Official Languages Committee on Nov. 15th, 2011

[Jocelyne Lalonde]

That's very clear for us working with Health Canada. Funding is granted to two agencies, Société Santé en français and the CNFS, and, for anglophones, it goes to two agencies in Quebec. That's very clear for us.

[Élaine Michaud, NDP, Portneuf—Jacques-Cartier, QC]

What about the others?

[Dr. Aurel Schofield]

The work, as such, of the Société Santé en français at head office in Ottawa is a very important aspect for us. The national office links the 17 networks in the provinces and territories. There is thus a consultation and communication in real time between the branches of our networks and the national office. In addition, the board of directors consists of representatives of each of the networks, members from the two government parties at the federal and provincial level and one Health Canada representative.

That enables us, in almost real time, to be constantly aware of the directions the various orders of government want to take. We always try to position ourselves as a tool enabling both orders of government to achieve their objectives. So we do planning at all levels. In our binder, you'll see the future direction we're taking. That's our basic framework for our strategic planning for 2013-2018. All our partners are taking part in this process in order to finalize it. This is a draft, but we nevertheless did quite a lot of thinking and made good progress in the consultations we had.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you, Ms. Michaud.

Mr. Trottier, go ahead, please.

[Bernard Trottier, Conservative, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank the witnesses for coming this morning.

I've very much interested in training for linguistic minority health professionals. My father graduated from the University of Manitoba and the Collège universitaire de Saint-Boniface and practised for a long time as a physician in northern Alberta. Some of his patients were anglophone, but he also provided care in French when necessary.

Health care in fact involves a very intimate discussion between a physician or health professional and his or her patient. It is very important to be able to speak the patient's language.

I'd like to know how you actually intervene. How do your two organizations intervene with the universities to provide good training for health professionals? For example, you described the program at Laurentian University, where courses are given in English for reasons of critical mass, which is not being achieved. However, the students can take courses in French. How can you actually intervene with those universities to ensure good professional training is provided?

[Jocelyne Lalonde]

I'll answer your question.

The Consortium comprises 11 universities and colleges. For example, the University of Ottawa, the Université de Saint-Boniface, the University of Moncton, the Centre de formation médicale du Nouveau-Brunswick and the francophone colleges are all members of the Consortium. The health professionals who are able to provide services in French are trained at those institutions. Some students come from immersion programs in western Canada. For example, a number of students taking health training on the Campus Saint-Jean have come from immersion programs. There is a nursing program at the Campus Saint-Jean of the University of Alberta. The Université de Saint-Boniface offers a bachelor of social work program which has produced a number of graduates, more than 30. That training has only been provided since 2004-2005. There are also programs to train health care attendants. People are being trained to work in seniors homes, which is very important in the context of an aging population such as ours.

All these programs offered by these institutions where 6,000 students are being trained, as well as the funding we receive from the federal government, are important factors contributing to an increase in the number of students registering for the various health programs. It is these institutions, with which we work, that are training people.

[Bernard Trottier, Conservative, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

What is the situation in Manitoba and elsewhere?

[Dr. Denis Fortier]

As you suggested, we don't have the necessary critical mass to offer professional training in medicine, for example. However, with the help of the Société Santé en français and our provincial network, and with the money received from the federal government, we have nevertheless been able to shore up our service centres. We have three in Manitoba and they are currently quite good. They're in Saint-Boniface, Sainte-Anne and Notre-Dame-de- Lourdes.

For a number of years now, we have been offering bilingual training and French-language training to health professionals, nurses and physicians at those three locations. Our organization is still quite small. We can't keep them for two years, but we take them in for three months and they work in French and English. In Manitoba, being able to speak two languages and to provide services in French and English is nevertheless an asset. We train our professionals by working together in this way.

[Dr. Aurel Schofield]

I can provide some additional information on that point.

