Official Languages Committee on May 6th, 2014

[Normand Lévesque]

It is difficult in the reality of the current economy. Someone without basic training or skills will have difficulty finding and keeping a job. Skills development has an impact not just economically, but also in other areas, including personal development and health.

I find that Canada is an interesting example. It is the country that invested the most in the last survey. There is a sample of 27,000 people, which is very large. If we compare the literacy tables from the 2003 survey to those in the 2013 survey, we can see that there was an overall drop of six points in Canada, regardless of the community. There was a seven point drop in numeracy.

It is important to understand that skills development is not static. The economy of 2003 is not the economy of 2013. The skills needs are not the same. I will give you an example. In this survey, we evaluated the skills relating to the technological environment, which is not something we did in 2003. Try to get by today without a minimum of technological skills and you will have difficulty.

What you raise is a fact. People who enter the labour market with few skills will end up in basic jobs. They will experience financial and job instability. They will have difficulty keeping their job. In addition, given the technological changes within companies, it will become difficult for them to move forward economically.

What is worse, and the surveys show this, is that people with few skills, with low literacy are those who get the least training. People like you and me will take part in a lot of training. In contrast, the statistics show that at most 2% of people who need training take part in it.

What you raise is fundamental. How can we respond? We could create policies on job training, policies that would be more specific and more concrete for this particular group.

In fact, what you are bringing up is a major challenge. The economic changes alone bring us to what we call 21^st century skills. If we cannot acquire them, we will encounter serious economic difficulties.

[Joe Daniel, Conservative, Don Valley East, ON]

Thank you.

Mr. Morrow, you talked about the economy and the francophone space in how the economy works. Do you see a specific francophone economic space in Canada, and if so, how would you define it?

[Justin Morrow]

In certain parts of Canada there is a certain francophone economic space, such as in St. Boniface and the Province of Quebec, and New Brunswick has its own. They're difficult to come by and to define as well. That's why in my presentation it was to speak to, to redefine one of the recommendations, which was to ensure the participation of the majority communities so that we could be talking about official languages for the entire Canadian economy.

When we're talking about how official languages impact the entire Canadian economy, we're not talking about a francophone majority or minority economy, or an anglophone minority or majority economy. We're talking about the whole thing and how actors in the traditional anglophone economy or francophone minority economy will interact with those of the opposite majority or minority.

[Joe Daniel, Conservative, Don Valley East, ON]

As a follow-up to that one, how prepared do you think the francophone community is in wanting to be able to engage in the European economy, given that we're now going to have a trade deal with Europe and the opportunity is huge there?

[Justin Morrow]

I'm going to take one point, and then I'll get Christie in here.

Mariette Mulaire in Manitoba has done a lot of international recruitment and brings the francophone space of Manitoba to the international level. The businesses that she's brought to the province of Manitoba have had significant economic impacts. That's one example.

I'll let Christie expand on that.

[Christie Dennison]

I think francophone communities are absolutely prepared to expand into new spaces and are engaged in doing this already. This is one of their priorities. Sometimes it's referred to as

…expanding the francophone community…

and not only in a cultural way, but in an economic way.

Openness towards international markets is obviously an advantage to francophone minority communities and is something they can leverage. For specific trade deals, it depends. French is often seen as a second language internationally, regardless of the what first language of either party is. They often share French as a common language. Also, we know that growing markets often have French as a language of business, so this is certainly an opportunity.

One thing that we did want to mention is the difference between a basic language acquisition and then the confidence to interact actively within a language community that isn't your own. Learning basic French doesn't necessarily mean that an anglophone will then engage actively with the francophone economy if there isn't an active offer to engage, but Canadian Youth for French recognizes through most of its partnerships that there is an openness from francophone minority communities to this reality.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you very much.

Monsieur Dionne Labelle.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Robillard, in your presentation, you mention the publication of the results of the programme for the international assessment of adult competencies, specifically the sections dealing with literacy and numeracy. However, the results are not broken down based on francophone and anglophone communities in Canada.

