Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I want to welcome you all here this morning. As you saw, we're doing this study on the road map. It has been the longest study I've ever seen in my life. I know sometimes we pass a bill in the House within two days, but here's a study we've been doing since September. I hope that something good comes from this.
First of all, I want to say that I am sorry that I was not at your event two weeks ago, your convention, because I do love to go. I was there when you came to Gatineau; I attended. They're really good events and I wanted to be there. But as you know, we had our NDP convention to choose our next prime minister of the country, and I wanted to be there. We were trying to find Pierre Poutine; we didn't find him. He's going to come later on.
To get to the study, when we look at education—and you said it well, Mr. D'Aoust, when you said that education is under provincial jurisdiction. At the same time, in the Official Languages Act, if you look at part VII, I believe sections 41, 42, and 43 talk about the federal government promoting in provinces where there's a minority.
There's this question of whether they're using the money in the right place. We raised the question with the Commissioner of Official Languages, who said it wasn't his responsibility to investigate in the provinces. And we're not just talking about Quebec; we're talking about across the country. I'm not going to pick on Quebec. I'll pick on New Brunswick. Is New Brunswick taking the money and putting it in the right place for francophones? Is Nova Scotia taking the money and putting it in education?
The commissioner said, when he was talking to one of the education ministers, that when they get the money they put it where they feel it's most important to put it. Sometimes it doesn't even go to education.
Do you feel that you get the money? We have you here, Mr. D'Aoust, and you work in education. Do you feel you get the money? That's one thing.
Is the money spread well across the province? I'm talking about Quebec now. I'm coming back to Quebec. The English minority is only in Quebec. It's not in New Brunswick, it's not in Nova Scotia, it's not in Ontario—it's not any place in the country except Quebec.
But is it going...? For example, I don't think Montreal is the worst served. You've got the universities, you've got the health care, the hospitals and all that, but when we're talking about Rivière-au-Renard, for example, the Fox River.... The first time I heard that was when I went for a tour. Official language...and they were talking about the Fox River. I didn't know they had a Fox River, but now I know this was Rivière-au-Renard.
Are you getting what you're supposed to get? That's one question.
The other question I want to raise, because we only have seven minutes and I want to get an answer.... To the three groups, do you think the road map should continue? If the road map is good and if there are programs where you people can attach yourselves with your organization and get something noticeable, do you think it should continue, and not just last until 2013? In the last budget they said they would not touch the road map; they will do it, but what about the future?
I think it's serious if you say you feel it's good or not, because that gives a signal to the government.
I'd like to hear you on this.