Personally, I think there is too much timidity in the discourse, if we consider our country's history and evolution.
We have had another era when we were ready to violate the rights of minorities, as they had been conceived in contemporary society. The situation was rectified in the 1970s and 1980s, but there is still a timidity that prevents us from moving forward and being very clear about our collective responsibility towards linguistic minorities. That is the explanation I propose. I'm not saying that around this table we are timid, but there were times when we were. There was concern about the critical masses in some provinces and about unilingual people who felt they were disadvantaged compared to bilingual people. This makes elected officials a little timid.
We also see that some elected officials have the opportunity to exploit people's anxiety or insecurity about the situation for political purposes. This is currently the case in New Brunswick. I would like to mention, with great respect for the Premier of Ontario, that we also saw a case where he was willing to see what people's reactions would be and to exploit their concerns and insecurity about a right that we should recognize, namely access to services for the francophone minority. This should be recognized as a right, not as a favour or privilege granted to this minority. Too many thinkers claim that we are doing these minorities favours or services, rather than insisting that it is a right.