Will the results of the survey be broken down according to those groups?

[Michel Robillard]

We have raw data. Naturally, in a year or two, more specific data will be used.

Regardless, initial reports from the PIAAC presented data broken down by the various communities in the various provinces, such as in Ontario, in Quebec, and so on.

What is interesting, as Mr. Lévesque mentioned, is that Canada provided the largest sample of respondents for the international survey. Of the 166,000 people who took part in the assessment, 27,000 were Canadian. What is interesting is that, in the Canadian sample, francophones from three provinces were over-represented, namely, those from New Brunswick, Manitoba and Ontario.

For the moment, the raw data will be broken down minimally, but there will be much more specific data in a year or two.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

For the moment, we don't know what the literacy level of francophones is.

[Normand Lévesque]

Yes, we do. The data are in the brief you have there.

Generally speaking, we know that the results of francophones in New Brunswick haven't improved since the last survey 10 years ago.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

It's in this report?

[Normand Lévesque]

Yes.

The results for Ontario and Manitoba are a little better, but not much.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

How do you explain that?

[Normand Lévesque]

A first situation concerns us. We assess that about 80% of people who say they are francophone replied in English. That rate was 66% in 2003. That's the first issue.

For the second issue, it's important to point out that, historically, the relationship between education and reading among francophones has been different. In general, to develop skills, you need to put them into practice. For the moment, the results and analysis of them has not enabled us to determine what exactly is going on.

The fact that many francophones answer in English gives rise to a lot of questions about access to services and about skills development. We are aware that, generally speaking, many francophones outside Quebec and in some areas of New Brunswick work in English. That's the reality.

However, maintaining the language and cultures has to be done in all provinces. Six thematic reports will be published by the federal government, including one on the PIAAC and the official language minority communities. Some provinces, including Ontario and probably New Brunswick, will go further with the analysis to better understand their own reality and determine how to react.

Skills development is not just a francophone reality in Canada; it's a major issue that has been raised by most economic development stakeholders.

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

I imagine that if the francophone minority communities have more catching up to do, that would be of particular interest.

What do you think of the new labour market agreements program? Do you think it does enough for the minimum basic skills, enabling people to enter the labour market? Is enough money being put into the program? Certainly this has to do with literacy, numeracy and, in general, literacy education. Is enough money being put into this area so that people are acquiring the minimum skills? Are these labour market agreements beneficial?

[Normand Lévesque]

On the one hand, it isn't equal across the country because these federal-provincial agreements are managed by the provinces. So we cannot make a uniform observation.

On the other hand, these programs are aimed at skills development and employment. It's a completely different area, and the approach may vary from province to province.

Lastly, with respect to acquiring basic skills, most provinces have different funding programs.

With respect to official language minority communities, since these agreements have just been concluded, we will see later how it will go. However, we know that previous agreements had major impacts and, unfortunately, they were not always positive. I'm thinking about British Columbia, where there were significant problems. In particular, it made a lot of organizations more fragile. We will have to see what these new agreements will bring.

Something interesting, in some cases, but not all, this brought the provincial government and official language minority communities closer together in terms of skills development. I think the communities understood, that they learned from that, that they have better control with this transfer of jurisdiction. So they are closer to the provincial governments because the money is now in the provinces. It remains to be seen how it will be made available.

Still, we think that the federal government can't give up its responsibility for official languages and minority rights. Significant issues remain in this area. Unfortunately, the answers aren't black or white. It is far more complex than that. We will see what happens with these new agreements.

We think that the closer the money is to the ground, usually, the more—

[Pierre Dionne Labelle, NDP, Rivière-du-Nord, QC]

There is a better chance it would be useful.

[Normand Lévesque]

That's usually the case. We still need to solve the problem of the minority communities' access to the funds in certain areas. That still needs to be sorted out with the provinces. We think the federal government could play a role in that.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you, Mr. Lévesque.

Mr. Williamson, you have the floor.

[John Williamson, Conservative, New Brunswick Southwest, NB]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you to everyone for showing up today.

