Prince Albert MP Defends Marxist Paradise Comments
Friday, June 02, 2006 at 15:08
The Member of Parliament for Prince Albert says comments he made at a recent parliamentary committee meeting have been taken out of context.
A report in the Saskatoon Star Phoenix this morning quoted Brian Fitzpatrick as saying Aboriginals live in a “Marxist Paradise.”
Liberal politicians immediately called for him to resign as Vice-Chair of the committee.
However, Fitzpatrick says his remarks were tied to a much longer speech. One where he talked about how First Nations people living on reserve are restricted in their choices of housing.
He says reserve residents don’t have things that everybody else takes for granted, like freedom of choice to do things in life, ownership of property and so on.
Fitzpatrick says ultimately he was trying to speak out about a system that is doing little to address serious issues on reserve when he made the comment.