Official Languages Committee on March 22nd, 2011

[Morris Rosenberg]

No. When they pass the exam, they should be able to provide services in French or in English.

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

They should be able to provide services in both languages, but is there any monitoring of that? Have you received any complaints?

[Morris Rosenberg]

Yes we do. The last time department officials appeared before your committee, one of your colleagues mentioned the fact that there had been complaints regarding five of our missions abroad. Shortcomings were noted with respect to service delivery in French. We took those complaints very seriously, and we spoke to the heads of the missions concerned. In every case, corrective steps were taken to improve the situation. We also made all of our heads of mission aware of the issue and their duty to ensure that service to the public was available in both languages.

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

On page 3 of your presentation, it says that 36% of your workforce is francophone while just 24% of the Canadian population is francophone. So that is a difference of 12%. If 36% of your workforce is francophone, what proportion of that 24% is bilingual? Is it 36%? Why are you telling us about the 36%?

[Morris Rosenberg]

I believe that refers to the report of the official languages commissioner, which talked about the

participation of English-speaking and French-speaking Canadians.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

We have to move on to the other witness because your time is up. That will give you a chance to find the information you were looking for.

So we will move on to Ms. Boucher.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Good morning.

As you said, you have done some things well. But we never discuss those. You scored an E on development of official languages minority communities and promotion of linguistic duality. This is 2011, and you told us that you were looking at ways to improve that score. Canada has two official languages. You said you were starting to look at the situation, but was anything being done before? Did you have to report to the official languages commissioner? Is this the first time you received these kinds of ratings from the commissioner?

Ms. Dubé, you have been on the job since 1998. Was anything being done before this? Why now, in 2011, are we still dealing with the same problem, why do we have figures showing that 57% of francophones and 67% of anglophones do not feel comfortable? There is a problem. What has been done since to fix the problem and to make sure that you never get another E?

[Morris Rosenberg]

I would like to respond, if I may.

As the commissioner points out in his report, there are deficiencies. This is not the first time we realized we had to do something about linguistic minorities. The department has done a great deal to promote the francophonie. We have formed relationships with many official languages communities, including the Fédération des communautés francophones et acadienne, the Fédération culturelle canadienne-française, the Quebec Community Groups Network and the English-Language Arts Network. We have met and consulted with these communities, and one of the objectives was to attract French-speaking foreign students to Canada to study in French-language institutions outside Quebec. We took all those steps, but the commissioner still noted shortcomings in his report. I will read what he said:

However, DFAIT did not seize the occasion to identify official language communities...and...their needs. This necessary step should be undertaken so that the needs of these communities can be included in the management of the Department's official languages program.

He also criticized the fact that the department did not take the needs of linguistic communities and minorities into account when deciding whether or not to develop or revise certain programs. We accept those findings, and we are now trying to improve our performance based on those observations.

[Sylvie Boucher, Conservative, Beauport—Limoilou, QC]

Very well. So you realized that programs were necessary.

In your discussions and meetings with the linguistic minority communities, did they have any suggestions or ideas on how to include them in the decision-making process?

[Morris Rosenberg]

In a moment, I will ask Ms. Dubé to answer your question on the practices in place before.

But first, with respect to the consultations, as I said in my presentation, I plan to hold an annual dialogue with official language minority communities, as some other departments have done. The purpose would be twofold: (1) to ensure the members of these communities understand the full range of programs that the department has and how those programs and policies affect linguistic minority communities; and (2) to give department employees an opportunity to learn what the needs of those communities are so they can be given more adequate consideration during program and policy development. That is what I plan to do this year.

Ms. Dubé, could you talk about what we have done in the past?

[Roxanne Dubé]

I believe Mr. Rosenberg mentioned in his presentation our network of official languages coordinators. Every quarter, representatives from our missions, our 12 regional offices and every division at headquarters meet to take stock of where official languages stand. And each year, one of those meetings is dedicated solely to a discussion with representatives of linguistic minority communities and their input.

In October 2010, we asked Ms. Bossé, the director general of the Fédération des communautés francophones et acadienne, to speak to the network. She spent a lot of time discussing internal concerns regarding Canadian Heritage's roadmap for linguistic duality. We were also able to identify needs in three areas.