I have a couple of questions, which I'll direct to Dr. Galbraith from McGill. I want to highlight a couple of points from some of the other witnesses.

The first is on literacy. While I think it is a problem that communities face—it's one in my home province of New Brunswick—I would highlight a point from the Réseau pour le développement de l’alphabétisme et des compétences, which notes, “This is not a phenomenon purely characteristic of the minority community or that affects only francophones.” This is true in New Brunswick. It is true across the country. In fact, I'd even note that the rate in Quebec is the same as it is for Canada as a whole.

Mr. Morrow notes that, for the purpose of the study, we really do need one vision, because it's a strong Canada that helps minority communities across this country. In fact, we've had several previous witnesses who have noticed that in parts of the country where economic growth is strong, the minority communities' participation, wealth creation, and employment levels parallel, if not mirror, those of the majority linguistic community. At the same time, we see the downside. In parts of the country where growth lags, minority communities share those same characteristics as well.

Dr. Galbraith, in some of your answers, you spoke on some of the global issues. Could you talk a bit about what are some of the characteristics that are necessary for growth so that we can envision policies in some of these slower growth areas of the country that would see them catching up to the economically stronger parts of the country? Is it institutions? Is it questions...? Is it resource development? I'd like to get some of your thoughts on those policies or those areas, so that as we look at this question we're not just looking at it from silos, but rather from policies that will benefit the country as a whole, and so that as one group is lifted up, so too are all groups in the immediate surrounding area.

Thank you.

[Dr. John Galbraith]

In responding to that question, I want to underline a point that Monsieur Dionne Labelle was making when he spoke of the compétences de base minimales when we discuss l'alphabétisme and numeracy. I think this is an important point in light of the question that you just posed as well. Again, I want to underline that I'm absolutely in agreement with Monsieur Robillard and Monsieur Lévesque on the importance, of course, of literacy and numeracy.

It goes without saying that…

these are things that we would like to be pushing close to 100% by whatever mechanism, provincial or federal, that can be used.

But again, as Monsieur Dionne Labelle was indicating, we're speaking of the compétences de base minimales. When we think of the knowledge economy, which is another one of the phrases that is on everyone's lips today, the kinds of enterprises that we think of and which we hope to encourage and develop in a country such as ours, which does have a highly educated workforce, are in general not those that are being created by people with a minimal level of competencies.

This kind of educational investment that we think feeds into this growth in the knowledge economy is really the most highly educated and capable people, and this is a different kind of program. Again, that does not take away from the importance of literacy and numeracy as Monsieur Robillard and Monsieur Lévesque have underlined, but it's another part of the distribution of talents that we're thinking about.

The Canadian government has addressed these things with a number of programs, including the Canada Foundation for Innovation. There are a number of ways in which the creation of a high level of knowledge and skill have been addressed. It's that other part of the distribution, rather than the competénces de base minimales. I can't quite think of how I want to say that in English, but it's a sort of minimal level of skills. That other part of the distribution is critical for this. so I think we should be making sure that our attention is turned to that as well.

As I was saying earlier, economic growth depends upon investment—we all know this—and investment has many forms. Education is one of these forms. Installation of capital is another one. To the extent that we are talking about education, as many people have been implicitly doing here today, I think we need to be sure that we're talking at least in part about the most highly skilled people in the economy, and not only providing the training, but also attracting people of that type to Canada as a place in which to learn, stay, and create enterprises.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

Thank you very much, Mr. Williamson and Professor Galbraith.

We are going to take a five-minute break.

We'll allow our witnesses to leave before we move to the second item on our orders of the day.

This meeting is suspended for five minutes. Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Conservative, Michael Chong]

We are continuing the meeting. The session is still public.

We have a motion before us. It is the motion that Mr. Godin moved at a previous meeting. The motion reads as follows:

That the Standing Committee on Official Languages invite the Minister of Canadian Heritage to appear before May 29^th, 2014 to discuss the Plans and Priorities for 2014-2015 of the department for a two-hour televised session.

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

On a point of order, Mr. Chair.