Official Languages Committee on Dec. 6th, 2011

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Welcome to the 18^th meeting of the Standing Committee on Official Languages this Tuesday, December 6, 2011. Pursuant to Standing Order 108(3)(f), we are going to study the Evaluation of the Roadmap: Improving Programs and Service Delivery.

Joining us today are Mrs. Villeneuve and Ms. Beaulieu from the Alliance des femmes de la francophonie canadienne, and Mr. Racine from the Fédération des aînées et aînés francophones du Canada.

Lastly, we have Madame Williams and Madame Raeburn-Baynes of the Black Community Resource Centre.

Welcome to all three of you.

We'll begin with an opening statement

from the Alliance des femmes de la francophonie canadienne.

[Louise-Hélène Villeneuve, President, Alliance des femmes de la francophonie canadienne]

Mr. Chair, members of the committee and dear partners, on behalf of the Alliance des femmes de la francophonie canadienne and its members, we would like to thank the House of Commons Standing Committee on Official Languages for giving us the opportunity to share our perspective on the Roadmap for Canada's Linguistic Duality 2008-2013.

My name is Louise-Hélène Villeneuve. I am the president of AFFC, and I am here with Manon Beaulieu, our director general. Our presentation includes a brief overview of AFFC, its priorities, its assessment of the roadmap, along with concrete examples of accomplishments, and some recommendations.

AFFC is the only national group consisting of French-language minority women's associations. The alliance includes 15 associations from across the country, from the Maritimes to the territories, with a common interest: improving the sociological and economic situation of francophone women so that they can directly contribute to the development of their communities. Our priorities are to improve the economic situation of women, to support and recognize caregivers, to promote and incorporate gender analysis and exogamy, and to develop the leadership of women. Through the diversity of its members, AFFC represents women of all ages and from all walks of life who work together and greatly contribute to the priority sectors of the roadmap. Let us give you some examples.

In health care, AFFC has been a leader since 2006, given that women represent between 70% to 80% of caregivers. The alliance works with member associations and provincial and national partners in order to move discussions and initiatives forward, and in order to improve access to French-language services for caregivers. Provincial health care systems are increasingly seeking to keep seniors and people who are ill at home. But there is only minimal planning to set up support and training programs to expand home care and respite care. The women from communities are the ones who commit to meeting those needs.

In terms of justice, eight member associations are working directly on developing and making French-language resources available for women who are victims of violence. These associations are also familiar with social and legal services offered in French in their area, and they are able to properly direct the victims towards those services. But it is important to point out that French-language services for victims in minority communities are practically non-existent. Only three provinces have a francophone reception centre for women who are victims of violence. Our members have to take the initiative to contact anglophone centres in order to find employees who speak French and who can help the victims.

In immigration, our member associations are very familiar with the isolation francophone immigrant women experience when they arrive in predominantly English-speaking communities. Some of the associations provide specialized services to newcomers, be they individuals or families. Among other things, our members give them training, and they help them buy food, manage their mail, fill out forms, make long-distance calls, and so forth.

In economic development, eight member associations work with francophone women from all ethnic communities to help them with their employability. They provide them with information and networking opportunities that will help them find their place in the job market. Our member associations have also been offering workshops, such as home-based child care management, to increase women's financial, political and economic literacy.

Cultural activities include essay contests, radio broadcasts on topics of interest to women, and a forum called “L'Art au féminin”. More specifically, this forum has enabled women to become familiar with social media and applications for funding. They have also been able to benefit from one-on-one career management counseling and, therefore, have acquired concrete tools to increase their artistic activities.

In terms of youth, the priorities of our member associations are the next generation and working with young women in the communities. There are many projects on mentorship, intergenerational meetings, leadership training and education.

Dear members of the committee, the activities and services that we have listed and that have had a direct impact on francophone Canadians are carried out by 15 AFFC member associations jointly with some of our partners.

Only seven of our member groups have full-time employees; the other eight only have part-time employees or volunteers. In total, almost 200 volunteers contributed more than 65,000 hours of work to enable the roll-out of those activities in which over 8,000 women participated.

