Thank you, Mr. Chair.
I'll continue to list the measures taken by the current Liberal government—which has been in power for nine years—that show its inconsistency, lack of interest and lack of will with regard to official languages.
First, remember that the Rouleau commission and the Hogue commission, which report administratively to the Privy Council Office, violated the Official Languages Act.
We talked about the Franco‑Ontarian member of Parliament earlier.
We're still waiting for the orders in council needed to implement the bill to modernize the Official Languages Act. This bill was passed in June 2023. It will be November 2024 tomorrow, and the orders in council haven't even been tabled yet.
Regarding the action plan for official languages 2023‑28, which lacks transparency and inflates the public service, organizations on the ground aren't seeing the results.
Today, we Conservatives are accused of lacking sensitivity. Our colleague is being asked to apologize, which he did on the X platform. As far as I know, Minister Duclos accepted his apology. Don't say that X fails to provide a good picture. Even the member of Parliament for Louis‑Hébert, 15 minutes after leaving the House, posted a tweet. It's funny. Our member of Parliament apologized in both official languages, and it took an hour and 40 minutes at most. By the way, if the Liberals need a reminder, the official languages are English and French.
We're accused of lacking sensitivity to the French fact. I would like to list a few even more compelling facts to show that what's being said isn't necessarily true.
Let's talk about our leader's sensitivity to the French fact. He was adopted by Fransaskois parents. When he was young, they used to tell him that, if he wanted more presents, he had to send his wish list to Santa in French. He grew up in Calgary, where he unfortunately lost his French. As the saying goes, when you're in a relationship, it helps to learn a second language. When he met his wife, a Montrealer with an immigrant background, he fell back in love with the French language. His children are being raised in French. It's their first language spoken at home.
Moreover, our leader speaks fluent French in all his remarks in the House of Commons and in interviews. This factor helped me rally behind him. He's an inspiring leader. Remember that a leadership race was held. I'm now proud to work with him. He has fully entrusted me to advocate for both official languages. I want to thank him for that. Obviously, French is the most fragile language and it's in decline. Our leader also regularly takes part in festivities for Quebec's national holiday, Saint‑Jean‑Baptiste Day; Acadia's national holiday; and so on. He's very sensitive to issues affecting Canada's francophonie.
Canada's Conservatives have been clear. We'll take concrete action to stop the decline of French in Canada. A future Conservative government will make the necessary investments to support the vitality of Canada's francophone communities. Every dollar will be spent on concrete action, not on more bureaucracy in Ottawa and across Canada.
My colleague, Mr. Iacono, reached out to me so that we could do our job. On Tuesday, he decided to table this motion, which cost us this meeting. On Wednesday, you decided, Mr. Chair, to cancel the visit of the witnesses from British Columbia who were scheduled to speak today. I think that you made the right decision.
It's now time to stop. I'm reaching out to Mr. Iacono and all the committee members. I'm reaching out with both hands, because there are two options.
The first option is that he simply withdraws his motion, we move on to committee business and we deal with the education continuum study. The second option is that I move an amendment to the motion. To this end, I would like the meeting suspended.