Ontario Premier Doug Ford Refuses to apologize for derogatory immigrant comments

Ontario Premier Doug Ford is declining to apologize for comments he made about immigrants.

After an unrelated announcement on Monday, October 18, in Tecumseh, Ontario, Ford launched into a familiar line about Ontario’s biggest problem being a shortage of workers, particularly in the trades and construction. He said people who want to come and work their “tail off” like every other new Canadian has done should come to Ontario, but people who want to “collect the dole and sit around” should go somewhere else. The term “collect the dole” which means accessing social assistance is a disparaging term used to describe the act of accessing “government programs that provide a minimum level of income support to individuals and households living in poverty.” New immigrants are often ineligible for many services shortly after immigrating, including being ineligible to receive social assistance. The Canadian immigration system favours the highly educated, highly skilled class of immigrants, yet these new immigrants, in many cases, cannot work in their trained fields in Canada, instead spending their lives in unstable employment for which they are overqualified and often underpaid.

During question period at the legislature on Tuesday, October 19, New Democrat Doly Begum said the comments are offensive to families like hers, who came to Ontario for a better future, and called for an apology. Ford refused to apologize. Instead, Ford doubled down and said that he is pro-immigration, no matter where people come from, and that his support base is made up of people from around the world.

The Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI) says Ford should not be promoting xenophobic tropes about immigrants.

Earlier, NDP Leader Andrea Horwath had said in a tweet that Ford should apologize. “Today, Doug Ford chose to traffic in demeaning stereotypes about new Ontarians looking to build a better life for their families,” she wrote. “Our diverse, welcoming province deserves better.” Speaking after Question Period, Horwath said that Ford’s response proves the premier has “some pretty distasteful and inappropriate values and beliefs about immigrants.”

“What he is doing is showing stereotypes of immigrants that create dislike, that create division, that create a situation where people assume that what the premier says is correct and it is not correct,” Horwath told reporters. “He can parse his words all he wants but a premier that speaks with such ignorance about who it is that built our entire province. We are a province and country of immigrants."

Liberal Leader Steven Del Duca also called on the premier to apologize, saying the comments were “callous.” Del Duca wrote on Twitter. “As a son of immigrants, I know first-hand how people like my parents helped to build Ontario. Doug Ford should apologize for his callous comments.” Del Duca said: “This kind of divisive language is deeply disappointing. A premier is supposed to unite Ontarians, not wedge us further apart.” "I think what he said was incredibly hurtful to lots of Ontarians. I think at the very least it shows a very outdated notion of the value of immigration,” he said. "It was a very outdated and tired thing to say so I hope he apologizes and we can move on."

Ontario Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner said that to suggest newcomers are not hard workers “is inexcusable.”

The premier comments are disappointing to members of the Regent Park, St. James Town and Moss Park communities, many of whom are immigrants and newcomers to Canada.

Written by
Murphy Browne

Journalist
FOCUS Media Arts Centre