Official Languages Committee on Feb. 2nd, 2021

[Bernard Généreux, Conservative, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair. I hope you don't hear too much wind. There's a lot of wind blowing here right now.

Thanks from the bottom of my heart to the witnesses for accepting our invitation to address this very important topic. I would immediately like to ask you a question.

In her testimony before the Standing Committee on Procedure and House Affairs, Nathalie Laliberté, vice-president of the service to Parliament and interpretation sector at the Translation Bureau, said that the bureau and the House of Commons Administration had established a set of criteria that had to be met, if possible, in the provision of remote interpretation.

Is it possible for us to know those criteria? Are they publicly known?

I'm asking any one of the witnesses.

[Stéphan Aubé, Chief Information Officer, Digital Services and Real Property, House of Commons]

I can answer that question.

Our priority is the quality of the environment in which you work and in which interpreters work.

Every system put in place for the House committees must meet ISO standards. For both conference and meeting systems, there are mainly six ISO standards that must be met in order to provide high quality service that meets health and safety standards. That means…

[Bernard Généreux, Conservative, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

I'm going to interrupt you right there. I just want to know whether the criteria that were established for interpreters' health and safety have been introduced.

You no doubt listened to the previous witnesses, who mentioned that the Zoom platform was not the best for interpretation purposes.

I'd like to know what the criteria are and whether they have been implemented.

[Stéphan Aubé]

Mr. Généreux, I'd like to emphasize that we meet the ISO standards respecting booths, interpretation systems and conference systems.

I should add that, for us, Zoom is not the interpretation system used in the House of Commons. We have a different model, and Zoom is a tool that may be used for meetings such as ours.

There are other videoconferencing platforms, such as Microsoft Teams and Cisco Webex, and there are also platforms that lend themselves specifically to meetings directly involving interpretation. Lastly, there is a fourth model, one we have chosen, the hybrid model.

This model enables us to meet ISO standards and lets people work as they were already working. We added an element, Zoom, solely to allow information to be transmitted among the various participants. It's important to ensure that our systems meet ISO standards.

[Bernard Généreux, Conservative, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

I see, but, as you'll understand, the interpreters have hearing problems. I don't mean to be adopting an accusatory tone here, quite the contrary. I want us to look at this together and find a solution.

I should also tell the committee that, since last spring, we've been using headsets every day, even for several hours a day, as were doing today—I will have had this on my head for six hours—and now I have a ringing in my ears and a headache that I never previously had. I've never had a headache in my life.

So we have to understand that these people have real problems. As a result, the House of Commons Board of Internal Economy has looked into their working conditions.

In your work in the House of Commons, you decided to opt for Zoom because you wanted a hybrid model, but were there any other possible solutions?

[Stéphan Aubé]

Mr. Généreux, we initially examined several solutions, but I have to tell you that the ISO standards are established by the Translation Bureau. So we made sure that all the solutions that we proposed for parliamentary events and meetings met those standards.

The Translation Bureau therefore establishes the quality standards, and we propose solutions that meet them.

[Bernard Généreux, Conservative, Montmagny—L'Islet—Kamouraska—Rivière-du-Loup, QC]

Okay.

I'd like to talk about headsets now, another important matter.

I've never understood why headsets weren't made compulsory from the outset. Three or four of them should have been sent to each parliamentarian so that there would be a headset at each workplace. This evening, I'm working from home, and I have a headset. I also have one in my office in Ottawa and another at my riding office in Rivière-du-Loup. I never hesitated to ask for them.

Wouldn't it have been simpler from the very outset to just send three or four headsets to every M.P.?

Once again today, some witnesses and parliamentarians forgot their headset and used small earbuds instead. That certainly doesn't make the interpreters' work any easier.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Mr. Aubé, Please answer in 10 seconds if you could.

[Stéphan Aubé]

Mr. Généreux, we established a process that would allow us to send out headsets within a 24 to 48 hour period to all members and witnesses, if we have enough lead time to send them. A process was established and agreements were signed with companies across Canada to deliver the headsets.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

Thank you, Mr. Aubé.

Mr. Arseneault, you have the next six minutes.

[René Arseneault, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I am a bit puzzled, Mr. Aubé, because I understood that the Zoom platform met all the IS0 criteria suggested by the Translation Bureau, but then the problems being encountered by the interpreters are not really being caused by Zoom. That being the case, what is causing their problems? Could they be arising because of the equipment in the booths?

[Stéphan Aubé]

No, Mr. Arseneault.

I'd like to clarify something.

As I said earlier, we implemented a hybrid model. At the moment, the interpreters don't work directly with Zoom. Instead, they use the currently available consoles and headsets.

We are using Zoom only for audio transmission of the quality audio from the committee room systems. Currently, the audio and interpretation both come from an interpretation room and are sent to all participants; the same is the case for the participants. Their audio is sent to the interpreters through our audio systems, which are operated in accordance with the ISO standards that also protect the interpreters' hearing.

Zoom is therefore simply a mechanism for transmitting over the Internet. Everything that happens here and in the House makes use of our own systems, which comply with current ISO standards.

[René Arseneault, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Okay.