We've developed a francophone Atlantic mission for the Centre de formation médicale du Nouveau-Brunswick. We're collaborating on the admission process for francophone students from the entire Atlantic region under the Quebec—New Brunswick Agreement and then repatriating them to New Brunswick for the training as such. As a result, we've taken on the mandate of developing clinical internship environments at francophone, francophile and bilingual locations in the Atlantic region.

There has been a major development in recent years, particularly in Nova Scotia. When we started eight years ago, we admitted one student a year from Nova Scotia. Now we admit three a year. The first graduates have just finished and are going into the Nova Scotian communities where we have one of the eight clinical internship sites.

The situation is the same in New Brunswick. We are everywhere in the province, except in Fredericton and Saint John. Those cities have just organized their own community health centres, which will be the clinical internship sites for our students in the coming years.

We're also developing a partnership with the Association of Faculties of Medicine in Canada, with which we are collaborating. Since the association has to meet requirements pertaining to linguistic and cultural competencies, the partnership between the Société Santé en français and the association will be able to link the francophone and francophile areas of all the regions of Canada with the faculties of medicine. They will then have francophone and francophile clinical internship sites where they can send students from their faculties.

Consequently, to answer Mr. Bélanger's question, there are ways for the local networks of the Société Santé en français to work very closely with a faculty of medicine to make this connection. We believe it is a win-win partnership in this case as well. It will meet the certification standards of the faculty of medicine, because it will become standard for the years to come, and will meet the community's needs.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

All right, thank you.

Mr. Harris will now have the floor.

[Dan Harris, NDP, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

Thank you very much.

My colleague Mr. Bélanger mentioned Mike Harris's name. Mr. Harris is one of the reasons why I am here today. I became a member of the NDP the day after Mike Harris was elected premier of Ontario. I sensed that crises would follow.

There has been a strange situation in the health field, as there has been in education as well. The situation of the francophone community has been improved through accidental crises.

I was a high school student at the time, and it was during the education crisis that we finally got our own school board, which improved our situation. Now they have grass and trees in the yard of my old school, which was all concrete when I went there. Everything has changed. Sometimes it's strange how things happen.

First, I would like to clarify some results from the survey the Consortium national de formation en santé conducted. We note, among other things, that most people work in the health field once they graduate.

Have you determined what percentage of those people worked in French or in the minority language?

[Jocelyne Lalonde]

What we were able to do, as a result of confidentiality issues, was to check to see whether our students are working in regions that provide health services in French now that they've become health professionals. Eighty-six per cent of them are working in regions where there is a francophone community and where they can be called upon to provide health services in French.

[Dan Harris, NDP, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

I'm going to continue on the topic raised by my colleague Mr. Aubin, regarding the Commissioner of Official Languages and the cancellation of the official language minority communities initiative of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.

Ms. Lalonde has had a chance to speak. Would the Société Santé en français have something to say on this point?

[Dr. Aurel Schofield]

Yes, we share exactly the same position. It clearly isn't very prestigious to conduct research on the francophone minority communities. People view research in terms of basic research, but these are much more innovative things than people think. However, it is clear to the Société Santé en français that conclusive data are required in order to exercise a certain influence. As we don't have conclusive data, we're forced to go into the field to try to identify needs in a hit or miss manner. However, there's nothing like having conclusive data on the minority francophone community if we want to establish truly relevant strategies.

We're currently conducting a population study. We've received the funding to do the study, which will provide us with data that we have never previously had and a better picture of the minority francophone communities and their needs in order to guide our strategic plan more precisely. It involves a sample of 10,000 persons across Canada. That isn't enormous, but it's the best we can do for the moment.

That's why it's very disappointing not to have the necessary tools to pursue this research. We think this should be an integral part of the government's recommendations to ensure that these figures are compiled regularly so that we can study them and base our actions on them.

[Dan Harris, NDP, Scarborough Southwest, ON]

Later on in the meeting, we'll discuss a motion on the mid-term report of the Roadmap. At this stage, the report won't be published, and the motion suggests that it be made public. Do you think it would be important for the report to be made public so that we can begin planning for the next Roadmap?

