Official Languages Committee on June 16th, 2009

[Sylvia Martin-Laforge]

Beyond the practical aspect of the use of our lines of credit and credit cards, I believe in the notion of longer term strategic effects and results. You should not overlook the fact that, when we put forward a one-year project and are told that we can start activities every six months, we have to reorganize our project, and the long-term structural effects are no longer there.

I'm tossing out a challenge to the government. I'm asking it to consider the use of public funds in a strategic sense. Granting funding in a piecemeal manner, every six months, isn't strategic. In fact, you want the organizations to be more accountable to taxpayers than the government. We're sure we have to produce strategic results, and you're preventing us from doing it.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you, Ms. Martin-Laforge.

Thank you, Ms. Guay.

We'll now go to Mr. Galipeau.

[Royal Galipeau, Conservative, Ottawa—Orléans, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This morning, I would like to welcome our guests with a sense of urgency.

Mr. Donnelly from the Quebec Community Groups Network, I hope you'll forgive me, but I will continue this discussion in French, and principally with the president of the Fédération des communautés francophones et acadienne du Canada. I hope you'll realize that if we manage to solve the problem for one, it will solve it for both.

I'd also like to point out to the committee that Ms. Routhier-Boudreau is a resident of Ottawa—Orleans. We have met on a number of occasions.

As far as I know, the issues we previously discussed were resolved to your satisfaction. Unfortunately, I don't remember discussing this one with you. If you had talked to me about it, I could have helped you. I very much appreciate the urgent efforts of the opposition members in wanting to support and help you.

This week, I got a call from the Festival franco-ontarien, which was facing a similar problem. In a few hours, they received the documents they needed. I think there's a way to improve the process.

The situation is probably the way it is because there have been abuses in other files in the past. Those abuses were committed not by the organizations that receive funding, but by the government. Today, the procedures are tougher. Everyone is ensuring stricter management of public funds. For a group such as yours,

and here I speak of both groups,

there is already an assumption of good faith. And since the assumption of good faith is there, I believe it's unacceptable to leave you hanging the way we are doing.

As for the $165 million increase in the Roadmap, as far as I know, you aren't eligible to receive that money for administration or promotional purposes. However, you are eligible for it for projects, to provide services to the people you represent. Since I am one of those people, being a francophone living in a minority setting, I would be critical of you if you didn't file an application to obtain a portion of that funding.

Ms. Routhier-Boudreau, I would like to speak with you during the break. I very much appreciate the assistance of all the other members in solving this problem as soon as possible. The fact remains that you have one servant at this table, me.

[Some hon. members]

Oh, oh!

[Pierre Lemieux, Conservative, Glengarry—Prescott—Russell, ON]

I'd like to thank you for being here.

There are definitely some problems. I would ask my counterpart Mr. D'Amours to be less partisan because, when we work together in this committee, we do a good job. We just did that in the context of a study on postsecondary education.

I would like us to study what is going on in the communities. We definitely support the vitality of your organizations in our communities. The services that you provide are very important. I know we are working closely with our minister and that the minister is pressing officials to expedite the review of your files.

What I'm saying is that it's not just under this government that there have been problems. When we did our study in 2006, we heard similar complaints that applied to a previous government. It's not a political thing. It's process and bureaucracy that are in the way, and we need to fix that. I would certainly be in favour of us looking at this in more detail so that we can continue to work with the department to correct what I see to be a significant problem.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you, Mr. Lemieux.

Go ahead, Mr. Donnelly.

[Robert Donnelly]

I'll be quite brief.

First, a 25% advance that arrives in June isn't an advance. An advance is an amount that arrives on April 1.

Second, we talked a little about access to Roadmap funding. It's not that there isn't any money for the anglophone communities in Quebec, especially

in arts, culture, and heritage, for example, but Sylvia talked before about the process we're stuck in. We put in a national program for arts, culture, and heritage that's going to be of benefit for all the English communities and for Canada in terms of the arts domain. When we try to access road map funding or whatever, we're sent through a regional office in Montreal. That's not a problem for our confreres here, but it is for us in Quebec.

Sylvia was talking before about the trouble with working at the national level. We're in the process now. We worked six months on developing the arts, culture, and heritage. Yes, we can perhaps access road map funding for something like that because it's across Quebec--it's not just one little sector or one little organization--but when we have to work through the Montreal regional office that has its own ideas about our cross-Quebec project, we don't even know how far it goes from that level. It's like we're dealing with two departments of Canadian Heritage at the same time. It shouldn't be like that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you, Mr. Donnelly.

Monsieur Godin, s'il vous plaît.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

You have found an honourable servant who will solve all your problems and he is sitting at the table.

I thought that, in Ottawa, it was the Parliament of Canada. There are four political parties. Politics exists, and always will. When we don't want to do something, the excuse we give is that we don't want to make it a political issue. And yet we engage in politics every day. That was true before and it is today. It's like before and after. At the age of 20, I had hair on my head, and at 27, I didn't. What can you do about it? I'm still the same person.