We heard otherwise from the previous and current witnesses. I understand what you're telling me, and I accept that, but there's something wrong, because the interpreters appear to be blaming the Zoom platform. However, you're saying that the audio being sent to them is really something else.

[Stéphan Aubé]

I'll offer two comments, Mr. Arseneault.

This summer, we carried out independent tests on the hybrid solution, which includes Zoom and all of our audio systems. We ran these tests with the National Research Council of Canada in Ottawa. We carried out tests in the House of Commons and in various committee rooms to make sure that the audio quality met standards that would prevent interpreters' suffering from hearing injuries. This doesn't mean that they won't experience fatigue, as Mr. Généreux was describing earlier. I personally attend several meetings a day and I must admit that I get tired. However, I wouldn't blame only one factor for it, because that wouldn't be right.

I disagree with the previous witnesses. There are several factors involved in the problem. Our approach was designed to ensure that the sound should be of a quality that would not subject the interpreters to any harm.

[René Arseneault, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Okay.

In his opening address, Mr. Robert alluded to the fact that several parliaments that operate virtually use the Zoom platform, including the European Parliament, at which several languages are spoken.

Do you have any other examples for us?

[Stéphan Aubé]

Mr. Arseneault, the European Parliament uses a number of tools. They use Zoom and other tools, depending on the context and the size of the event.

At the outset, the number of participants at meetings was one of the factors that led us to choose Zoom. But if we wanted a solution that would also work in the House, then 300 to 400 people would have to be able to take part in the meeting. Zoom was one of the options, and we said to ourselves that if the Zoom audio quality was not as good, we should use our existing systems; hence the hybrid solution. That's what we implemented in the fall.

[René Arseneault, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Okay.

With respect to the complaints from the interpreters and the Translation Bureau, have you noted an improvement since issuing your recommendations? You made recommendations about headsets, microphones and cable Internet connection rather than Wi-Fi, among other things. You went to all the riding offices for each M.P. to check signal quality.

Has there been an improvement since your office made sure the equipment was first rate and that it was being used properly by members?

[Stéphan Aubé]

Mr. Arseneault, the complaints are not made directly to our office, but rather to the Translation Bureau. The Bureau's representatives could answer this question.

But I can say that we are working steadily to deal with every request from the Translation Bureau to provide and improve interpretation quality and enhance what I would call the three major variables that have an impact on audio quality: the equipment used by the people taking part in the meetings, the carrier technology and the interpretation system. We are continuing to work with the Translation Bureau to deliver quality interpretation and to protect people's health.

[René Arseneault, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

How are you made aware of interpreters' complaints about the poor sound and synchronization quality?

Who are the intermediaries between their complaints and your work?

[Stéphan Aubé]

It's rather a combination of things, Mr. Arseneault.

We keep in very close touch with people at the Translation Bureau, and some of them interact with our managers and employees on site.

In addition, the technicians are on the premises every day for every meeting. This means that they are made aware of whether the interpreters have encountered any problems during the meeting. We make note of them, keep statistics on them and follow up with members and witnesses, where required, in order to explain to them what needs to be changed to improve the situation.

We do these things every day to ensure quality, and to look after the health and safety of the interpreters.

[René Arseneault, Liberal, Madawaska—Restigouche, NB]

Thank you very much. I would have liked to ask another question, but I get the feeling the chair is going to crack the whip.

[The Chair, Liberal, Emmanuel Dubourg]

You're right! Thank you, Mr. Arseneault.

I'd like to take a moment to remind all the participants to speak more slowly. Although it's an interesting subject, let's not forget our interpreters.

Mr. Beaulieu, you have the floor for six minutes.

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I'd like to return to what was said earlier.

There's really a contradiction between what the interpreters presented and what we've just heard.

The Association's documents specifically state that the Zoom platform may have been chosen for good reasons, but that "its suitability for delivering quality interpretation could not have been one of them." The interpreters described the sound as "toxic" in terms of the ISO standards established by international experts. We were also told about all the injuries to which they were subjected.

There's also a small table showing that in terms of quality, Zoom comes in last on the list of various platforms.

What's your take on that?

[Stéphan Aubé]

I can't comment on that because I don't have the Association's data.

But I can tell you that we've been working closely with the parliaments of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, which have also prepared reports comparing the various platforms. As I was saying earlier, four models were compared. We are using one of them, which is not the Zoom version with interpretation only, but a hybrid model with several additional health and safety features.

In fact, the comparison that was made in the previous presentation was not very accurate. It's important to look at the facts and compare existing models. I don't want to put words in the mouth of any of the Association's representatives. I'm simply reporting what I understand about what was said and what we're comparing.

We compared the standard version of Zoom with the other products, but that is not the version we're using. As I said earlier, Zoom is only one component of a platform that has been designed for quality, and for the health and safety of the people taking part in our meetings.

[Mario Beaulieu, Bloc, La Pointe-de-l'Île, QC]

Could you show us some of your audio test results so that we can see how they compare to other platforms?

In any event, we're not trying to blame anyone. If you haven't seen these tables or heard this other version of things, you might even take advantage of the opportunity to look for ways to improve the system.