Federal Liberals are demanding that Okanagan-Shuswap MP Colin Mayes resign as chair of a committee on Aboriginal affairs after learning of his response to an e-mail joke.Liberal Indian Affairs critic Anita Neville had not seen the full e-mail, but said she was shocked by Mayes’ response to a joke about First Nations people. She said he owes Aboriginals an apology.“This joke, with its reference to ‘chief’ and ‘tonto’ and its fractured English, is a classic example of the old negative stereotypes that lead to the denigration of Canada’s First Nations people,” she said. “He didn’t make the joke but he reinforced stereotypes of Aboriginal people.”Mayes responded to the e-mail by saying “good joke.”
The joke was included in an e-mail sent to Mayes from a local party member on Oct. 21, 2006. After the Liberals distributed a press release about the e-mail exchange, media outlets across the country pounced on the story.In an interview from his Ottawa office on Thurs-day, Mayes scoffed at Neville’s remarks. “I’m quite upset about the cheap partisan smear that Liberal Anita Neville is making against me,” Mayes said. “She has taken an e-mail comment and completely misrepresented it.”What was most surprising Mayes said is that Neville has been complimentary of his work on the committee and told him he was “very fair” as chairman.
When asked if she had spoken to any First Nations people who had taken offence to the remark, Neville initially said no, because she had been in meetings all day, but then changed her answer.“I’ve heard from a number of people,” she said. “They were quite appalled by it.”Neville said that Mayes should have simply deleted the e-mail and not responded to it. “Mr. Mayes should know better,” she said.
Mayes fired back saying that he does not find humour in jokes that insult the culture or heritage of anyone. He said he comes from a multicultural family with a wife of Japanese heritage and two adopted grandchildren from Haiti.This isn’t the first time that an e-mail has landed a local Conservative in hot water. Former Conservative board member Miles Lehn was fired earlier this week because of an e-mail that some other directors took offence to. In August, Mayes’ wife Jacquie apologized when she claimed “we are being attacked by principalities and powers that are evil” in an e-mail about Vernon Daily Courier managing editor David Wylie.
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