Faced with a controversial departmental legacy, federal Minister Joe Volpe brings passion and pragmatism to the challenging task of improving immigration in Canada.
It's perhaps fate's twisted sense of irony that brings in an Italian to mend the federal government's reputation after a scandal involving pizza. Earlier this year, Minister Joe Volpe, who immigrated to Canada as a seven-year-old boy after World War II, was given the task of taking Citizenship and Immigration Canada, a department that has been driven by controversy, critiques and bureaucratic inefficiency in the past, in a new direction — forward.
Good thing Volpe's favourite Italian dish is no pizza pie; it's orecchiette, an ear-shaped pasta.
"It's peculiar to the region of Italy where I come from; it means "little ears," says Volpe, whose town of origin is Monteleone. He says it was the location of the first popular rebellion against the fascist regime in Italy. "A couple of my aunts were the ringleaders in this woman-led rebellion," adds Volpe, who was invited back to his hometown last year to commemorate the uprising.
After World War II, Volpe says the town was virtually depopulated by young men and their families. "They wanted to go abroad, seek work and make a future for themselves after the war," he says. His father had left four years before him, his mother, and brother and sister joined him.
"We landed at Pier 21, took a train almost immediately, travelled for two days when we finally landed in Toronto, where we were reunited with my dad."
Volpe didn't know a single word of English when he first arrived, but started to learn from the other kids at school, even though the family still spoke Italian at home.
"When my dad was alive, my mother and I never spoke anything but Italian with him. I'm not sure that my mother speaks English. I could never verify that," he says.
Volpe continued the tradition of speaking Italian at home with his wife and four children, three boys, one girl, who are now passing on the Italian heritage to their own families. "Our culture is known for the way we express ourselves," he adds.
Volpe certainly is a passionate speaker. At a recent citizenship ceremony in Vancouver, he had many of the new citizens in tears during a heartfelt speech about Canada.
Along with his passion comes an intelligence (he can pick up a debate on the artistic merit between Da Vinci and Michelangelo), a dry wit (when asked his reason for leaving his career as a school principal for politics, he answered, "I lost my sanity") and a no-nonsense pragmatism, which, together, will hopefully see him make real progress in the immigration department
