Official Languages Committee on Nov. 27th, 2012

[Guy Laflamme]

Mr. Dion, thank you for pointing this out. We feel it is important. Without taking anything away from my colleagues, this has to do with the importance of the national capital region as a window for the whole country. Without taking anything away from the other regions of the country, the fact remains that we are a second home for Canadians. In a nutshell, it is a question of determining to what extent the committee can highlight the vital role of the capital region in promoting linguistic duality and in showcasing the entire country. We have to make sure that everyone can learn something about our history and celebrate our accomplishments. We also have to look to the future to get Canadians excited about what we will be able to accomplish with future generations.

Thank you.

[Chantal Schryer]

At the Canadian Museum of Civilization and at the Canadian War Museum, we feel much the same as my colleague Mr. Laflamme just said. Given that we are telling the story of Canada's history and in light of this new mandate in particular, we need the support of each and every one of you to promote this museum across Canada in both official languages. In addition, what I would like to see in the report is support for smaller museums and institutions across the country that do not really have the money or the resources to tell their history in both official languages.

Thank you.

[René Légère]

As to the place of both official languages in the celebrations in Acadia, it is definitely non-negotiable.

You have to understand that living in Acadia means living with the anglophone community. We are a minority on the territory of the Atlantic provinces. On a daily basis, we have to share our experiences, we have to better understand the anglophone community and we have to get that community interested in us. To do so, we are increasingly reaching out through our francophone and anglophone artists. In most of our events, we try to bring them together, so that, as Canadians, we realize how rich this diversity is in all our regions.

You are going to say that, in New Brunswick, that is a given. No, it is not a given. We have to constantly work at it. There is no time for rest. I think it is sort of the same for the anglophone side. The anglophones in the Atlantic provinces are also faced with the challenge of constantly trying to get to know the Acadian community better, as they share their lives on a daily basis. We get married. We have a high percentage of exogamous marriages between francophones and Acadians. Our hope is to live in both languages, not just in English. We really want that aspect to be shared.

In terms of the second question, which had to do with Acadia's affirmation within Canada, I feel that the 2017 celebrations will be a unique opportunity for us to make ourselves known and to share all our positive experiences. In Acadia, we have accomplished some rather interesting things in education, health and culture. The dialogue we have established with the anglophone community shows that there is an interesting model somewhere that has worked well, that works well and that could be used in the rest of the country.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Okay, thank you.

Mr. Morrow.

[Justin Morrow]

Regarding the delivery of the service, we think there should be a committee that consists of the various communities with young people who all understand both official languages. That committee would receive demands for all the applications, all the grants, from all the different communities across the country, and it should be their responsibility to decide which projects get approved. It should be a central thing.

We recommend, first and foremost, a strong linguistic clause. If a minority francophone community wants to be part of a celebration in a majority anglophone setting, there shouldn't be two distinct celebrations. They should work together, the anglophone community and the francophone community, to do something together. They should definitely not do it apart. If any French community wants to do that, they should automatically be paired with one of the English communities.

For the communities who don't have a francophone voice, there should be something that promotes an understanding of our linguistic and cultural duality. Somehow, the group or project that gets approved by the committee must demonstrate that they have the resources and a creative way to include the understanding of both dualities. We hope that we will be there to play that role.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

I would like to invite our witnesses to eat with us.

We'll suspend for five minutes.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

We are going to continue the 62^nd meeting of the Standing Committee on Official Languages.

I will now give the floor to Mr. Trottier.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My thanks to the witnesses. It is always a pleasure to have you at the Standing Committee on Official Languages.

My questions today are for the Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation.

I would like to hear about your findings on long-term trends. We are comparing the 2017 celebrations to our experience from 1967. Do you think that Canadians are more interested in and more familiar with their history than they were in 1967 or even 25 years ago? What is the long-term trend when it comes to people's interest in and knowledge of Canadian history?

[Chantal Schryer]

What I can give you is the results that we have obtained so far from our consultations. This is what Canadians are telling us right now.

To date, we have held consultations in five cities, including Vancouver, St. John's, Halifax and Fredericton. You will find this information on our website. At the museum, we feel that Canadians are showing a renewed interest in the history of their country. If you are asking me whether we will see the same interest as in 1967, I am not sure. However, I think that each of us has a role to play in reaching out to Canadians, in developing programs and in creating dialogue with Canadians—in our case, we have exhibitions—to rekindle Canadians' desire to know more about their history and the way their country was built.

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

One of the important aspects of our history is this linguistic duality. Are there specific exhibitions at the museum that deal with the history of bilingualism?

