The Chinese Canadian National Council (CCNC) (french: Conseil national des Canadiens chinois pour la justice sociale), known in the Chinese-Canadian community as Equal Rights Council (平權會), is an organization whose purpose is to promote equity, social justice, inclusive civic participation, and respect for diversity. The first CCNC in Ontario was CCNCTO, founded in 1980. In 2019, CCNC-SJ was founded to monitor racial discrimination in Canada and to help young

Chinese Canadian , native_name = , native_name_lang = , image = Chinese Canadian population by province.svg , image_caption = Chinese Canadians as percent of population by province / territory , pop = 1,715,7704.63% of the ...

s learn about their cultural history.

History

The organization was created in 1980, after an incident in September 1979 when the

CTV Television Network The CTV Television Network, commonly known as CTV, is a Canadian English-language terrestrial television network. Launched in 1961 and acquired by BCE Inc. in 2000, CTV is Canada's largest privately owned television network and is now a divis ...

incorrectly represented Chinese Canadians in an investigative show called '' W5''. In a feature called "Campus Giveaways", CTV used allegedly incorrect statistics to conclude that foreign students were eroding other Canadians' opportunities for a secondary education and benefitting from public universities funded by Canadian taxpayers. ''All'' Chinese university students were treated as foreign students, regardless of their real nationality. The show also made numerous racial remarks about the Chinese students. The incident and the resulting campaign were reported in the Canadian media. In response, Chinese communities across Canada staged protests against CTV and forced the President of CTV to publicly apologize for the ''W5'' feature. After the incident, Chinese who protested against CTV across Canada staged a meeting in

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

. The meeting called for a stronger voice representing Chinese Canadians nationwide, thus the CCNC was formed. By 1980, the organization had developed nationwide presence with twenty-eight chapters. The United Chinese Community Enrichment Services Society (S.U.C.C.E.S.S.) was accepted as a voting member in 1989.

Advocacy history

Since the formation of the CCNC, it has spoken out against racial discrimination against Chinese in Canada. The CCNC is also involved in controversial issues concerning Chinese in Canada, like forcing the Government of Canada to apologize and redress the

head tax A poll tax, also known as head tax or capitation, is a tax levied as a fixed sum on every liable individual (typically every adult), without reference to income or resources. Head taxes were important sources of revenue for many governments fr ...

that Chinese had to paid from 1885 to 1923. On November 28, 2005, the Toronto chapter of the CCNC (CCNCTO) was granted the William P. Hubbard Award for Race Relations by the Toronto city government, in recognition of the CCNC's advocacy for Head Tax redress. CCNC-SJ has criticized the

Bank of Canada The Bank of Canada (BoC; french: Banque du Canada) is a Crown corporation and Canada's central bank. Chartered in 1934 under the ''Bank of Canada Act'', it is responsible for formulating Canada's monetary policy,OECD. OECD Economic Surveys: Ca ...

for leaving out the image of an

Asian Canadian Asian Canadians are Canadians who were either born in or can trace their ancestry to the continent of Asia. Canadians with Asian ancestry comprise both the largest and fastest growing group in Canada, after European Canadians, with roughly 19.3 ...

from its

100 dollar bill The United States one-hundred-dollar bill ($100) is a denomination of United States currency. The first United States Note with this value was issued in 1862 and the Federal Reserve Note version was launched in 1914, alongside other denominations ...

and condemned the bank for listening to 'racist comments and feedback from the focus group' of its bank note design. The Bank of Canada later apologized to the CCNC-SJ's executive director Victor Wong.

References

{{Authority control Chinese Canadian organizations