Good afternoon, and thank you very much for inviting me today. It's a great pleasure to be here.
I am accompanied by Mohamed Ghaleb, our Project Manager, Investigations, Research and Surveillance. Before you, therefore, you see one third of the Office of the French Language Services Commissioner of Ontario.
The commissioner's office was established in 2007 to ensure the effective implementation of the French Language Services Act, which was unanimously adopted by the Legislative Assembly of Ontario in 1986. Like our counterparts at federal level, Graham Fraser and his team, and in New Brunswick, Katherine d'Entremont, whom you had the pleasure of hearing from a few weeks ago, the commissioner's office receives complaints from the public. We work together with the Government of Ontario to make sure that those complaints are treated systematically and in order, and that changes are made to the way in which French-language services are processed by the government and the institutions in the province of Ontario.
Immigration is a priority issue of my office since its inception. In fact, my first recommendation as commissioner concerned this issue. I had asked the minister responsible for francophone affairs to review the definition of the francophone population of Ontario in order to ensure that it adequately reflects the new reality of this population.
As such, Ontario's francophone population has benefited, since June 2009, from a new inclusive definition of francophone, a first in Canada. The inclusive definition of francophone, or IDF, reflects the diversity of Franco-Ontarians, regardless of their place of birth, ethnic origin or religious affiliation.
Ontario has also been active on the national scene through the Ministerial Conference on the Canadian Francophonie, calling for the IDF alone to be used to count the Franco-Ontarian population, even though none of its federal, provincial and territorial government counterparts have yet to follow suit.
In 2011, there were, according to the IDF, 611,500 francophones in Ontario, accounting for nearly 5% of the total population. There is no question that, aside from the statistical exercise, the adoption of the IDF is enabling newcomers to identify as francophones in Ontario and takes their contribution to the francophone community into account, thereby reinforcing their feeling of belonging to their host community.
Thus, if we want to attract them to our francophone communities, francophone immigrants must be an integral part of their new community. The IDF certainly contributes.
In Ontario, responsibility for newcomer integration programs, for example with settlement, language training and employment, is shared between the Ministry of Citizenship, Immigration and International Trade of Ontario and the Department of Citizenship and Immigration of Canada.
There is certainly some overlap between programs, but the Ontario government has looser eligibility requirements than its federal counterpart. Nevertheless, it is important that, before and as soon as they arrive, immigrants realize that they can not only obtain service in French from the federal and provincial governments, but also live in French, such as applying to have their children educated in French and obtaining community assistance in French. We need to make the newcomers aware of those services and opportunities
As our friend from AFO, Peter Hominuk, said earlier, in 2012, the Ontario government announced the development of its first immigration strategy to attract more highly skilled workers. This clear goal and this leadership by the government were reflected in the announcement of a 5% target for francophone immigration, which will contribute to the vitality and the social, economic and cultural development not only of the francophone community, if it is reached, but also of Ontario society as a whole.
Since the publication of Ontario's first immigration strategy in 2012, the provincial government has undertaken a number of actions. Notably, a working group was formed to develop measures for achieving the 5% target under the leadership of the Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and International Trade. As you know, immigration is an area of jurisdiction shared between the federal government and the provinces, which means that the various levels of government must join forces to facilitate progress.
This is why my colleagues Katherine d'Entremont and Graham Fraser and myself wanted to lead by example. by stating four guiding principles. More recently, in 2014, Graham Fraser and I published a joint report to present an overview and analysis of the issues surrounding immigration to francophone communities. We formulated eight recommendations, primarily to the federal government, but also to the Government of Ontario.
These recommendations deal with: support for French-speaking immigrants through francophone institutions and organizations; information and resources for French-speaking newcomers; cooperation with provincial and territorial governments; accountability, and incentives for employers to recruit and select francophone and bilingual workers.
During this celebration period of the 400th anniversary of the French presence in Ontario, and as we approach the 150th anniversary of Confederation in 2017, we believe that the two levels of government must join forces and show leadership so that immigration truly contributes to the development and vitality of francophone minority communities and must ensure that Canada's changing demographic mosaic continues to be in line with the specificities of Canadian society.
As proof, we see that, although Ontario's francophone population represents 5% of the total population in the province, 2% of the immigrant population had French as its first official language spoken, according to Statistics Canada's 2011 census data.
As is the case for the Canadian population as a whole, we need immigration to offset the sharp decline in the birth rate and higher rates of population aging. Immigration has a direct impact on the community's vitality.
We also need immigration to ensure the continuity of French-language services. For example, we will need more nurses to take care of our aging population, and more early childhood educators, teachers of French and many other subjects.
It is clear that, over the years, Canada and Ontario francophone communities have benefited less from immigration than have the anglophone majority communities.
In conclusion, I believe that our governments must act now to redress the current immigration imbalance affecting francophone communities. We have formulated a plan with eight recommendations. If you remember anything from my presentation only, let it be those eight recommendations. It is time to act on them.
I will be pleased to answer any questions you and your colleagues may have.