I don't accept the idea that a government can say, as an excuse, that it's the fault of the public servants, who only work at the rate they're asked to work. I didn't accept that during the time of the Liberals, and I won't accept it under the Conservatives either. If things don't go quickly enough, perhaps it's because there aren't enough public servants. Perhaps there's only one official responsible for all the projects. What's the problem? You say you don't know where the file is. Someone has to take responsibility for that. The minister can't say that he isn't aware; it's been repeated to him for 10 or 15 years. It's the same problem.

Mr. Donnelly, you put it very clearly: a 25% advance six months later isn't an advance. I'm sure you've already told the department and the minister that makes no sense. Leadership has to come from the top. A member can't simply tell someone in his riding that, if he had known, he would have met with him and everything would have been solved. My God, spend the rest of the day with that member and solve all your problems. Promises are being made, but the money isn't going out. There are reasons for that. The longer the situation goes on, the better it is for them. That undermines the development of the communities.

If I was in your position, I would simply close up shop, but you're saying that's not the solution. It's true that it's not the solution, but when individuals who care about their community have to use their credit cards, what has to be done? It's the government that should care about the communities. Laws have been passed, and it's the government that's responsible for linguistic promotion of Canada's anglophone and francophone minorities.

I can't wait to see the motion the Liberals will be introducing. We have to find a solution. We must stop making this a political issue and ask the minister to find solutions. Why has this problem been around for 10 years? Instead of blaming the Conservatives, we have to wonder what the problem is. We should also ask the officials who is responsible for the problem. Is it them, the minister or the government? What do you think?

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

There are two minutes left.

[Lise Routhier-Boudreau]

For every dollar we receive from the government, we generate three, four or five. With what little we've received, we've moved mountains. We now have 25 community radio stations, French-language weeklies, French-language health networks and schools right across the country. The communities are making the most of the money they receive from the government.

The problem we currently have is major, and we've been talking about it for 10 years. I'm very pleased to hear you say today that everyone is concerned by the situation. If the problem persists, we'll be seeing office closures. We're dealing with a major case of fatigue, we are having trouble finding and retaining staff. We can't compete with other employers. The situation is serious, and yet our work is extremely important and is moving issues forward.

I believe that Mariette Carrier-Fraser, president of the AFO, spoke to you about this as well, Mr. Galipeau. It's really a priority for us. If we can address this problem, we'll be working even bigger miracles.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

Has she previously spoken with Mr. Galipeau? I thought he had heard nothing about that.

[Royal Galipeau, Conservative, Ottawa—Orléans, ON]

She didn't speak to me about it, and Mariette Carrier-Fraser hasn't spoken to me about it either.

[Yvon Godin, NDP, Acadie—Bathurst, NB]

All right.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Do you, the people from the Quebec Community Groups Network, want to add something, a final word? We're going to thank our witnesses before moving on to something else.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

First, I have a point of order.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

We're not going to adjourn; we're simply going to finish with the witnesses.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

I just want to make sure we get the unanimous consent of all parties on this subject so that the motion I have drafted is studied on a priority basis.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Before that, do you people from the Quebec Community Groups Network want to add something?

[Robert Donnelly]

I simply want to say that I completely agree with Lise on what she just explained. I've been coming here for three years, and we always talk about the same things, such as delays and the problems they cause. In fact, these are vulnerable organizations because budgets are fairly limited. That's the problem.

In addition—and this is the third time we've said this—for the anglophone communities in Quebec, there is a structural problem. We're somewhat caught in it: we do business with two offices related to Heritage in Quebec. And then there's our desire to work at the national level, and that's very important for us.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you very much, Mr. Donnelly.

As the saying goes, if at first you don't succeed, try, try again.

You saw this morning how surprised I was to see that parliamentarians had more comments than questions. Moreover, we're going to debate a motion.

[Royal Galipeau, Conservative, Ottawa—Orléans, ON]

That's because we all agree.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

So I would like to thank you for being here. You may still attend the committee's proceedings. We are now going to continue on the same subject. I believe Mr. Rodriguez would like to speak. Thank you.

We'll also have to adopt a report this morning.

Mr. Rodriguez.

[Pablo Rodriguez, Liberal, Honoré-Mercier, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

We are on the subject, which makes the motion acceptable. To the best of my ability, in both official languages, this motion reads as follows:

That the Committee study, at the earliest opportunity, the impacts of the delays in providing funding to beneficiary organizations, following what was heard at the meeting of June 16, 2009.

That the committee study, at the earliest opportunity, the impacts of the delays in providing funding to beneficiary organizations as heard at the meeting of June 16, 2009.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you.

The motion is admissible since it concerns the subject.

Before hearing speeches, I will first reread it:

That the Committee study, at the earliest opportunity, the impacts of the delays in providing funding to beneficiary organizations, following what was heard at the meeting of June 16, 2009.