You used the appointment of Victor Goldbloom to the position of commissioner as an argument in your favour. Just for the record, I have been deeply involved in official languages for 35 years. I sat on the Commission of Appeals on Language of Instruction; I was a lawyer with the Conseil supérieur de la langue française; I was the director of legal affairs at Alliance Québec, where I had the pleasure of working on matters of access to and oversight of francophone school boards; I advised Claude Ryan on the Charter of the French Language; and I was in charge of revising the translation of all the statutes of Manitoba as the result of a Supreme Court decision. I know the field very well.
In my opinion, it is of prime importance that the person in this position not be partisan. You tried to use the appointment of Victor Goldbloom to your advantage, but may I suggest to you that the example is not valid. Victor Goldbloom was appointed by Brian Mulroney. A Conservative appointed a former provincial Liberal minister. You see the difference. It was the antithesis of partisanship; it was a non-partisan appointment because two different parties were involved. In Victor Goldbloom, who was certainly an excellent commissioner of official languages, everyone could see someone who was not tied to the government that had just appointed him. Do you understand the difference between your situation and Victor Goldbloom’s?