21 kids allegedly removed from Toronto school to make way for foreign students

Over the last few weeks, through the SNC-Lavalin scandal, we have seen just how much the mega-wealthy businesses in Canada can lobby their way out of penalties. With SNC-Lavalin, a company which fills up the world banks banned list, likely managing to skirt all serious punishment for a criminal offence.

Now it seems, foreign groups also may be able to cruise by a different path than that provided to most Canadians as well.

According to the CBC, multiple families have accused a Toronto District School Board of banning 21 preschoolers at a downtown daycare from moving "across the hall to a junior kindergarten classroom" this fall to allegedly make space for the children of incoming foreign doctors and researchers.

The pre-schoolers had been scheduled to graduate and move onto a junior kindergarten class in the same building later this year, and the school had previously assured them that their kids would be allowed to stay even though the families did not live in the boundaries of the school.

In a turn of events though, families received a letter earlier last week from the school's principal noting that the school was now full, and therefore their kids would have to be moved.

While plausible that the school is, in fact, full, further details from the CBC story seriously put the school boards comments into question.

For example, as early as February, multiple daycare directors who met with school board planners were told "doctors and academics from overseas were expected to arrive in the school district" and that furthermore, they would take multiple places in the school.

If true, this story could seriously shake up the foundation of what it means to be a Canadian citizen, right as we enter the 2019 election.

Already Canadian sentiments against immigration are reaching records highs precisely at a time when Canada needs good immigrants most.

Our social safety net is vastly over-extended, and if we do not keep adding in young people who have kids, and build businesses, we will be left with a wholly broken welfare state, alongside a languishing economy.

At the same time, homes in downtown cores remain extremely expensive, almost unaffordable, while food banks remain resource-strapped, and shelters remain full.

This economic and social pressure is precisely why all governments must work together to provide smooth, integrative immigration which reduces the chances of social strife or competation for limited services.

The first aspect of actually doing that involves ensuring a fair playing field, where new entrants are not provided excessive benefits in comparison to those already here.

We should not be replacing ourselves in the Canadian economy, rather adding on to our growing mosaic.

It seems that today, for the most part, we are losing sight of that with endless policies designed to cater to specific groups of people rather than building a united Canada.

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