That's not my view. I think an understanding of both official languages is....
Particularly in a context in which the last court of appeal exists, the last place where a citizen or a lawyer can make a final case before the courts, I think it's very important that the lawyer or the citizen be understood in his or her language.
This is not about benefiting judges. This is about defining the characteristics that are required for the nine most important jobs in the Canadian legal system.
Again, I have a great deal of respect for Judge Major, but I'm not sure that somebody who doesn't speak the other language knows what he doesn't know. Donald Rumsfeld once talked about the known knowns and the unknown knowns. I don't know how a unilingual person can evaluate how important language knowledge is as a professional competence. By its very nature, if you don't speak another language, then you don't understand what you would understand if you did speak that other language.