has an “algorithim” (ie, business decisions that favour the rich and educated), we are filtering out the very people who work hard for Canada. Defend it. Cherish it. And be loyal to it.

2. ---

   It takes a village to raise a child
   Keeping grandparents from permanently immigrating here robs children of culture, tradition, morals and values, and also increases the cost of childcare/household expenses for parents.
   Countless immigrants will tell you it was their grandparents that looked after the kids while the parents went to work. That cooked and cleaned, ensured the children were well behaved and well raised, and instilled a solid moral footing in the kids when the parents were too tired at night to do nothing more than eat and sleep.

   By pretending grandparents have the luxury to stay in Canada up to 10 years if they so choose, the Conservatives are dismissing the contributions grandparents have made to the Canadian economy over the past 150 years. This would be the most offensive case of elder abuse if I ever saw one. Tell my Gedie or my children’s Babushka, that their contributions don’t matter. What real burden to immigrant grandparents have on the rising costs of healthcare? Show me the evidence that they are placing an extraordinary financial burden on the Canadian economy.

   The Conservatives love the idea of “the family”. Well last time I checked, grandparents made up 99% of all families. Canadian or not. Are you telling me that there is no other way to protect our piddle of a Canadian pension from the dirty clutches of immigrant grandparents? No other way to prevent the depletion of isotopes that those medicine hungry elders seek?

3. ---

   Where did the money come from and was it ethically earned?
   How did these investors earn their money that they can buy their way into Canada?
   Was it off the backs of poorly paid women and children? Was it by legitimate and healthy business competition? Was it at the expense of our global environment?
   The new investor program is just the Provincial Nominee Program (PNP) for the 1%. If we are telling immigrant grandparents that you can come on a supervisa without ever getting citizenship, well why can’t we also tell immigrant investors, you can come hide invest your money without ever gaining citizenship as well? Do the Conservatives really think investors have an interest in the prosperity of Canada?

4. ---

   Most immigrants Jason Kenney is courting didn’t have buckets of money
   Let’s also consider the man of the hour – Jason Kenney – every immigrants politician. He’s visited just about every ethnic community we have here in Canada. Those ethnic communities, the ones the Conservatives are claiming that support the immigration reform, those communities were formed by the very immigrants who would never get into Canada today with the new reform! Imagine – the immigrants that the Conservatives are trying to woo would not be here today if they had to go through his immigration reforms. Somebody tell me – is that irony or a paradox?

5. ---

   Where do highly educated immigrants loyalties lie?
   When a highly educated immigrant seeks Canadian citizenship, it’s not because they want to contribute to the economy here, not unlike their less educated countrymen, they seek better opportunities for themselves and their families. Recent studies show that in fact, immigrant entrepreneurs retain close ties to their home country. When push comes to shove, do they really have a loyalty to Canada or are they also just seeking refuge from corruption and injustice.

To build a better Canada we need diversity, and believe it or not, socio-economic diversity is part of the eco-system that allows innovation and the free market to thrive. In fact, if we look at the top 10 successful people in Canada, how many are immigrants or 2nd generation, how many have PhDs, how many came from nothing and made it themselves.

While I don’t dispute that the business process for accepting and processing applicants was broken, out-of-date and inefficient, and I don’t even dispute the fact that changes needed to be made to the system and the immigration policy that was created following WWII, I would argue that the direction the Conservatives took did not consider the whole picture of what made Canada as successful as it is today – since Canada was created almost 150 years ago, it was the hard work of communities, pockets of ambitious immigrants and their families, that shaped the values and economic success of the Canada we have today.

By choosing an elitist immigration reform policy that cherry-picks only the best and brightest immigrants, or only those with questionably deep pockets, the Conservatives have chosen to open Canada’s doors to the world’s 1%.

Canada doesn’t need the 1%, we have enough of our own, we need the 99% the world economy relies on to keep it spinning.

Georgina