AFFC's key role is to support its members in all activities related to the priority sectors of the roadmap. AFFC is central to communication. It provides a network for sharing information and practices, and it works together with the staff of member associations. AFFC also plays a key role as an interface between its member associations and national and provincial sectoral organizations, both francophone and anglophone, including Quebec. This not only allows members and non-members to keep abreast of current cases or issues, but also to develop partnerships with sectoral bodies in their provinces or territories. So we all contribute to the advancement of francophone women in Canadian society.

In 2010-2011, six of our member associations received funding from Canadian Heritage. But it is difficult to determine whether the funding from Canadian Heritage falls under the roadmap. Only three member associations have received funding from Status of Women Canada, which is not listed under the roadmap departments. Others receive only very little funding from provincial governments, but most of them have to rely on other partnerships with local or regional community organizations, or even on the sale of lottery tickets.

If we look at the return on investment of our member associations, it goes without saying that the minimal amounts invested have almost miraculous results, but this insufficient funding does not allow francophone women groups to be equal participants, alongside other members of the francophonie, in the development and vitality of their communities.

On the morning of December 6—a national day of remembrance and action on violence against women sadly memorable because of the murder of 14 female students from the École Polytechnique in Montreal—let us be visionary and imagine what could be achieved if women groups were adequately funded.

We wish to share with you our strong recommendation to renew the Roadmap for Canada's Linguistic Duality, which has been and continues to be of paramount importance for the concrete development of our communities. Ideally, enhancing it would be even more desirable.

We also recommend that multi-year funding be the preferred approach in order to enable organizations to better plan their work in the field.

In addition, we recommend that each spokesgroup for minority communities receive funding in order to be able to work with minority life researchers so that an ongoing study is conducted on the impacts of investments.

Finally, AFFC recommends that the next roadmap makes women a priority sector. This commitment from the government will allow women to continue their pivotal role in the communicating French culture, developing community vitality and strengthening inclusion and social cohesion in Canada.

Ladies and gentlemen of the committee, on behalf of all francophone women living in minority communities, we thank you for your attention. We hope to have shown you that, like the federal government, women pledge their unwavering support for official language minority communities.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you, Mrs. Villeneuve.

We are now going to continue with the Fédération des aînées et aînés francophones du Canada.

[Jean-Luc Racine, Director General, Fédération des aînées et aînés francophones du Canada]

Thank you, Mr. Chair and members of the committee. On behalf of the Fédération des aînées et aînés francophones du Canada, and on behalf of our president, Michel Vézina, from Gravelbourg, Saskatchewan, who could not be here today, I would like to thank you for inviting us to speak this morning.

First, let me introduce the Fédération des aînées et aînés francophones du Canada. We are a non-profit organization with a membership of 295,000 seniors in Canada. Our federation includes a federation of francophone seniors for every Canadian province, except for Newfoundland and Labrador and the two territories. The federation has about 1,800 members in Alberta, 1,200 in Manitoba, 13,000 in Ontario, and so on. It is important to note that the 295,000 members of the Fédération des aînées et aînés francophones du Canada include the 265,000 FADOQ members from Quebec, which is a significant number. But the fact remains that 11 of the 12 federations that we serve operate in minority communities. We actually represent about 30,000 seniors who contribute to member federations. In the minority communities where we work, there are about 404,000 people aged 50 and over for whom French is their first language.

Before I begin, let me give you a few numbers. First, it is no secret that the Canadian population is aging. This reality is even more pronounced in minority communities. In 2006, 32% of Canadians were 50 years old and over. In Saskatchewan, the proportion is 57%. That means that 57% of francophones in Saskatchewan are 50 and over. It is 47% in Prince Edward Island, 46% in Manitoba, 45% in Newfoundland and Labrador, and 40% in British Columbia. So the francophone minority population is very old, which is why it is important to make sure that seniors and retirees are fully involved in communities.

I will also give you some other interesting data. Based on the 2006 census, we saw that, proportionately, there were considerably more francophones 65 and over living alone compared to anglophones. There are a lot more single, widowed, separated and divorced francophones. In addition, our data shows that the median earnings of francophones 65 and over is $4,076 less than the earnings of anglophones. In terms of average income, the difference is $7,082. That means that francophone minorities are more disadvantaged in terms of income.

