Hon. Alice Wong, P.C.

On November 23, 2009, Alice Wong made a Member’s Statement on David Chen, who is the owner and operator of the Lucky Moose Food Mart in Toronto, Ontario.

For some background information, the national media has some coverage. Sample articles include:

– Blair defends arrest of grocer who nabbed thief – Globe and Mail, October 29, 2009
– Two charges dropped against shopkeeper – Toronto Star, November 3, 2009
– Opinion: To catch a thief in Toronto – Globe and Mail, November 4, 2009
– Opinion: Creating contempt for the justice system – The Gazette (Montreal), November 7, 2009
– General news search on Google News – David Chen, Lucky Moose

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The following is a transcript (November 23, 2009):

Mrs. Alice Wong (Richmond, CPC):
Mr. Speaker, shoplifters, vandals and other criminals are terrorizing small businesses in Toronto’s Chinatown. The victims of crime are often recent immigrants who own and operate their own small businesses.

Every dollar’s worth of merchandise that is stolen is a dollar less a store owner can spend on food and shelter for his family, a dollar less for his children’s university tuition, a dollar less for his family’s retirement.

Shoplifting is costing Chinatown grocer David Chen, owner of the Lucky Moose Food Mart on Dundas Street West, as much as $50,000 a year. Chen employs ten people and has a family of four. David Chen is a victim of property crime. There are many more small business owners in Toronto’s Chinatown just like him.

[Member spoke in Mandarin and provided the following translation:]

Our Conservative government has introduced legislation in support for victims of crime and we will continue this support. We believe that the primary purpose of a criminal justice system is not the welfare of the criminal; it is the protection of law-abiding citizens, their property and their families.

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