Mon Feb 26, 8:04 PM
By Chris Maughan
OTTAWA (CP) - At least 110,000 "Lost Canadians," who risk being stripped of their citizenship under an arcane law, are the children of soldiers and diplomats who served overseas, a parliamentary committee heard Monday.
Don Chapman, who has been leading the charge to change Canada's Citizenship Act, said veterans who fought and died for the country would be ashamed of the government. "It is totally against what they fought for," Chapman said after an appearance before the Commons citizenship and immigration committee.
"They fought for a Canada that was accepting, compassionate, and fair, and they fought for their own children. Those children are being victimized today."
Between 1947 and 1977, Canada's Citizenship Act said children born out of wedlock or to a father who took a second citizenship would be disqualified as Canadians. Those two scenarios are the ones that apply most often.
The issue has left many Canadians, including four MPs, scrambling to find out if they or their children are citizens.
Chapman wants the current law changed to restore citizenship to those who had it revoked, and to protect those born between 1947 and 1977.
He estimates that 700,000 Canadians have either lost their citizenship or are at risk of having it stripped.
Christine Eden, chair of a special Air Force committee on Lost Canadians in the military, said 110,000 is a conservative estimate for the number of military and diplomat kids affected.
"It's a big problem because if we're not Canadian, then we're citizens of the country of our birth - and I'm already hearing about some men who have been served draft notices by those countries," Eden said.
Eden added that at least two active soldiers have lost their citizenship.
Immigration Minister Diane Finley said the government has had just 881 calls on potential loss of citizenship.
"I am treating these cases as a priority," she said in a statement. "I have directed the department to resolve these questions as quickly as possible.
"I think it's also important to keep the scale of the issue in perspective."
But Chapman, Eden and many MPs agreed that's not a reliable number because many people either don't know they're Lost Canadians or they don't want to come forward in case they have their citizenship stripped.
Committee members shook their heads as they listened to testimony from Lost Canadians, including Joe Taylor, the son of a survivor of the Normandy invasion of 1944.
"To our soldiers, and their descendants, whenever I hear your story, I have to apologize," said Liberal MP Andrew Telegdi. "This is terrible and I feel awfully bad for each and every one of you."
Eden said the government's failure to tell military staff about changing citizenship rules constitutes a definite lack of respect for the families of those willing to die for their country.
Just ask Sheila Walshe. Her father, a Canadian soldier in England during the Second World War, had her out of wedlock because Allied soldiers were barred from marrying during the war.
"They were expected to die in battle," she explained.
Afterward, Walshe was raised in Canada for nine years. Then her homesick mother abducted her, taking her back to England. Walshe was told her father had died a few months later, but in 1990, she found her estranged father and decided to move her family back to Canada.
In 1991 she tried to do just that - and found out she wasn't Canadian.
Fighting back tears, Walshe explained that her father was a patriot and his dying wish was to see his daughter's citizenship recognized by the government. He never did.
"I've always been Canadian," said Walshe. "I wasn't English, that's for sure, because they kept telling me I was a Canadian bit of dirt."
She said the government isn't living up to her idea of Canada.
"Canada is just and honourable and fair, and I know because my father told me so when I was knee-high to a grasshopper. None of this seems very Canadian."
Copyright © 2007 Canadian Press