Official Languages Committee on April 13th, 2010

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Is that not the number of employees...

[Louise McEvoy]

That statistic has to do with employees that—

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

I think that would be unilingual employees.

[Joseph Galimberti, Director, Government Relations, Air Canada]

Mr. Godin was referring to the percentage of unilingual employees—

[Louise McEvoy]

— in bilingual regions. All right. Those are administrative positions.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Very well. Fifty-three per cent of staff are bilingual. Very well. Thank you very much.

Mr. Nadeau, did you want to take part in the fourth round?

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

Mr. Chairman, I do not want to belabour the following point, but it is not the first time this has happened in committee. Neither the Bloc Québécois nor any other colleagues be they Conservative, Liberal or New Democrat, should have to make excuses for the work they do. The tenor of our questions is up to us. Witnesses come here to be accountable to the government and to the people on situations and we are entitled to our questions. When we are skeptical about something, it is up to us to ask those questions. If we do not, we will be complimenting left, right, and centre, and we would not be reflecting reality. That was my remark.

I would like to know from Air Canada and its partners how many courses are offered. I would like to have a figure, I am not asking you to provide it straightaway if you do not have it. Courses, according to me, last for a period and include lessons. How many courses are there? I know there are three categories, I read the documents you provided and I thank you for them. Just to get an idea, can you tell me how many Air Canada staff members have taken these courses on a yearly basis over the last five years? Let's compare that with the number of staff members within the entire Air Canada machine.

As was said earlier on, 41% of bilingual positions held by bilingual people—we have seen that 59% of these positions are held by unilingual people. I would certainly hope people would rush to take lessons to become bilingual. If positions are given by the administration in good conscience to individuals who do not meet the linguistic requirements of the position, I hope those people work hard and do everything they can to succeed. If they do not, I hope they are told that they were given a chance and that they will be transferred elsewhere. If it is a bilingual position... there must be some degree of pride in holding that position, better wages, I do not know, I do not know all the criteria.

So, tell me how many courses, how many people are taking them—according to the three categories you referred to earlier on—and, finally, compare that figure to the total number of staff at Air Canada.

Another aspect of things is the number of people taking these courses and working directly with the public or with clients. That is a major point! Not necessarily the baggage handler so much as the person inside the plane and all workers that the travelling public will encounter on a trip. Also, can you tell me how many people are taking this course compared to the number of people working in front-line positions, as we say in other professions as well, or in other words, directly with clients.

That would give us an idea. And over the years, if we see an improvement, we may say that perhaps things are not perfect but at least efforts have been made.

At this point, we are relying on everyone's good faith, whereas we have a report from the Commissioner of Official Languages which put you—and when I say “you” I am referring to Air Canada of course—among the offenders. It has gotten to such a point that we are considering legislation because of this legal vacuum, to make sure that your partners have the same responsibilities.

You know as well as I do that people travelling on planes do not have the upper hand as clients: we can even be arrested in some cases. Well, if we ask for services in French, are not given them and that creates a disturbance, we could end up in jail or be prevented from travelling.

If we can have these figures, it would be much appreciated.

Yes, Mr. Chair?

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Just to say that your time is running out. You have about 30 seconds left.

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

Oh! How wonderful!

Go ahead, madam.

[Louise McEvoy]

For the year 2009, the figure is in the appendix to the document, but you would like these figures for the last five years?

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

As I said, I would like to know the total number of people and how many people are taking courses. We need points of comparison.

[Louise McEvoy]

Very well. As you can see there are 1,792 employees and the majority of them are front-line workers. Those who hold administrative positions take courses, but the majority are front-line workers. One thousand seven hundred and ninety-two of our 7,000 employees are front-line workers. We exclude those who are already bilingual, who therefore have level 4, and do not need to take courses. We can certainly provide you these figures.

As I've always said, my dream is to have everyone take refresher courses. That would mean everyone would speak French. At the very least, the majority are taking these refresher courses.

[Richard Nadeau, Bloc, Gatineau, QC]

I'm convinced the commissioner will be quite pleased to have these figures, thank you.

[The Chair, Conservative, Steven Blaney]

Thank you very much, Mr. Nadeau.

We have just completed our four rounds and are nearing the end of our meeting. Ms. Boucher had said she wished to question the witnesses and I believe Mr. Bélanger had a request.

Ms. Boucher, you have the floor.

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

I have two questions. The first has to do with French tests you referred to. Do you have a written test?

[Louise McEvoy]

There is a written test for some categories of staff, but we use an oral test for our front-line workers.

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

Can the committee have access to the written test so that we may assess it?

[Louise McEvoy]

That is a sensitive issue. This test is an extremely confidential tool for a company. However, we can certainly provide you with the criteria, yes, certainly.

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

Could we have a blank test, so we can see where the difficulties would arise?

[Louise McEvoy]

Yes, we can provide you with an assessment criteria template and the general process for testing.

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

If I'm writing a 20-minute test what do I need? What am I allowed? Am I allowed to use a dictionary or not? That's all I'm interested in because I want to know. I think it's important that the committee be aware of the level of difficulty.

Under the Air Canada Public Participation Act, can the government, whichever government, impose financial penalties on Air Canada if the company does not meet its official languages obligations?

[Louise-Hélène Sénécal]

Not currently. There are no penalties under the Air Canada Public Participation Act. There is no section or chapter on penalties.

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

I would also like to come back to what Mr. D'Amours said. It's rare that I agree with him but I do in the case of bilingualism outside Quebec. We know that everyone speaks French in Quebec. Many people speak French. There is a huge number of francophones outside Quebec. Many of our young people, the new generations, who are interested in the world, would love to go and help out in Vancouver or on Prince Edward Island.

Why not open doors to them? There aren't just students. We need to recruit bilingual francophones who could assist not only Air Canada, but also put out the message that Air Canada is completely bilingual. VIA Rail does this, but we need to do it even more because the generation after us is much more open to the world, especially because of the Internet. Young people speak many more languages than we do. I think this would be a positive way to promote the francophonie everywhere.

[Louise McEvoy]

I think our recruitment group has already considered the relocation of candidates in other areas. This exists in the flight service obviously and it works. However, with respect to summer positions in airports I believe this has been considered.

If I am not mistaken—and perhaps I could give you more details later—all candidates must apply to Air Canada through our data base, our website in the “Careers” section. They must state whether or not they are willing to be relocated. I think that we already have statistics on this.

With respect to whether or not we should advertise that possibility, we need to examine that issue seriously.

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

I know that the government wants to make sure that Air Canada is in full compliance in order to protect official language rights. This is important because it is about our own identity. We have two official languages in Canada which have to be given equal respect. I think that we have to move ahead and work together, not against each other.