Harper Government Issues Full Apology For Chinese Head Tax

It started just a few years after Canada officially became a country. 

It ended in 1947.  

But for many, the true conclusion to one of the most shameful moments in Canadian history took place Thursday, when Prime Minister Stephen Harper stood up in the House of Commons in Ottawa and officially apologized for the Chinese Head Tax.  

 The levy was imposed on Asians in this country, forcing them to pay as much as $500 for the right to come to Canada. And though many Chinese immigrants helped build our unifying railroad, they were forced to pay for their efforts with a racist surcharge.  

Chinese immigrants were eventually banned altogether until the laws were finally changed in 1947. 

The P.M. called the tax “a grave injustice” and offered those affected by the tax – and their families – a heartfelt apology.  

“On behalf of the people and government of Canada, we offer a full apology to Chinese Canadians for the head tax and express our deepest sorrow for the subsequent exclusion of Chinese immigrants,” he told the Commons.  

“While Canadian courts have ruled that the head tax and immigration prohibition were legally authorized at the time, we fully accept the responsibility to acknowledge the shameful policies of our past,” the Tory boss intoned as about 100 Chinese community members listened with tears in their eyes in the public gallery.  

Among those making the symbolic train trip trip to Ottawa: 106-year-old Ralph Ing, one of the last surviving Chinese Canadians still around from the regressive Head Tax days.  

“He talked about working on the railroad from sun up to sundown and being treated like a dog,” recalls his granddaughter Landy Ing-Anderson. “We are just so happy that we’re here today, and that grandpa is alive for the apology.”

It was the first time Ing has left his nursing home in over a decade. He arrived carrying something symbolic – one of the last spikes from the railroad he helped build.

“For over six decades these race-based financial measures aimed solely at the Chinese were implemented with deliberation by the Canadian state,” Harper admitted.   “This was a grave injustice and one we are morally obligated to acknowledge.”  

The Head Tax not only separated families from their money, it took them away from their loved ones, too.

When Canada closed the door to Chinese immigrants, many were unable to see their wives, sons, daughters or parents again.

“When I was 12, that was when I met my dad for the very, very first time,” recalls Linda Ing, the  daughter of the 106-year-old.

“My grandmother was living in poverty and my uncle died of starvation in that period because of the Exclusion Act,” Ing-Anderson complains.

But the apology was about more than just words – it also involved money. After years of demanding both a mea culpa and reparations, those affected got both.  

Victims or their descendants will receive what the government calls symbolic payments to compensate them for the costs and the humiliation – about $20,000. There will also be $34 million doled out towards community and national commemorative projects.

Many are still incensed their ancestors were charged the heavy levy only after the railroad was built. At least 1,000 of the workers died during its ocean-to-ocean construction.

Now, finally, after several generations, the old wrong has been at least partially righted.

“We can close this chapter in our lives,” Ing agrees.

That’s a sentiment shared by all who arrived in the nation’s capital to witness the long awaited words they weren’t sure they’d ever hear.

  To see unedited video of the apology, click here.

Head Tax history