Official Languages Committee on May 2nd, 2016

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Mr. Commissioner, thank you for all of the good work you have done over the past years.

I agree with you that Mr. Mauril Bélanger has worked very hard to defend official languages. I would also like to mention Yvon Godin, who also devoted himself to that cause.

On this topic, I am happy to know that you are following the progress of Bill C-203, which I introduced and which deals with the understanding Supreme Court justices have of official languages. I hope it will be adopted. In this regard, you explained very well the importance of your report entitled “Access to Justice in Both Official Languages: Improving the Bilingual Capacity of the Superior Court Judiciary”. I am happy to learn that we will finally be able to dust off that report, which had been shelved. I think that the Minister of Canadian Heritage, Ms. Joly, took note of this when she came to meet with us. I hope to see the adoption of this bill my former colleague Yvon Godin worked so hard on over many years.

[Graham Fraser]

Indeed, I expressed my support for this bill from the beginning. I did so in all forums and I am willing to do it again if it is studied in committee.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Let us hope that it will be, no matter which party brings it to completion. I simply wanted to highlight Mr. Godin's long-term work and thank him.

Recently, the Liberal government posted available Governor in Council appointments. In the past, these notices stated that a mastery of both official languages was essential or preferable. Consequently, fluency in both languages was one of the criteria. However, the notices no longer mention this. They simply say that the Government of Canada will take bilingualism into account, which gives it a very broad discretionary power. Is that not very worrisome? What explains this change?

[Graham Fraser]

Here is the explanation that I was given. A few years ago Parliament passed a law, which I support, under which any agent of Parliament, at the time of his or her appointment, must be bilingual: the Auditor General, the Commissioner of Official Languages, the Chief Electoral Officer, and all of the others. According to the interpretation of that law by the Privy Council, there are now nine positions for which it is mandatory to be bilingual, but, by default, bilingualism is optional for the other positions. In my opinion, that is a regrettable interpretation.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Yes, I agree.

[Graham Fraser]

We looked at the situation closely. I finally decided to send a letter to the Prime Minister expressing my concern about the Governor in Council appointments.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Did you receive an answer?

[Graham Fraser]

No, no. I think that what matters is to recognize that there are certain positions where it is extremely important that all of the candidates be bilingual when they are appointed, and others where it would be preferable that they be bilingual, but not as essential. I hesitated before issuing that analysis, because some of my predecessors had said that any person appointed to any position by the Governor in Council had to be bilingual. The reaction of the Privy Council and of the government of the time had been to thank the commissioner for his opinion and consider the file closed. I realized that, to be realistic, we had to recognize that there are indeed certain positions where bilingualism is not essential.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Is that why a distinction was made between cases where it is preferable and those where it is essential?

[Graham Fraser]

Yes, that is correct.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

However, the removal of those two elements may pose a risk.

[Graham Fraser]

Indeed. I think, for instance, that—

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

Commissioner, I am going to have to interrupt you, because I have very little time.

[Graham Fraser]

I'm sorry.

[François Choquette, NDP, Drummond, QC]

I will ask one last question, if time permits.

In your 2015-2016 Report on Plans and Priorities, you mentioned a situation which also concerns me. You say that you are going to have trouble fulfilling your mandate to promote and defend official languages, given the financial resources you currently have. Can you explain more specifically what that means?

[Graham Fraser]

Not only has there not been an increase in resources in 10 years, but there have been additional expenses. Over the past 10 years, we have had to absorb all of the salary increases in our operating expenses. We also had to pay for the implementation of the new IM/IT system ourselves.

In addition, there was a 34% increase in complaints since last year. Our funding allows us to perform investigations, process and prepare reports for 400 complaints a year. If we receive more than 600 eligible complaints, as is the case currently, it becomes difficult and we are under pressure. It becomes a burden for our employees and it is frustrating for the complainants. It is increasingly difficult for us.

We used money that was supposed to be used for promotional activities so as to ensure compliance. In spite of that, there have been delays in processing complaints, which is frustrating for the complainants, some of whom are parliamentarians. So there is constant pressure.

I am going to ask Ms. Lagacé to add some points I may have forgotten to mention in my presentation.

[The Chair, Liberal, Denis Paradis]

With your permission, I am going to go immediately to the next speaker, because we have to respect the time allocated for interventions. You may have the opportunity to come back to this later.

Ms. Lapointe, you have the floor.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

Thank you very much.

I thank you very much for being here with us today. It is a pleasure to meet you and your team.

I am also grateful to you for having highlighted Mr. Mauril Bélanger's contribution. Please know that he still reads committee transcripts to see what is said here. It is good of you to have thought of it.

I want to share with you a comment I got on Facebook today. It was a very specific question concerning the 2016 Census which began today. I put a link up on Facebook. Mr. Daniel Lavallée mentioned that he had consulted the Statistics Canada site and that on the census page, under the heading “Tips to Fill Out the Online Census Questionnaire”, he was very discouraged to see the poor quality of the texts. There were several mistakes, spaces were missing between words, all of which made reading difficult.

I went and read that part. Indeed, one gets the impression that no one revised it. When you see that many mistakes in a French text, in your opinion, what is the solution?

[Graham Fraser]

First of all, this is the first time I have heard of this.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

I read the French version. Before asking you this question, I went to see it. A person from my riding took the trouble to point this out to me.

[Graham Fraser]

I am not challenging what you say at all. What I mean is that this is the first time I have heard of this.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

The words are stuck together.

[Graham Fraser]

It is possible that they used an automatic translation system.

[Linda Lapointe, Liberal, Rivière-des-Mille-Îles, QC]

In your opinion, it does not work perfectly.

[Graham Fraser]

That was speculation on my part.

When people ask me questions about translation tools, I always reply that someone absolutely has to revise the final product. I often give the following example: when the tractor was invented, the farmer couldn't just sit on his veranda and look at the tractor roaming about in the field.