Let me also give you an overview of the situation in education. Among francophones, 49% of people aged 65 and over don't have a degree whereas the percentage is 38% among anglophones. That gives you the socio-demographic profile of our clients.

In terms of the latest roadmap, the only sector specifically for seniors is health. That is the only part of the roadmap that mentions seniors. And they were actually recognized as one of the three priority clienteles of the roadmap. The summary I gave just now of the socio-demographic profile provides an overview of the so-called determinants of health, which are significantly less favourable for francophones.

So we believe that the government was absolutely correct in indicating in the roadmap that targeting francophones, and seniors in particular, as a priority. It went without saying.

We are also very pleased to see that 12 projects that were funded by the Société santé en français—and therefore, by Health Canada—dealt directly with seniors. We feel these various projects make it possible to provide adequate health services to francophone seniors. It is so important to receive health care services in your own language when you are sick and vulnerable.

I'm not going to discuss the 12 outcomes because it is basically a matter for the Société santé en français. But I will provide a single example to give you some idea of the scope of the results. In Alberta, funding was given to VON Canada to develop a project that supports francophone family caregivers.

Every time I meet with franco-Albertan seniors, they all speak highly of this project. They tell me how much it helps francophone seniors. People are so appreciative that an organization the size of VON Canada has developed services in French. It is interesting to see the benefits of this project because it is making progress.

In parallel with that project, VON Canada reported that it is worthwhile and feasible to provide services in French to francophones in a minority situation. So VON Canada is quite interested in continuing this development.

We recently held a four-way meeting. In attendance were VON Canada, the Alliance des femmes de la francophonie and the Société santé en français, among others. We spoke about developing a true pan-Canadian strategy to help seniors with care and services at home, but also care with family caregivers to establish a pan-Canadian strategy. As you see, by working on a small project that began in Alberta, we are in the process of implementing a project that will grow across Canada and serve all francophone seniors in a minority situation.

It may seem somewhat ironic, but we also worked on a project supported by the youth fund. We didn't actually expect to receive funding. But we did, and it was for intergenerational projects.

But there is a paradox. In fact, many of our francophone seniors attended anglophone schools because there were no French schools at the time. They always spoke French at home; it was valued. Today, with exogamous families, a lot of young people attend francophone schools, but when they go home, it isn't necessarily French that they speak.

Our seniors are also quite convinced. They believe in the importance of continuing to preserve French, speak French and live in French. It's very important for them. We determined it would be beneficial to combine these two groups because, in bringing them together, the younger people would be able to see the importance of speaking and keeping their language. It's very beneficial for us. We received $35,000 from the youth fund.

With that money, we gave 12 intergenerational workshops with secondary school students and seniors. From those workshops, we developed 10 intergenerational projects in four Canadian provinces. In total, 124 seniors and 108 youths took part in the workshops and in the various projects. So we managed to fight a lot of preconceived notions from both sides, bring these two groups together and get them to work together.

Naturally, this project is now leading us to develop more intergenerational projects. The results are incredible.

We know that there were investments in other sectors of the roadmap where the benefits are considerable for our communities. We are well aware of that.

These are the only two areas where seniors have been involved.

We would like to take the opportunity to present the five priorities we will be working on in the next few years. We recently met with people from the Quebec Community Groups Network, a group of anglophone seniors. We will also be working with them on certain files relating to communities in minority situations. So there are five files we will be doing a lot of work on in the next year.

The first file concerns young retirees. Right now there is a stagnation in the clientele of golden-age clubs. Young retirees need to be found. We are aware of this. Our stagnant clubs are not managing to recruit new members, it's the status quo. Furthermore, we have developed a very interesting model in Ottawa. We even intend to appeal to the private sector so that it can help us set up franchises across Canada to find this clientele. We are very proud of it. We think it is essential to reach out to this new clientele and continue to mobilize it. Our experience shows that it's really in mobilizing seniors and retirees that we can encourage them to remain active and get involved in their communities.

