When Tom Mulcair was leader of the NDP at the height of its post-Jack Layton tally of parliamentary seats, he too was also attacked for holding a foreign passport, in his case a French one. Evidently there is something unpatriotic and faintly sinister about claiming to be a Canadian while holding some other country's passport, even if it's only politicians that get publicly assailed for it.
But these days Canada has been handing out Canadian passports by the thousands to foreigners (mostly Americans) who have never have lived here and quite likely never will, on the basis of their descent from some distant ancestor who did live in Canada but left, perhaps centuries ago.
Is dual citizenship evil, as the Mulcair and Scheer smears suggest? Or is passport collecting a hobby that anyone can pursue, like stamps or coins, as the Canadian government (and many thousands of dual passport holders) seems to believe?
Like many people from immigrant families, I am eligible for several foreign citizenships. I could seek British citizenship, having been born there, and Irish (with European citizenship attached) on the basis of long-dead ancestors. Indeed, Britain is so eager to have me apply (and pay exorbitant fees) for a British passport that they will not permit me to enter Britain on my Canadian passport. Canada, in fact, takes the same position with citizens of foreign countries who were actually born here -- it won't let them in unless they first acquire a Canadian passport. The theory here seems to be that it is illegitimate to change one's citizenship, and countries are entitled to disrespect the passports of their ex-citizens' new countries.
For the record I have never held a passport other than a Canadian one. Think of it this way: if you hold a nation's passport, chances are it will eventually want to tax you or conscript you. Choose carefully.
Meanwhile, the Canadian government is encouraging non-Canadians to acquire a second passport as a souvenir, while public opinion makes it faintly shameful for anyone in public life to hold more than one.
We need to sort out how we feel about this multiple-passport marketing. That is, we need to agree it is nuts, even if the Supreme Court told the feds to do it.
