Several politicians signed a document today (April 25) pledging their support for "providing funding to research  to incorporate the missing history of Chinese pioneers" into the B.C. school curriculum.

The declaration also called  upon the B.C. government to take "redemptive actions towards the Chinese community" in cooperation with the City of New Westminster when the Royal City holds its  150th anniversary celebration later this year.

In a signing ceremony at a church in southeast Vancouver, NDP MLA Jenny Kwan, NDP MP Don Davies, Liberal MP Ujjal Dosanjh, and a few Green party provincial candidates—Jodie Emery, Doug and Rev Warkentin, Helen Chang, Grant Fraser, and Stephen Kronstein—all supported the declaration created by Canadians for Reconciliation.

Kwan told the Straight at the event  that she  was signing  the document on behalf of the entire NDP caucus. No B.C. Liberal candidates were present for the signing ceremony.

New Westminster once had a thriving Chinatown bounded by Columbia, McNeely, Carnarvon, and Blackie streets. Much of it was demolished in 1919 after the fire marshall declared the district "a fire trap".

The following year, the New Westminster building inspector ordered the demolition of 14 buildings, mostly in the core of Chinatown, according to a Canadians for Reconciliation presentation at today's event.

Bill Chu, president of Canadians for Reconciliation, told the crowd of about 50 people in the church that there hasn't been a provincial government or City of New Westminster demonstration of remorse for the past discrimination against the Chinese in B.C.

He characterized New Westminster as the "epicentre" of racism against the Chinese in the 19th and early 20th centuries, but noted that this discrimination spread across the province.

"Reconciliation is about bringing back such groups to hear the truth in history, to express appropriate remorse, and to undertake to treat each other with respect," he said in his speech.

He added that it's important for the Chinese diaspora to learn about the history for the sake of their identities.

"Here in B.C., without the current culture and curriculum painting Chinese as cofounders and builders of the province, non-Chinese will see themselves as the hosts and the Chinese as guests," Chu said.  "This will likely  result in inequities from school playgrounds to work."

One woman in the audience, Wendy Harris, said she was born and raised in New Westminster and lived there her entire life.  "I never had a clue that New Westminster had a Chinatown," she said, noting that she is nearly 50 years old.

Canadians for Reconciliation presented the audience with a timeline demonstrating the depth of discrimination meted out to Chinese migrants in B.C. in  the 19th and 20th centuries. It mentioned, among other things:

1875: Chinese people were disenfranchised from voting in provincial and federal elections.

1875 to 1879: The revised Land Act 1875 made land available  to settlers free of charge except for those of Chinese and aboriginal descent.  

1876: The Municipal Act was amended to prohibit Chinese from voting in local elections.

1877: B.C. adopted the Coal Mines Regulation Act, which stated: "No Chinaman or person unable to speak good English could hold 'any position of trust or responsibility', which resulted in most mine owners not employing Chinese labourers to work underground.

1878: A clause was added to provincial public-works projects stating that Chinese should not be employed. This remained in effect until 1958.

1884: William Smithe's government tried to impose a $10 annual tax on all Chinese over the age of 10. The courts struck it down.

1885: The head tax was introduced on Chinese immigrants, beginning at $50, rising  in 1900  to $100, and then to $500 before virtually all Chinese immigration was banned in 1923.

1886: The legislature accepted a "no Chinese" clause in several bils incorporating utility, railway, and mining companies.

1891: Premier John Robson stated that Chinese were "a most undesirable class and were not wanted in this country".

1893: The legislature voted to increase the head tax to $1,000. B.C. also asked for three-quarters of the revenue to cover the alleged costs of administering justice and providing facilities for lepers, allegedly caused by the Chinese. The federal government was not sympathetic to these suggestions.

1897: The provincial Liberal association's platform supported "the discouragement by all constitutional methods of immigration and employment" of Chinese labour.

1899: B.C. passed the Alien Exclusion Act to deny employment to Asians. All charters granted by the legislature banned the employment of Asians.

1904: The McBride government laid 142 charges against various managers at Cumberland to enforce the "no Chinese" rule in the 1903 Coal Mines Regulation Act. The federal government disallowed this act.

1905: The B.C. government reenacted the "no Chinese" clauses, but they were again disallowed.

1907: The Asiatic Exclusion League held a rally, which turned into a race riot in Chinatown and Japantown.

1911-1912: Provincial revenue from the Chinese head tax accounted for $1.4 million—or a little more than 13 percent of all provincial revenue.

1912: Premier Richard McBride, who was born in New Westminster, stated that "British Columbia must be kept white....we have the right to say that our own kind and colour shall enjoy the fruits of our labour." The City of New Westminster demolished part of Chinatown.

1919-1920: Further demolitions took place in New Westminster's Chinatown.

1923: New Westminster MP W.G. McQuarrie introduced the Chinese Immigration Act, which obtained parliamentary approval. It  banned the immigration of almost all Chinese people until 1947.

In an interview with the Straight earlier this month, Chu said that in the 1881 census, Chinese people comprised 20 percent of the nonaboriginal population in B.C.

He noted that life was miserable for Chinese people in China during the 19th century as a result of foreign powers importing opium into the country. This forced people to leave southern China. "After 1840, there were all these nasty things the colonial powers did to us," Chu said.

He added that when he attended school in Hong Kong while it was under British control, this history did not appear in his textbooks. "They don't even want to bother distorting history," Chu said.  "They simply erased it."

He said this is why he's concerned about the missing history of the Chinese pioneers  in B.C. "It happened to us once in Hong Kong as a colony," he said. "Now, we come to this place, and...how come our history is not really in the curriculum today?"

Chu said it's time to correct this. "Last year, we had this BC 150 [anniversary]. Not a word got spoken about this piece of history we're talking about."

He noted that his interest in New Westminster was piqued last year when he learned about a Chinese cemetery underneath what is now the local secondary school.