The following is the full text of the speech titled "Canada and the World" delivered by Liberal MP Michael Ignatieff at the University of Ottawa on March 30, 2006.
Ever since I entered Parliament in January, people have been asking me: Why have you gone into politics? As in: “ Are you nuts?”
No, I’m not nuts.
This is my country, after all.
As a child, I played in the barns of my uncle’s dairy farm in Richmond, Quebec; I swam off the rocks at my aunt’s place in Georgian Bay; when I was a young teacher out in British Columbia, I remember sailing up Howe Sound and watching the sun burn the mist off the ocean; as a father, I rocketed down the Kicking Horse River in a raft with my children; as a husband, I stood with my wife among the graves of the Hungarian pioneers — her people — who settled the country near Esterhazy, Saskatchewan.
This is my Canada. These are the memories that made me who I am. This is the river that runs through me, as it runs through you. This is the place that defined my political allegiances. This is the place I call home.
My father came off a boat in Montreal harbor in 1928, a refugee from Russia. He became an ambassador for his country. Canada made him who he was, and he repaid his debt with a life of public service.
Now it’s my turn.
My family taught me to think of Canadians as a serious people.
Steadfast, tough, courageous.
During World War II, my mother worked in London with the French Resistance. One of her closest friends was a young Canadian who parachuted into France in 1943 to fight fascism. His name was Frank Pickersgill. He was captured by the Nazis and died under torture in Buchenwald. He died so that other men and women could live in freedom.
At our best, we are that kind of people.
Today, we are concerned about our soldiers in Afghanistan. So we should be. But service in Afghanistan is in the best traditions of our people. From Vimy Ridge to Juneau Beach, from Rwanda to Bosnia, we have earned our place in the world of nations by service and sacrifice.
I’ve been to Afghanistan, once when the Taliban were in power and once since then. I’ve got
faith in the Afghans who are pushing their country out of the ditch. It’s good that Canadians are putting their shoulders to the wheel to help them.
Critics say I’ve been out of the country a long time. They seem to miss the years spent teaching at UBC, at the Banff Center for the Fine Arts, the documentary series I made for the CBC, the television shows I hosted for TV Ontario, the Massey Lectures I gave on CBC radio, the books and articles I’ve devoted to Canadian problems. I don’t feel I’ve been away at all.
But yes, I’ve also been a war reporter, human rights teacher, journalist and I’ve seen a lot of the world.
Sometimes you only see your country clearly from far away.
I saw it clearly in eastern Croatia in 1992. I had just crossed a UN check point and had been taken prisoner by a half a dozen armed men high on alcohol and ethnic nationalism. A young UN peacekeeper arrived, as I was being bundled away. He cocked his M-16 and said: ‘We’ll do this my way.’ And they did.
That young soldier was from Moncton, New Brunswick.
I saw my country clearly watching a policewoman escort frightened families to and fro across a mined no-man’s land in another part of Yugoslavia. When I asked her why she was doing dangerous work in a foreign country she said, with a smile: ‘It beats writing traffic tickets in Saskatoon.’
I saw my country clearly in the young Canadians who took my classes at Harvard. I saw how eager they were to test themselves against the best the world has to offer.