[Réal Roy]

Yes, I believe it would be important to make it public.

[Dr. Aurel Schofield]

Yes, because we need a starting point. Whether the report is made public or not, there could definitely be an addition so that we can forward the data to the agencies so that they can reorient or improve their performance. I believe those figures should be sent to the people who will be developing winning strategies for everyone in the coming years.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Ms. Lalonde, what do you think?

[Jocelyne Lalonde]

I think that's essential. We at the Consortium national de formation en santé are conducting our own evaluation and our report will be made public in two weeks. We'll be able to send it to you, if you wish. I believe that will enable us to make adjustments, if we need to do so, to see whether certain things have to be improved and to orient our management. We also need that in the Roadmap.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

All right, thank you.

Mr. Weston, go ahead, please.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thanks to our witnesses for being here today.

You probably won't be surprised that I am focusing on the testimony of the members from British Columbia for two reasons. I believe that what you have said is very good for us, and I myself am particularly interested in the issue.

My family and I went camping at Guillam Lake in northern British Columbia. The trip was put together by the organization of parents who support French in British Columbia. My three children went to Pauline Johnson school in West Vancouver, where they were able to develop their French.

As well, it’s a bit of a unique situation in my riding. We have two mayors and a provincial representative who speak French. It’s perhaps the only riding where all three levels of government are able to speak French in British Columbia. This is something we are very proud of.

I have a few questions to ask you. The first question is this: is it currently possible to go to British Columbia to study French? There are now international schools that wish to attract students to study French in British Columbia. I personally believe this is a really good breakthrough for official language duality.

As for my second question, do you think we really need more regulation? If not, is this something that is increasingly rooted in the hearts of British Columbians who wish to study French themselves?

Regarding my third question, there is a growing trend to have children in British Columbia study Chinese. Do you think this could curtail interest in studying French? If not, will it help?

[Réal Roy]

Thank you for your questions. I will begin with the last question as to whether the interest in teaching Chinese will necessarily have an impact on French.

Personally, I have lived in China and I learned Chinese. I believe it is a beautiful language that certainly deserves to be studied. However, there are very long waiting lists for French immersion programs. So we first need to make sure that French is learned since it is the second official language in order to be able to work at the federal level. So it is often desirable to be able to speak French.

My concern is that by adding the possibility of Chinese or Hindi immersion, we are diluting already-limited provincial resources. First, I think it would be important, while not preventing learning a third language, to ensure that priority is given to learning French.

As for studying French in British Columbia at the postsecondary level, the Office of Francophone and Francophile Affairs has been in place now for more than six years and has created two programs: one in administration and the other in education. So, it is becoming possible, but it would preferable to provide more support to this core at Simon Fraser by supporting the development of postsecondary education in other universities in British Columbia. There are a number of Francophones and Francophiles who could teach. For example, at the University of Victoria, about 15%—about one hundred profs—have French as their first, second or third language. They could teach courses in French. There are several people from various communities who could teach courses in French.

[John Weston, Conservative, West Vancouver—Sunshine Coast—Sea to Sky Country, BC]

There are also private schools in British Columbia. There are even some in my riding. What is your opinion regarding this concept?

[Réal Roy]

Personally, I don't know about it, but Christine seems to be more up to speed. So I will turn it over to her.

[Christine Sotteau]

In British Columbia we are working on establishing a group of all organizations interested in teaching French and teaching in French, as well as in the promotion and use of French. This is a new group that will be created near the end of next week with the help of the Fédération des francophones to combine the interests of all these people, and the International School will be included in this group, as will the Alliance française, Canadian Parents for French, core French teachers, as they are called in British Columbia, and teachers at immersion schools and with the school boards. An entire network of people is being established. These are people who are interested in teaching French and teaching in French, including literacy. This will be an absolutely crucial force in promoting how we can maintain French and how we can live in French to the fullest.

As Réal just said, choosing to live part of one's life in French is what we're aiming for in expanding this francophone space everywhere around us.