Queer groups recommend changes to refugee reform bill

I have a new piece up on the national page of Xtra.ca today, which looks at the representations made before the Commons immigration committee by queer groups. This is part of the ongoing look at refugee policy in this country that I've been looking at, and I was glad to be able to attend the the hearing - even if the one I attended (the session on May 27th with the Rainbow Refugee Committee) was at eight o'clock at night. The hearings had been running in a marathon session, often holding two sittings in a day, each of them two-to-three hours long, so it's no surprise that the committee has been pretty exhausted by the end of it.

One thing that didn't make it into the story for lack of space was the way in which Conservative MP Alice Wong made a point of confirming that Egale Canada Executive Director Helen Kennedy once worked for NDP MP Olivia Chow, when Chow was a city councillor in Toronto. It was a transparent attempt at discrediting Kennedy's testimony, but it didn't go anywhere when Chow tried to challenge it. I also saw during the time I was at the committee that Wong was making disparaging remarks about other committee members, but when they tried to challenge her on it, Wong's Conservative colleagues tried to accuse the Liberals of "bulling her" because she's a woman. This isn't the first time they've tried this tactic, and it was interesting to watch it happen in front of me.