I will quickly go over the other four files. For intergenerational matters and with respect to community involvement, we feel it is very important to continue with the seniors and ensure that they are involved in their communities. The third file, which is very important, involves employability. Since our population is aging, we will start to see shortages in the labour force starting in 2013. Immigration is one solution, but we think measures should be put in place to enable seniors, retirees and older workers to continue working or to return to the labour market. This is very important to us. We intend to work very hard in these areas. The fourth file concerns health, and the fifth, economic development. We plan to invest greatly in that area. Perhaps I will come back to it during the discussion if I have time.

We would like to end the presentation by strongly recommending to the federal government that it continue to work in partnership with communities in minority situations as part of the next roadmap. We have confidence in our future. We intend to be creative and innovative, to take hold of our destiny, and to ensure that seniors and our francophone communities can continue to grow and live fully in French. We invite the federal government to be a leading partner in this adventure, and to believe, as we do, that Canada's wealth lies in large part in the growth and vitality of Canada's two official language communities.

I'd like to thank all the members of the committee very much for their attention.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you, Mr. Racine.

Now we'll have a statement from the Black Community Resource Centre.

[Dorothy Williams, Program Director, Black Community Resource Centre]

I'm afraid I don't have a statement.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

That's no problem. We have your statement.

[Dorothy Williams]

Good morning, everyone. My name is Dorothy Williams.

I am here today to share with the committee some of the issues we face at our organization. I'm program director at the Black Community Resource Centre. I have worked there since 2007 and have seen the organization through ups and downs. As program director, I function as a project manager, office manager, grant writer, and community liaison person. This entails finding funding, developing and writing projects, reporting, hiring, supervising, and networking.

It is a challenge to build a viable community organization within a struggling, underserved minority community. BCRC is unique amongst other black organizations in the city because our lens is on the entire community rather than on the concerns of the immediate district we live in.

We, and by that I mean specifically myself, spend a lot of time looking at the larger issues that impact blacks on the island, indeed throughout Quebec. It is incumbent upon me, at that point, to look for models and programming that can try to ameliorate or address these global issues. I would say that most of our engagements, particularly networking, revolve around such larger roles and issues. Like other functioning black associations, or BCAs, as we call them, we strive for the betterment of the members in our community.

The BCAs include BCRC and ethnic and fraternal organizations. All of us face challenges. Some of those challenges are systemic and endemic, due to the unique cultural differences, the diverse ethnic origins, and the multilingual make-up of the various black communities in Quebec. In our case, as an official language minority community organization—OLMC—BCRC must also deal with several other distinct challenges. Some are actually roadblocks to our quest to create a forward-looking, vibrant community landscape. Specifically, we find ourselves living from paycheque to paycheque, or, in our case, from project funding to project funding.

What this means for BCRC is that we cannot, despite our best intentions, really engage in long-term initiatives. Sure, we have our own five-year plan where we've identified key strategic areas crying out for intervention. We're not fooling ourselves. The systemic issues, such as social exclusion, racial profiling, job insertion, underemployment, education, health access, etc., all require long-term concerted program interventions.

Unfortunately, without core funding, in a given year we're able to address only those issues where funding is available. The lack of core funding also means that the development of non-profit human resources is retarded. We spend an enormous amount of time training volunteers and project staff. However, the payoff for organizations like BCRC is immediate but of limited duration, as we have to release them, particularly staff, when projects are terminated.

Concomitant with engaging staff for projects, their hourly wage is tied to project funding, yet they are implicated in the resolution of BCRC's long-term strategic areas. This knowledge transfer and expertise that we build up is sadly lost when this young staff is terminated or they transfer to higher-paying, more secure jobs. This is a waste of resources, human and financial, all the while slowing down our own internal capacity building.

