Evidence of meeting #44 for Official Languages in the 40th Parliament, 3rd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was dawson.
9 p.m.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
As Francophones, have you tried in the past to sign petitions or that sort of thing to submit them to the Yukon government, as a means of securing more services in French?
9 p.m.
President, Commission scolaire francophone du Yukon
We took them to court, Mr. Lauzon.
9 p.m.
Conservative
Guy Lauzon Conservative Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON
Petitions are for elected officials. When a lot of people are unhappy, you have political power. You should try that.
9 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Steven Blaney
Ms. Leclerc, we are finishing off in Dawson, where it all began, in a way.
9 p.m.
Board Member, Centre de la Francophonie à Dawson
I like to see my community as a community that is getting organized. We have a lot of users.
My group has fought tooth and nail. I am proud to tell the committee that we won the Binet-Dugas prize for services in French this year, even though we are only volunteers.
9 p.m.
Board Member, Centre de la Francophonie à Dawson
At the Gala de la francophonie 2010. The users nominate services--
9 p.m.
Conservative
9 p.m.
Board Member, Centre de la Francophonie à Dawson
No, the one here in the territory. It is organized by the Association franco-yukonnaise.
I just wanted to tell you that we do have users, but we are now looking for our leaders.
9 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Steven Blaney
I will allow myself one quick comment. I want to thank you for being here.
What I take from this, and I was making this comment to our analyst a little earlier, is the comment made by Mr. Bourcier. As you may remember, he said that, statistically, Francophones form 0% of the population of the Yukon.
People often talk about assimilation, but it's exactly the opposite. Basically you are in the process of rebuilding. You are rebuilding a Francophone community.
Remember that what you are doing is creating value-added for Yukon, because proficiency in several languages is an asset. You know, all the people we saw and who have been educated at the l'école Émilie-Tremblay represent value-added not only for the Yukon, but for Canada.
I can tell you that there are opportunities in the public service. According to our report—you can read it—there are 5,000 positions that open up every year for bilingual people. What you're doing is really building the future of the Yukon.
On that note, I want to again extend my thanks and wish you the best of luck.
The meeting is adjourned.