STATEMENT BY TOM LUKIWSKI

APRIL 4, 2008

 
“Mr. Speaker, I would like to offer through you and to you to every member in the House my deepest apologies for some profoundly unacceptable and offensive remarks that I have made in the past which have recently come to the public forum, particularly in the last 24 hours.

Despite the fact that I made these comments just about 17 years ago does not lessen the shame that I feel for making those comments in the first place, nor does it diminish the hurtful aspect of those comments that were contained in my remarks of 1991.

Therefore, I feel absolutely compelled that I must stand here today and publicly apologize to a number of people.

First and foremost, I want to apologize to all of my friends and colleagues who are gay or lesbian. I have no idea what they must think of me now. I have no idea what they were thinking when they first heard or read about my comments. To say that I am ashamed is not putting it in context and certainly not putting it in strong enough terms.

Their friendship and support for me during my entire career and my personal life has been extremely important to me, and today I ask their forgiveness.

Just being in the public sphere means little to me compared to their opinion toward me, and to them I say I am truly sorry.

To the entire gay and lesbian community, I also want to extend my deepest and most abject apologies. The comments I made should not be tolerated in any society. They should not be tolerated today. They should not have been tolerated in 1991. They should not have been tolerated in years previous to that.

The words I used were more than just hurtful. They are words that should not be allowed to be spoken today, either publicly or privately.

I know there is an awful lot of anger directly toward me from members of the gay and lesbian community and that anger is certainly understandable and, I would say, it is justified. All I can say is that I hope that over the passage of time, my apologies will be accepted.

There are many other people to whom I need to apologize because of their relationship to me. Because of that relationship the criticisms that will be made directed toward me will end up affecting these people. They will in effect probably bear the brunt of much of that criticism, when in fact they had absolutely nothing to do with this incident.

To my family, to my friends, to my colleagues, to my staff, to my Prime Minister, to the people of Saskatchewan and, most particularly, to the people of Regina—Lumsden—Lake Centre I offer not only my apologies for my remarks, but I apologize for the embarrassment and the hurt that I have surely caused them.

I also want to make a comment to the hon. member for Burnaby—Douglas who raised this issue in question period yesterday. I simply want to thank the hon. member for allowing me to personally apologize to him. He accepted my phone call with that in mind. I will never forget the member's generosity and kindness.

There are times when people say things they do not mean, and this is one of those times with respect to my comments. While it is very, very true I made those hurtful comments; they do not reflect my personal beliefs. They did not reflect my personal beliefs in 1991. They do not reflect my personal beliefs now, which lend itself to the obvious question, then, if I did not mean what I said, why did I say those things to begin with?

The only explanation that I can give to you, Mr. Speaker, and to the members of this House, is that I was stupid, thoughtless, and insensitive. I am not using that as a defense. I am merely stating the way that I felt and the actions that I took.

There is absolutely nothing that I could say in or outside of this assembly that would do adequate apologies to those people whom I have hurt. I deeply regret and I have deep remorse for my words of 17 years ago. I can assure you, Mr. Speaker, and all of my colleagues in this House, that I will spend the rest of my career and my life trying to make up for those shameless comments.”