Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Ladies and gentlemen of the committee, Mr. Power is a hard act to follow, but I will do my best. I will deal with three points that Mr. Corbeil raised in his testimony last week. I will then say a few words about our document.
First, Mr. Corbeil indicated that francophone minority communities were not the only ones to request specific questions about themselves and to make that request as a matter of urgency. I do not know what group Mr. Corbeil was talking about, but official language minority communities are the only ones—together with indigenous communities, perhaps—to have rights that depend on their numbers and that are protected by the charter. This is an important distinction to be made.
Statistics Canada and the government should show leadership and provide us with the data we need. These very precise data allow us to identify rights holders wherever they are, either in small communities or in urban centres. Extrapolations made on the basis of surveys, the long-form census, or other surveys conducted with samples of the population are simply not sufficient for us.
Second, Mr. Corbeil said that there were already too many questions about official languages in the census. The reply to that is that there are indeed a number of questions about official languages in the census, and, as citizens of this country, we should be proud to make sure that we are well aware of official language minority communities. However, as I mentioned, there are no rights attached to the language frequently spoken at home, although there are questions about it.
Our rights are based on the first language learned and still understood, and on the language of instruction of parents and their children. If you ignore two of those three categories, there could be 20 questions and it would not be enough. If the number of questions is really the issue, which I doubt, the questions on the language most frequently spoken at home must be put back into the long-form questionnaire. Before the previous government removed them, those questions actually were in the long questionnaire. So that space can be used for the essential questions that everyone must be asked, not just 25% of the population.
Third, Mr. Corbeil said that Statistics Canada had not consulted lawyers and he indicated no intention to do so. We see that as a problem, for two reasons.
First, part VII of the act requires the government to consult minorities and gather good information. That implies that it must consult experts in education and at community level, but also lawyers. Actually, failing to consult lawyers may result in errors. For example, when he appeared, Mr. Corbeil pointed out that one of the current issues is that the mother tongue of a good number of immigrants settling in the country is neither French nor English and that francophone immigrants settling outside Quebec were not covered by section 23(1)(a) of the Charter. But that is false.
For example, immigrants from Arab countries who have learned Arabic, French and English in that order, have French as their first official language. So they are rights holders as soon as they acquire Canadian citizenship. In reality, almost all provinces and territories allow them into francophone schools even before they obtain their citizenship and even though they are not yet official rights holders. So it necessary to enumerate them.
Those are the three points in Mr. Corbeil's appearance that I wanted to address.
I would like to briefly describe the document so that it will be useful to you after we leave. It is nine pages long, including the appendix that Mr. Power mentioned.
The first page and a half summarizes the situation and sets out some legal facts that will definitely be useful to you. The next six pages reproduce excerpts from legislation or case law to which we thought it would be useful to draw your attention. Each paragraph is preceded by a subheading that goes with the citations. It is very easy to understand the information as you go through the document.
Specifically, the requirement is to base decisions on evidence, as Mr. Power said. We call this:
evidence-based decision-making
That's the only thing official language minority communities are asking. It's very important to them.
In the census, we recommend that the question on mother tongue be changed and that some questions be added—not 11—in order to find out the language of instruction of parents and their children. A post-censal survey is not enough. I think enough things has been said about that. That's not something the provinces can do with half measures. The federal government must do it through the census, which administers the questions to 100% of the population. Compliance with section 23 of the charter with respect to government communications and services depends on it.
The committee will conduct its study and table a report, which I'm sure will be very significant. It would be unfortunate if it were put on a shelf to gather dust.
We also recommend that the committee continue to study the matter and to occasionally—every four or six months—have officials from Statistics Canada and Minister Bains appear to keep you informed of the progress made with implementing your recommendations.
Mr. Samson knows what I'm talking about. The same thing happened in Nova Scotia in the Doucet-Boudreau case where the courts still monitored the case after their ruling was handed down to ensure that it is enforced. It has even become a well-known term in law. We talk about the Boudreau order to refer to the follow-up of a case to the end. I strongly recommend that you do that.
To reiterate what Mr. Power said, we are in the process of preparing a report with Mr. Landry and a number of stakeholders from education and communities. The French version of the report will be sent to you later this week, soon to be followed by the translated version.
Thank you.
We will be pleased to answer any questions you may have.