[Chantal Schryer]

At the Canadian Museum of Civilization, which will become the Canadian Museum of History, the Canada hall will be redone, and so will the Canadian personalities hall on the fourth floor.

People love the Canada Hall, but contrary to what many believe, this hall does not tell Canada’s history. In this room, there are a number of vignettes that give people a look into events that took place at a specific time somewhere in Canada. Of course, we mention the rebellions and conquests, but it is not what people really expect to find there. That is why this exhibition is going to be completely redone.

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

What will you do to bring this history to the other museums? The other museums will probably not have the necessary infrastructure to put on exhibitions. You also need to have people who can explain things or who can organize visits in both languages. How can we help those museums, if we want to have exhibitions at the national level?

[Chantal Schryer]

At our museum, we are developing partnerships with museums across Canada. Among the new exhibitions, we will have a room fully reserved for exhibitions from other museums in Canada. For example, the New Brunswick museum will be able to come and present the history of New Brunswick in this room. At our museum, we would be providing visitors with the opportunity to learn about the history of Canada's various regions, and this room will be complementary to the major exhibition on Canada’s history. We are also going to develop exhibitions or modules that can be presented in other Canadian museums.

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

What is the significance of 2017 for your organization?

[Chantal Schryer]

It is very important to us. Since we represent two museums dedicated to Canada’s history, meaning military history and the history of the Canadian people, it is certainly a priority for us.

I would say that practically each and every one of my colleagues is working on it. This is our major project for the next five years.

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

What will you do differently in 2016 or 2018? What will happen?

[Chantal Schryer]

In 2017, we are going to unveil this new major exhibition. We are going to launch our Canada-wide programming. We are going to promote our partnerships with other museums. New modules are going to be put on our websites.

Actually, I cannot give you all the details now because we are currently discussing this with Canadians across the country to help us define the exhibition and the programming.

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

Thank you.

My question is for all the groups. What are the major themes that your communities or your corporations would like to focus on for the celebrations? I would like to get an idea in just a few words.

This is to help our committee do our planning, and to also help Canadian Heritage and other branches of government, of course. So could you summarize in a few words the main themes that we should address during the celebrations?

We can start with Canadian Youth for French.

[Justin Morrow]

I am personally giving three presentations on the following themes. The presentation for bilingual people is called “A Canadian Ideal/Un idéal canadien” and it takes place in both languages. The English presentation is called “French, it’s not that bad”. Finally, in French, the presentation is called “Français, la langue seconde de millions de Canadiens partout dans le pays”.

Those are the three themes.

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

Thank you.

A representative from the Société nationale de l'Acadie.

[Amély Friolet-O'Neil]

Clearly, we are going to make some changes in terms of Canada's francophone history in order to include Acadia in the history of Canadian Confederation. René and I mentioned this earlier. We often talk about francophones in Quebec and anglophones in the rest of Canada. So, we need to use the 2017 celebrations to set the record straight in terms of francophone communities as part of the Canada-wide francophonie, especially in terms of Acadia's role as a founding component.

Also, in our community, we would like 2017 to be an opportunity for us to reflect on Acadia's role. Just now, I made a mistake, a slip of the tongue by saying “World Acadian Congress”. I actually wanted to talk about the Acadian national convention. This is a time for us to reflect on Acadia's place, as well as on Acadia's role in the Canadian project and in the Canadian francophonie.

[Éric Mathieu Doucet, Executive Director, Société nationale de l'Acadie]

I would also like to add something. The Canadian identity is made up of a multitude of communities and groups that work together for the prosperity of our country, which we love.

I think that the 2017 celebrations will be a success, if all these communities—Aboriginals, Acadians and various groups—celebrate their contribution to Canada and show how happy they are to be part of this big family.

There has to be a mechanism that allows them to contribute. It could be sort of like the mechanism for the War of 1812 commemorations. It created a space for dialogue for people who wanted to take action, to promote their contribution and commitment to Canada.

It would really be the collective success of all Canadians.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you.

Mr. Lauzon now has the floor.

[Guy Lauzon, Conservative, Stormont—Dundas—South Glengarry, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

My thanks to all the witnesses for joining us here this afternoon.

I am going to address my questions to the youngest witnesses first.

Welcome, Mr. Morrow. You mentioned that the goal of your organization is to promote bilingualism among young people.

Is that really your goal?

[Justin Morrow]

Our mission is to increase the number of bilingual Canadians and to foster a greater appreciation of the French language in English Canada. That is part of the promotion.

For us, young people are those graduating high school, so people in grade 12. They are between 18 and 25. I feel that we will get the best results with that age group.