Another area of concern, and certainly one requiring a full review, is that OLMCs are not rewarded for success. By this, I mean when we have identified and facilitated a successful program in the community, funding rules prohibit repeat funding. Even in our case, when a project has been evaluated as successful, the participant and stakeholder feedback is sometimes off the chart, but there is no chance that it will be funded again unless it is modified to fit within some criteria in another program. I've seen the results of failed projects treated much the same as successful projects, with little regard or interest in maintaining successful interventions in the community. Why? Because the success of projects is solely tied to the project's immediate results, which we meet, but not to the long-term overarching need to have sufficient funding in order to ameliorate social, cultural, and economic outcomes, or to fill a gap, or to enable communities to be sustainable, and this is a goal of BCRC.

Funding in Canada is silo-based. For real change to happen, this type of funding must derive from diverse sources.

Our organization addresses multiple issues from a more global perspective. We call it the holistic approach. Our youth and their families are often waylaid by more than one problem at a time. Difficulties they face in one area tend to be magnified because there are additional overlapping problems in other areas. For instance, if your family has lived in poverty for decades, it is unlikely you will have networks to acquire meaningful employment, be knowledgeable about health access, or have acquired sufficient economic capital for educational empowerment or entrepreneurial initiatives.

Such access is taken for granted when one has access to a certain level of household income. Underserved youth may need long-term mentoring or coaching, or just a push in some cases. Any support that is offered needs to take into account the totality of the individual, their protective factors, their characters, their environment, and such. You don't put people on their feet just by giving them better health access. You need to assist them in multiple ways from multiple perspectives at the same time.

I mentioned earlier that in a given year we were able to address only those issues when funding is available. This brings to mind another issue about funding, and it is that organizations like mine, that serve unique, isolated populations where there is an issue that we identify, often have to wait until new funding streams come on board, even though we may see these new issues bubbling under the surface. Because we must respond only to those priorities identified years earlier—for instance, 2008, the previous road map that we're in now—we find ourselves having to shelve some ideas because they just don't quite fit the volet.

The road map needs to ensure that funding is pertinent: it is sensitive and encourages the push towards building stronger and sustainable communities, and, by doing so, building stronger and relevant organizations. That is why, Chairman, I invited Gemma Raeburn-Baynes of Playmas Montreal, because she is a partner with BCRC in this drive that we have here in Montreal and to represent the organizations that BCRC supports.

[Gemma Raeburn-Baynes, Partner, Black Community Resource Centre, and President, Playmas Montréal Cultural Association]

Good morning, everyone. I'm very pleased to be here.

I've been associated with the BCRC as a partner for the past three years. Our organization is called Playmas Montréal Cultural Association, and we provide programs and social development programs for youth. We give scholarships through our very popular event called A Taste of the Caribbean Festival, and I hope you will all be attending next year. It's a festival where we promote the Caribbean culture in music, entertainment, and food, especially food, the cuisine of the Caribbean. We open that up to the general public so that everyone can appreciate the culture we have and that we bring to this wonderful country of Canada. With the funds, we give scholarships to minority kids in the culinary arts programs. We are partnered with the Pius X Culinary Institute, and we have young people from the ages of 16 to 24 attend the school. We take disenfranchised black kids and help them to have successful careers in order for them to learn, develop, and succeed, and to have a better social life.

Because of the BCRC we're able to get some administrative support, but as Dr. Williams said, it's only for a certain amount of time. It will be for, say, nine months, and then there is no more funding, so we have no more administrative support and we have to retrain somebody else or try to get help. But the BCRC has been wonderful to us as a partner. They have been able to not only help us with administration, but they've been mentors, and they've been mentors to even the students involved in our culinary program. They have been great consultants. She has a great shoulder that I cry on from time to time. I'm really very happy that she invited me to be here. A lot of different organizations need the support of the BCRC.

[Dorothy Williams]

Finally, I would like to take this time to put forth recommendations that will perhaps go a long way to making a difference with the new road map.

Number one, identify and support OLMCs with core multi-year funding, rather than short-term fiscally derived project funding.

Number two, for measurable impact, a holistic approach to organizational funding is needed. Multiple government departments with similar interests could contribute to one envelope, so that OLMCs could mount sustained, long-term initiatives in order to address systemic problems.

Number three, the road map in Quebec needs to be far more sensitive to the reality of multi-ethnic, multi-racial anglophones in Quebec. In Montreal, in particular, concerted inroads are needed into communities that speak English but are not of anglo British origin.

