Mr. Chair, I'd like to thank both ministers for being with us today.
Like you, Mr. Chair, I want to tip my hat to the team who managed to bring everyone together. It's not easy to do what we are doing today and to have two ministers appearing to respond to our report.
We spent months working on our report on the next action plan and immigration. It addresses key issues, and the fact that it has the committee's unanimous support shows just how important it is. The report contains 16 recommendations, two of which I'd like to focus on.
I'll speak to Mr. Hussen about the first and to Ms. Joly about the other.
Minister Hussen, as you know, Canada's target for francophone immigration is approximately 4%. Unfortunately, we've never reached that target, or even come close. According to the last study, francophone immigration accounted for about 1.4% of the national total.
Before I get to my question, I want to congratulate you on the new Mobilité francophone stream. It is going to be very beneficial. Not to mention, the awarding of additional points under the express entry program will go a long way towards improving the situation. Those are tangible measures. Your participation, along with that of your parliamentary secretary, at the ministerial forum on francophone immigration was very important. I received a lot of positive feedback on that.
Nevertheless, given how hard it is for Canada to reach that 4% target, the committee was told that it may be advisable to have someone in the department who is responsible and accountable for meeting the target. Instead of the target simply being one of the department's internal objectives, someone would be responsible and accountable for meeting the target. That person could be a director general or a deputy minister. We aren't exactly sure what it would look like, but, as recommendation 15 indicates, we want IRCC to ensure that the principle of substantive equality in official languages is applied to all departmental programs.
I'd like to hear your take, Minister, on recommendation 15 in the committee's report.