Mr. Chairman, thank you very much for the question.
I'd like to say something in particular about the Canada School of Public Service. While there are some shortcomings in terms of what we discovered in terms of our observations, I am impressed with the initiative they are taking in terms of developing a pilot project with 11 post-secondary institutions. This is an approach that I think is extremely important for laying the groundwork so that universities provide language training for future public servants so that they arrive on the job with the language classification they need to progress in the public service.
The federal government is Canada's largest employer. I noted with some considerable interest, a week or 10 days ago, a Globe and Mail special supplement on universities. One of the sections asked students who their choice employer would be, and in every sector, whether it was medicine, whether it was law, whether it was arts, or whether it was science, their employer of choice was the federal government.
I think it is extremely important that training exist not just for new employees and not just for employees as part of their career planning, who intend to qualify themselves for the executive ranks or for supervisory ranks, where they would have language responsibilities. The federal government should send the message to universities that this is something that is very important for advancement in the ranks of the public service, since, quite clearly, students have sent the strong message that they see the federal government as an employer of choice.
Similarly, universities have to send the message to secondary schools that they will consider language an important criteria when they evaluate applications.
I think there's a cascading effect that needs to happen, from Canada's largest employer to the universities and from the universities to secondary schools and school boards.