I'd like to welcome you to the Standing Committee on Official Languages. We're happy to be with you today here in Vancouver.
My name is Yvon Godin. I'm the member for northeastern New Brunswick, and I'll be chairing the meeting today.
As you're no doubt aware, the Standing Committee on Official Languages has been in existence for 25 years. So we decided to do a national tour to meet with people in the field, to see what's going on in the area of official languages. We want to know whether the action plan that was introduced in 2003 is working well, if there's been any impact in the communities.
I'd like to introduce, on my right, the government members: Sylvie Boucher, parliamentary secretary, and Pierre Lemieux and Steven Blaney, committee members. On my left, we have Brian Murphy, from the official opposition, and Paule Brunelle, from the Bloc québécois. As I always mention, normally, being an NDP member, I take my place beside Ms. Brunelle.
We're going to begin with five-minute presentations. You may say that's not a lot, but, as you'll see, we'll be able to talk for two hours during the question period. So we ask you to make quite brief speeches, but then we'll be asking you questions. The members will have five minutes each to ask questions.
We'll begin with Mr. Donald Cyr.