Evidence of meeting #122 for Official Languages in the 42nd Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was language.
A recording is available from Parliament.
10:40 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Denis Paradis
Thank you, Mr. Samson.
Mr. Choquette, you have three minutes.
Just a moment, please. The bells are ringing and the lights are flashing to summon us to vote in the House. I request unanimous consent to enable Mr. Choquette to use his three minutes.
10:40 a.m.
Some hon. members
Agreed.
10:40 a.m.
Liberal
10:40 a.m.
NDP
François Choquette NDP Drummond, QC
I want three minutes just to conclude, because in three minutes I don't have any time to add anything else. I just want to use those three minutes to have a conclusion regarding how you see the modernization of the Official Languages Act.
10:40 a.m.
President, Quebec Community Groups Network
There are two points we want to leave you with today. One is how important the current crisis in Ontario is, how much we appreciate everybody pulling together, and how much we feel it's necessary to continue with this exercise.
The more important long-term one, other than the purpose of the meeting, is to say how important the Official Languages Act is, how good an instrument it has been, and how relatively small and relatively uncontroversial changes—not massively redesigning the whole thing—could make it more effective and could make it a subject or a device to create unity in the country.
One of the things that make Canada Canada is the profile of two official languages. I had the privilege of attending Commissioner Boileau's symposium in Toronto yesterday. One of the presentations talked about all the countries in the world that have bilingual constitutional functions. There are about 52 countries out of 195, so about a quarter of the countries in the world do. The model that the proposition placed before us was that the model we function with in Canada is an example for other countries. Many other countries don't do as good a job.
Since we have these devices—and it is a very healthy thing for the country—to make them a little bit more effective and to continue to apply the energy and attention that you are doing is a very constructive exercise, and we want to encourage it, and we want to help in any way we can.
10:40 a.m.
Liberal
The Chair Liberal Denis Paradis
Thank you very much, Mr. Chambers and Mr. Thompson. Thank you very much for your presentations and for answering the questions and comments of the members of the committee.
We will see each other again on Thursday. I remind you that the meeting will be held in the Centre Block and that it will be televised. We will be hearing from the commissioners of Ontario and New Brunswick.
The meeting is adjourned.
