TILSON BRINGS CUPE BOYCOTT OF ISRAELI ACADEMICS TO THE HOUSE’S ATTENTION

February 24, 2021

PARLIAMENT HILL – David Tilson, Member of Parliament for Dufferin-Caledon, rose during Question Period in the House of Commons on Monday, February 23, to raise the issue of the CUPE’s boycott of Israeli academics.

“Mr. Speaker, Ontario’s largest public sector union recently passed a motion calling for a boycott of all Israeli academics,” Tilson said. “The deliberate targeting of the Jewish people by the Canadian Union of Public Employees is not new. In fact, CUPE's president, Sid Ryan, recently compared the Israeli government with the Nazis. Will the Minister of Immigration explain the government's reaction to this motion by CUPE?”

With support from all sides of the House, the Honourable Jason Kenney, Minister of Citizenship, Immigration, and Multiculturalism, responded to Mr. Tilson’s question on behalf of the government. “Canadians should be concerned about the growing wave on Canadian campuses by organizations such as CUPE that are singling out and targeting the Jewish democratic state of Israel for opprobrium in the most vile language possible. …On behalf of all Canadians we denounce this kind of intolerance and extremism that is totally unacceptable.”