Funding of programs through the road map should somehow be evaluated or assessed with pre-determined measurable indicators to determine if they can receive repeat funding. I am not saying give everybody all the money they want, all the time, in every single instance. That's not what I'm saying.

Successful program models not only need to be kept in place when possible, but they should be considered for expansion, either to other groups in different regions willing to see if the model works there or to different target populations in one's area. Replicating success should be part of what the road map is all about.

To echo what you said, the road map needs to recognize the value of community research. It's not just university people who do research. We're not objects. We can do our own research. But we need the resources. One of the major caveats is that we don't fund research. It's very difficult, particularly with isolated unknown communities, to find the information, other than anecdotal, to really deal with what the issues are out there. Without research, there's quite a bit of, I would say, playing around before you hit on a model that's going to make a difference.

That's all I'm going to say. Thank you very much for listening to me this morning.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you very much, Madame Williams and Madame Raeburn-Baynes.

We'll have about one hour of questions and comments from members of the committee, beginning with Monsieur Godin.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to welcome you to the Standing Committee on Official Languages. Your presentations were very good. There are a lot of questions we could ask you, but our time is limited. So I will try to ask relevant questions.

Let's start with the AFFC. Actually, I'd like to put my first question to the three groups.

Do you want the roadmap renewed? And does the roadmap improve things? In fact, have there not been cuts, for example to Status of Women Canada, since 2006?

Mrs. Villeneuve.

[Louise-Hélène Villeneuve]

I can start.

Clearly, we want the roadmap to be renewed. But we've noted that it's difficult to know which funds exactly come from the roadmap, for instance when we do business with the departments, such as Canadian Heritage. It's certainly something we'd like to see improved.

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

I would like you to explain just this point. We're discussing the roadmap, an innovation that was put in place in 2001, I think.

Mauril, was the first roadmap put in place in 2001?

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

In 2003.

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

In 2003.

It seems like everything is linked to the roadmap. But when we ask whether the money comes from roadmap, we don't really have an answer. It's as if there were some kind of lack of communication between the organizations and the government. It's as if you can't get access to it. Does the money really come from the roadmap, or does it come from standard programs that are already in place?

It's nice to talk about the roadmap, it's as if it were a gift from the heavens. But can you say that the roadmap has really changed things and that you really need it? If that's the case, can you explain why?

[Louise-Hélène Villeneuve]

We recognize that we have taken initiatives that fit with the roadmap priorities. But when we turn to the departments to ask if that money is coming from their envelope allocated under the roadmap, we get a clear answer.

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

So have you not seen the regional offices closed, for example?

[Louise-Hélène Villeneuve]

Absolutely. With respect to Status of Women Canada and the cuts, we dare believe that we, women, have done our part. In 2006, Status of Women Canada saw cuts of over 40%. While there used to be 16 regional offices, now there are only four.

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

This is what I have trouble with. There were cuts, even with the roadmap, and 16 regional offices became four. That means that there was no one on the ground to work with people. In the regions where we are closing an office, there no longer is anyone who is working with the people.

[Louise-Hélène Villeneuve]

Exactly.

I would like to make a clarification: Status of Women Canada is not one of the departments and agencies targeted by the roadmap.

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

No, but it's still a government agency.

[Louise-Hélène Villeneuve]

It is a government agency, exactly.

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

Please excuse the language, but I don't give a damn whether it comes from Canadian Heritage, Human Resources and Skills Development or another department. At the end of the day, if the government makes cuts to an organization, it's still a cut. It's all very well to put it elsewhere, but the fact remains that you experienced cuts.

[Louise-Hélène Villeneuve]

Please allow me to add two things to this. First, the word "equality" was removed from Status of Women Canada's mission statement, as if equality pertains to an ideological choice. Rather, we think that it's a fundamental Canadian value.

Second, we can no longer do research. You know as well as we do, when we submit funding applications, we are asked for statistics. As our colleague said, we do not have funding from Status of Women Canada for our particular situation. It is also more difficult these days to get funding to do research in our communities. So it is becoming more difficult to support our requests with statistics.