Good morning everyone. I'm very glad to be with you today.
We've discussed a lot, specifically the action plan, of course. I don't know whether it's being written as we speak, but I hope it will be done before the election. I also hope that whichever party is in power after the election, the government continues to support you when it comes to official languages.
We've talked a lot about rights holders and issues involving Statistics Canada. Members on both sides of the House bombarded the people from Statistics Canada with questions that weren't always pleasant. The members of the Standing Committee on Official Languages work well as a team. I must confess that the answers to our questions left me stone cold.
I always ask myself one thing. We give Statistics Canada a lot of freedom to collect data. When it comes to the real numbers on official language minority communities and their day-to-day experience, do you think there's another way, a novel way, to collect that information? I'm talking about a way to paint a much more representative and comprehensive picture of the communities.
Yesterday I spoke with someone in Whitehorse, and that's where the idea to ask this question came from. I don't think it's something that's ever really been asked, either within government or at the community level. Do you think there's a more effective way to go about this? Currently, everything goes through Statistics Canada, but we're seeing a good bit of information being overlooked, whether it pertains to minorities, employment insurance or some other issue. I've met with people from the agency numerous times about all kinds of issues.
I'd like to hear your thoughts on that.