Olivier De Schutter: Canada Political

Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq Dept: Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq denounced UN right-to-food envoy Olivier De Schutter as patronizing, ill-informed and academic. Immigration Minister Jason Kenney was no less harsh . I think this is completely ridiculous, he said. Instead of giving Canada political lectures, the UN should focus on countries where people are starving, he suggested, according to The Star. Whatever the case, it s always healthy to consider how others see us, even if the truth is unflattering. A country as democratic, rich and innovative as ours should be big enough to absorb a critique from time to time and prime Minister Stephen Harper s Conservative cabinet fairly erupted in indignation this past week as Canada took a knock from a United Nations envoy for turning a blind eye to the poverty, inequality and, yes, the hunger in our midst. Granted, no one likes to be criticized. And granted, Canada s relative poverty bears little comparison to the dire misery in Africa, where people do starve. Moreover, De Schutter doesn t seem to have had any special reason to come here on his first tour of a developed country, unless it was to make the point that no nation is beyond reproach. (www.immigrantscanada.com). As reported in the news.