Thank you for the question.
I have with me a couple of documents that the department responsible for immigration has produced. I would invite you to consult the documents and invite the experts who may have authored these to come and answer those specific questions.
The government has implemented an action plan on francophone immigration further to recommendations by me, my predecessor, and I am pleased to see that the provincial government has set an objective of attracting 33% francophone immigrants by the year 2020. That is reflected in this strategy. If you recall from my presentation, recent immigration patterns have attracted about 12% francophones. Our population is 33%. The position of the commissioner is that we want to maintain the demographic weight. Because the population is not increasing, we need to rely on immigration to maintain the linguistic balance of our two linguistic communities.
I am pleased to see that the provincial government has adopted an objective of achieving 33% between now and the year 2020. I will remind this committee that about 75% of the control of immigrants is within the provincial nominee program and the other quarter is under the control of the federal government's programs. Again, I am not the one to get into detail about that, but it is a shared jurisdiction, as you know. Whether the funding is enough, I will leave that to others to comment on.
What I have asked for and worked on with my colleagues, both Commissioner Fraser and Commissioner Boileau.... We issued a joint news release back in October. I have personally met with Minister Alexander, and with our provincial Minister Landry, who is responsible for immigration in New Brunswick, to impress upon both ministers and both levels of government the priorities that we have identified in terms of making sure that our demographic balance is maintained.
When Minister Alexander talks about 4% and 5% across Canada for francophone immigration, that does not resonate in New Brunswick because we are aiming for 33%. That is one message that I want to make sure is clear here today. There needs to be a recognition of the specificity of the New Brunswick situation in terms of our constitutional framework, legislative framework, which recognizes that we have two linguistic communities that are equal and have equal status.
Immigration practices that perpetuate un déséquilbre, a lack of balance, in attracting immigrants is something that I have been alerted to. I have taken several steps to impress upon both levels of government that efforts have to be undertaken not only to rectify past imbalances, but also on a go-forward basis to step up these efforts.