Governments apologise for sending children to work in Canada and Australia

November 16 2009 by Liam Clifford

Children sent to live in Canada and Australia will receive an apology.

The British and Australian governments have announced that they will apologise officially for child migrant programmes which, for centuries, sent poor children to live in Canada and Australia to work as domestic servants.

The remaining living victims of these programmes are welcoming the decision to apologise for the schemes, which resulted in many children becoming victims of physical and sexual abuse.

Despite the announcements of the apologies from Gordon Brown and Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, the Canadian government says no such apology will come from them.

Alykhan Velshi, the spokesperson for Canadian immigration minister Jason Kenney, said, "it goes without saying that the treatment of these individuals, their experience in Australia, was different to that in Canada. As a result, there has not been a widespread call among Canadian descendants of British home children for an apology."

Although an official apology may not be made, there are plans to make 2010 the 'Year of the British Home Child’ across Canada. The motion has been put forward by Canadian MP Phil McColeman in response to calls to commemorate the role the children played.

Some 100,000 British children were sent to live in Canada under the scheme between 1869 and the 1930s.

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