Judy Sgro, Canada’s Immigration Minister, was forced to resign on Friday:

“Sgro resigned after pizza shop owner Harjit Singh filed an affidavit which accused Sgro of offering to help him stay in Canada in return for pizza deliveries and assistance with her election campaign…Sgro is already under investigation by parliament’s ethics commissioner for giving a temporary residency permit to Romanian stripper Alina Balaican, who had also worked on her campaign in the run-up to last June’s election.”

Canada Immigration Minister Quits in Pizza Scandal – Reuters January 14, 2005

This comes just a month after British Home Secretary David Blunkett fell, having been found to have accelerated the visa application of his lover’s nanny.

The rapid succession of these events highlights yet another serious problem cause by heavy immigration: the extra powers - and consequently the temptations - accruing to the professional politicians administering the regulations. This point was firmly grasped by Toronto’s Globe and Mail:

“How does an immigration minister fend off the mountain of inevitable requests to use ministerial discretion to bend the rules …For anyone who has a predisposition to do special favours for supporters, or who is too weak not to, the post offers tempting powers…In the broader scheme, a minister open to importuning may be persuaded to shape immigration in a way that doesn’t serve the country’s best interests”

Judy Sgro’s departure doesn’t fix the problem – Globe and Mail January 15 2005