See below for a newstory from
The Sudbury Star.

http://www.thesudburystar.com/webapp/
sitepages/printable.asp?paper=
www.thesudburystar.com&contentID
=115184&annewspapername=The+Sudbury+Star


By Laura Stradiotto/The Sudbury Star

Saturday, June 25, 2005 - 11:00

Local News - Gim Foon Wong has just finishing riding 1,000 km in the 
last two days on his Gold Wind motorcycle.

“It’s a miracle we’re here,” said Wong, tired but alert after arriving 
in Sudbury at 3 a.m. Friday.

The 82-year-old left Beacon Hill Park in Vancouver on June 3 and is 
travelling across Canada in an effort to raise awareness about the Chinese 
Head Tax and deliver a message to the Prime Minister.

His son, Jeff, is travelling behind in a 1979 Chev van with a handmade 
wooden trailer that snapped in half in Winnipeg.

The father-son team is trying to get back on schedule in order to 
arrive in Ottawa on Canada Day, the same day 82 years ago that the Canadian 
government implemented the Chinese Exclusion Act, which stopped Chinese 
immigration until it was repealed in 1947.

Wong, a World War Two airforce veteran, plans to dress in his old 
uniform, drive up to Parliament in his motorcycle and hand over a petition 
demanding a redress of the immigration tax.

Between 1881 and 1885, Chinese men were recruited overseas as a cheap 
source of labour to perform some of the most dangerous jobs building the 
Canadian Pacific Rail.

The Canadian government imposed a $50 head tax in 1885 and later 
increased the fee to $500 — the equivalent of two years salary — in 1903.

Wong’s father had to pay the hefty fee, which could have bought two 
houses in Vancouver’s Chinatown back then.

He borrowed money from his brothers and family back home, but was still 
paying it back in the 1930s.

“During the Depression, people were poor, but they were twice as poor,” 
said Jeff Wong.

The father-son team was greeted by Sudbury’s Chinese community, many of 
whom have parents and relatives who paid the head tax.

Yew Lee’s father George, a long-time Sudbury restaurateur, was forced 
to pay the tax.

George Lee, although now deceased, came to Sudbury in 1913 from Hoi 
Ping, China.

He had to borrow $500 from his family back home to be granted 
“permission” to stay in the country.

“It was like having a mortgage to belong to this country,” said Yew Lee 
on Friday.

“But you still couldn’t vote and you couldn’t go into public 
facilities.”

His parents were separated for 14 years. Because of the Chinese 
Exclusion Act, his mother Chow Quen Lee was not allowed into Canada until 
1950.

Back in China, many women who were waiting for their husbands died of 
starvation, said Lee.

“It’s a terrible history and a shame. There should be an apology.”

The Chinese Canadian National Council is one of Wong’s sponsors. The 
council continues to seek a redress on behalf of the surviving head 
taxpayers and their families and urges the Canadian government to negotiate 
a resolution.

Click here for related stories about Gim Wong and Redress on this blog site.

http://www.gunghaggisfatchoy.com/blog/
ChineseHeadTaxissuesGimWongsRideforRedress