Madam Speaker, I would like to set the record straight. It seems that I dared to question the minister about certain things and I got a rather disagreeable response today to effect that his party was the only one that was proud of the performance of our athletes at the Olympic Games.
That is absolutely not true. Hon. members will recall that when Parliament resumed on March 4, the hon. members of the House from all parties celebrated and gave our athletes a standing ovation.
Hon. members will also recall that it was the same thing when Barbara Ann Scott came to the House with the Olympic flame. Everyone, without exception, was happy.
Today I heard the minister say that his party was the only one that was proud of the Games. Let us be clear: we were all happy.
My question on March 4 was on the opening ceremonies of the Olympic Games. I dared to quote the minister himself, who said the next day in all the newspapers across the country that there should have been more French. Those were his words, not mine. I was quoting him. He was not the only one to say so either. The Premier of Quebec, Jean Charest, made some comments as well. I watched the opening ceremonies and I can say that, as a francophone, at one point I did not really identify with the ceremonies.
That is what my question was about. Today, again, the minister quoted the Commissioner of Official Languages with regard to the Olympic Games. Let us not forget what the Commissioner of Official Languages said about the opening ceremonies, “What I saw at the opening ceremonies was a concert which had been conceived, developed, and presented in English, with a French song. It wasn't what I expected”.
That is not at all what the minister told us today. I wanted to start by setting the record straight.
I wanted to know why the minister had given in to the Conservative habit of going into hiding and hiding documents instead of sharing information with Canadians. In this case it is somewhat understandable, because the specifications that I was looking for and that journalists were looking for were only available in English. We can understand why the government and the minister were embarrassed.
We had to ask the Standing Committee on Official Languages for the document. I would like to thank all the members of the committee for unanimously agreeing to this request. However, we had to wait an extra week for the document so that it could be translated. I can understand why he hesitated to make it public, but let's move on.
The specifications for the ceremonies, which we now have, say only one thing, and I will quote it. I think it is important that people know this. I am referring to point k in annex E of the document, a contribution agreement that committed Canadians to chip in $20 million for the ceremonies. That is a significant amount. This is what it says:
k) Opening and Closing ceremonies will be in both official languages and the national anthem will be sung in its bilingual version; the program will include participants and events which represent both official language groups;
I believe that this is a bit minimalist, and it makes no reference to the equality of the two languages. We will await the conclusion of the study that the Commissioner of Official Languages is now conducting after receiving 40 complaints about the games and a number about the opening ceremonies.