That's a very good question.
I'm not a lawyer, and unlike when I was commissioner, I didn't bring anyone with me today. I'm not here with a team of lawyers.
I'm not sure whether replacing the word “may” with the word “shall”—and making the equivalent change in French—is the best approach or whether the same thing could be achieved by way of regulations.
In 2006, I purposefully chose not to go down the regulatory road partly because I sensed that the new government wouldn't exactly be keen on the idea. I hadn't discussed it with anyone in the government at the time, but my reporter's intuition told me that the new Conservative government would automatically opt to reduce the regulatory burden, rather than increase it.
I remember we, at the Office of the Commissioner of Official Languages, talked about the Official Languages Regulations, with the legal affairs branch raising the possibility of amending the regulations. My immediate reaction was to say that the new government didn't even know that the regulations existed and I didn't want to be the one to tell it.