First, there is education: our linguistic minority communities need to be supported. Within the department, we have a program to address that need, designed to carry out promotion and education efforts abroad, to attract francophone and anglophone students to regions with linguistic minority communities. They are on board with this initiative, as are the Association des universités de la francophonie canadienne and the Réseau des cégeps et des collèges francophones du Canada. We had an excellent discussion with Ms. Bossé on the matter.

The other area with a high level of participation—

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Ms. Dubé, I have to interrupt you there. I know you still have two areas to cover, but I have to make sure we keep to the time allotted to members. We may have a chance to come back to it later.

Thank you, Ms. Boucher.

We will now begin our second round of questions with Mr. Bélanger.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Ms. Dubé, you can have 15 seconds of my 5 minutes. Please continue briefly, you have 15 seconds.

[Roxanne Dubé]

Okay. The second area is the francophonie. As you know, further to the Francophonie Summit in Montreux, we are currently supporting the Quebec government as far as this international French-language forum is concerned.

The third key area with a high level of cooperation is export promotion with our regional offices in Winnipeg, Moncton and Prince Edward Island. Significant efforts are already under way on that end.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Thank you kindly.

Good morning everyone.

Mr. Rosenberg, you are the unlucky one who has to take the rap for all those years of neglect by your predecessors. So I urge you to stay on the same track you have started on.

First, if I may, I would suggest that you consult your colleague, Mr. Dupont, the Deputy Minister of Natural Resources, who also appeared before the committee. His department got a less than stellar rating as well. Mr. Dupont came to us with a very convincing action plan, very well prepared, very appealing to look at and easy to understand. As a department, it may be worth your while to see what they did on their end.

Second, I want to commend you and encourage you to keep up that annual dialogue you plan to hold with official languages communities. That is something that used to be done. You would know since you took part in it when you were a deputy minister at Justice Canada. I urge you to continue with that dialogue. What's more, if possible and only if the other parties agree, I would be delighted to receive some sort of overview or minutes from the meeting.

Third, your department is Canada's face to the world. According to what you said, you communicated with 150 missions. You said so in your presentation. You contacted all of them. Did they all get back to you?

[Morris Rosenberg]

No, not yet.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

Can you tell us which missions have yet to respond?

[Morris Rosenberg]

Yes, but I do not know the exact date we had asked them to respond by or whether there was a deadline.

Before I answer that, I would like to give those who have yet to respond one last chance.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

That is fine with me. If any of them fail to comply with a request from the deputy minister, the committee would be happy to bring them into line.

Seriously, though, I have had a chance to visit some missions, and what I saw was not good. I did not feel comfortable. As a French Canadian, I did not feel represented in some of those missions. I was also in one where I would not have felt represented as an English-speaking Canadian. That was the case in only one mission. I won't say which one, I will wait for your responses.

In addition, I have a minor concern about the second prong of your approach pertaining to part VII, and that is attracting immigrants to Canada, especially students. It should not be just students. Students have a tendency to leave again, when that is not really what our communities need. The committee has done a fairly in-depth study of that.

Ms. Dubé, I would recommend that you take a look at it. I believe it was the committee's first report.

I hope you will try to attract more than just students.

[Morris Rosenberg]

Allow me to explain that. I completely agree with you. I drew a distinction between the activities that fall within our mandate, the responsibility of our department, and the activities that fall within the mandate of other departments.

The institution responsible for immigration is Citizenship and Immigration Canada, even though we are on a joint committee to coordinate our plans and efforts to attract immigrants to Canada's official language minority communities. I completely agree with you. It was simply a matter of mandates.

[Mauril Bélanger, Liberal, Ottawa—Vanier, ON]

I have just a minute left, Mr. Rosenberg. And there is one last thing I would like to explore, if we can in such a short amount of time, and that is the relationship between deputy ministers and the clerk.

Does your mandate letter or mission mention official languages?

[Morris Rosenberg]

No, not the mandate letter. But that does not mean we do not discuss the issue of official languages. Deputy ministers address it in a few ways.

First, there is a deputy ministers' committee chaired by the Secretary of the Treasury Board. That committee examines various key management concerns across the federal administration. And it is that committee that deals with official languages. I believe that Mr. Fraser was even invited to meet with that committee.

Second—

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Once again, I have the thankless task of interrupting you. I apologize.

We will continue with Ms. Nadeau. Sorry, I mean Ms. Guay.

[Some hon. members]

Ha, ha!

[Monique Guay, Bloc, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Please don't make that mistake too often, Mr. Chair. I am very fond of my colleague, but come on.