Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Minister John McCallum apologized to Conservative critic Michelle Rempel after telling her, “We’re into sunny ways, I would suggest to my colleague to look a little more cheerful,” in question period on Thursday.

Rempel, who is the official critic for Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship asked McCallum how many Syrian refugee resettlement applications were started prior to October 19th of this year.

Rather than answering the question, McCallum said to “look a little more cheerful.”

Shortly after question period concluded, Rempel asked Speaker Geoff Regan to ask McCallum to apologize for his comments.

“Earlier in question period I asked the minister an important question,” Rempel began, adding, “I’m being heckled even now.”

Rempel questioned whether if McCallum would tell a man “to look a little more cheerful.”

“I will admit I became heated after his response…the prime minister also laughed at me and I asked ‘are you laughing at this?’ And he said ‘I’m laughing at you,’ my colleagues saw that,” she said.

“Mr. Speaker, I would ask both colleagues to stand up and apologize for all women in this place.”

McCallum said his comment was intended in a “lighthearted way to celebrate the arrival of refugees,” but understands it could have been taken in a number of ways.

“I shouldn’t have have made it and so I’m happy therefore to apologize for that comment to my colleague,” said McCallum.

Regan reminded Parliamentarians to respect one another and said, “we are all humans, we make mistakes and we apologize for it.”

McCallum’s remarks were criticized on Twitter.

That was a strange moment for @JohnMcCallumLPC telling @MichelleRempel to “look more cheerful”. Well. An answer to the question would help. — Evan Solomon (@EvanLSolomon) December 10, 2015

Did John McCallum just tell Michelle Rempel to look more cheerful? What? — Emma Loop (@LoopEmma) December 10, 2015

McCallum told CPC critic Michelle Rempel to “be a little more cheerful”; the #SunnyWays joke fell a bit flat, Speaker called him out on it — Claire Wählen (@Claire_Wahlen) December 10, 2015

Huh. Why would Immigration Min @JohnMcCallumLPC tell #CPC‘s Rempel “to be a little more cheerful” when asking questions to him? #cdnpoli — Richard Madan (@RichardMadan) December 10, 2015

The hell? John McCallum, in response to a question from Michelle Rempel on refugees, urged her to look “a little more cheerful.” — Paul McLeod (@pdmcleod) December 10, 2015