Official Languages Committee on Nov. 21st, 2024

[Stéphanie Chouinard]

Exactly. Obviously, no parents have complained about the far more affordable child care services we now have, but it's clear that the lower cost had led to higher demand. I think we could have anticipated this result, but it might have been hard to anticipate the scope. Indeed, workers are telling us that the waiting lists are significantly longer now that child care costs are lower.

When we look at what child care centres can do financially, we note that spots for infants are the hardest to fund because child care centres lose money on those spots. However, that's how young children enter the early child care system. That's what the board at my son's day care believes.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Thank you, Ms. Chouinard. You'll get the opportunity to speak later when other questions are asked, but we have significantly exceeded the six-minute mark.

Mr. Beaulieu, our second vice-chair, has the floor for six minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I want to thank the witnesses for being with us.

We have two witnesses who are researchers. Mr. Bourgeois talked about how effective the federal language policy is and how to assess it. If we look at the Official Languages Act since its adoption in 1969, we could ask whether it's a failure or a success.

The francophone assimilation rate has continued to rise since 1969, and it's very obvious outside Quebec. Quebec has seen some progress, despite having the Constitution forced on it. Quebec is home to 90% of the francophones in Canada. Quebeckers are not recognized as a minority, even if they are a minority within Canada.

Furthermore, the Official Languages Act seeks solely to reinforce English in Quebec. We thought that the new version of the act might change things but, clearly, that's not the case. It does nothing to support the French language in Quebec. The federal government is doling out subsidies to francophones outside Quebec for their education system. Witnesses spoke about the education system and, in many instances, funding for preschools and schools was insufficient. One witness told us earlier that British Columbia had no public francophone college or university created by and for francophones.

Ultimately, isn't the aim of the federal language policy to quietly and gradually assimilate francophones and to let them assimilate? In Quebec, where there is a chance of ensuring their survival, there are efforts to weaken French in order to promote English.

I'd like to hear what the two witnesses have to say about that.

[Daniel Bourgeois]

Many Quebeckers have made that argument since the Royal Commission of Inquiry on Bilingualism and Biculturalism in the 1960s. Biculturalism was subsequently abandoned in favour of a policy on bilingualism and multiculturalism.

As a researcher, however, I’ve never read anything confirming that the federal government sought to assimilate the minority, bit by bit. That’s your opinion. I’ll leave it there.

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

Understood.

This issue was raised prior to the adoption of the Official Languages Act, but also following its adoption. There has often been criticism to that effect.

Ms. Chouinard, what do you think?

[Stéphanie Chouinard]

Good morning, Mr. Beaulieu.

Today’s study is on the education continuum. I think it’s important to recall that, pursuant to Section 93 of the Constitution Act, 1867, education falls under provincial jurisdiction. The question is a Gordian knot. We talked about it in relation to post-secondary education, and we’re talking about it again today.

The federal government makes investments. Are they insufficient? We can certainly discuss that. Personally, I’d like to them to be higher, but the key is really to ensure that, when those transfers are made to the provinces, that the money gets spent where it needs to be. Perhaps that’s thanks to the sections on language, which should be imposed on the provinces, to ensure among other things that funding is invested based on the needs of the communities and to meet the needs and priorities of those communities.

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

I think that Quebec is the only province where funding for a minority-language community is guaranteed. The anglophone community in Quebec is considered a minority by the federal government, and it’s certainly a minority in terms of Quebec’s population, even if it’s part of the English-speaking majority in Canada. That community is well funded, and I would even say that the funding is higher than the percentage of anglophones, be it at the preschool, elementary or secondary school level. In that province, the federal government only takes action to reinforce English. If Quebec’s powers are weakened, if the federal government encroaches more in Quebec, we could consider that that it will further undermine the future of French in Quebec.

Wouldn’t it be better to do things differently?

[Stéphanie Chouinard]

Mr. Beaulieu, for the first time in history, the new Official Languages Act explicitly states that French is the language of the minority in Canada.

I think that the federal government is adopting a very clear tool precisely to ensure that this imbalance is corrected. Now, it’s time to implement this wonderful statute, which dates back to last year.

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

Thank you.

However, if you look at the Action Plan for Official Languages 2023–2028: Protection-Promotion-Collaboration, nothing has changed. All the funding in Quebec goes to English. The new act says one thing and its opposite. It admits that francophones, including those in Quebec, are part of a minority, but it continues to refer to anglophones in Quebec as a minority. In the end, this ambiguity seems to serve to perpetuate the same old system as before.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

You have 15 seconds, Ms. Chouinard.

[Stéphanie Chouinard]

Mr. Beaulieu, I think you and I disagree on how to see things.

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

However, I hope that the situation will change, but it hasn't yet.

[The Chair, Liberal, René Arseneault]

Thank you very much, Mr. Beaulieu.

Ms. Dance, the floor is yours for six minutes.

[Leila Dance, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Thank you very much.

I'm new to the committee, and I'm trying to understand things. As researchers, I'm hoping you can share some information with me so that I have a better understanding of what we're looking at.

What I can see is that the provinces and territories must provide a per diem for each student. Is that correct? Are we talking about the federal government providing the provinces with money based on the number of students in general?

[Daniel Bourgeois]

It varies from province to province. I did research for the Fédération nationale des conseils scolaires francophones in 2014. Some provinces have a lot of money per student. Some have much less. It depends.

Actually, the trend is that the more students there are—in New Brunswick and Ontario, for instance—the less money there is per student.

[Leila Dance, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Did you compare anglophone students to francophone students? When it gets to the provincial level and they start dividing it up, is it being disbursed evenly?

[Daniel Bourgeois]

It's not even. What I did was study the PLOE-OLEP funding, which is for immersion second language and French first language.

In every province and territory, if I remember correctly, the funding for the French language and minority languages was superior per student, per total, than the amounts for second language French immersion.

[Leila Dance, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Right, but none of that was compared against just anglophone students in the English-speaking classrooms.

[Daniel Bourgeois]

No. All I did was compare the PLOE-OLEP funding.

[Leila Dance, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

I'm trying to understand this. Both of you have mentioned how the provincial government isn't spending correctly, and that there's a discrepancy. I'm trying to compare both sides to figure out how we can increase that or make sure that it's on par.

Do either or both of you have any recommendations on how we can hold the provinces more accountable for those types of things?

[Daniel Bourgeois]

I suggest an integrated tripartite plan where everybody knows what everybody is supposed to be doing. Everybody accounts for their spending and their investments. That's probably the best one.

I'll give you an anecdote. In Prince Edward Island, the school board had to make a request under the freedom of information and protection of privacy legislation to get access to how the province was spending its OLEP funding. The province refused, because the pretext was, “Well, we're negotiating with the federal government, so negotiations between federal and provincial governments preclude the divulgence of information.”

I personally think the best solution is to have a plan where everybody signs on board and everybody shares the information. We know where we're heading. It's “You do this, I do that and minority school boards do this,” and everybody grows in the same direction.

[Leila Dance, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

I like that.

I'll pose the same questions to the other witness, Ms. Chouinard.

[Stéphanie Chouinard]

First of all, welcome to the committee. It's nice to see a new face.

I largely agree with my colleague on either a tripartite agreement or, as some other community members would call it, a linguistic clause. Ideally, a representative of the provincial community would be a signatory to ensure not only transparency in where the funding goes but also that where the funding is allocated is on par with and represents the priorities and needs of the community. Nobody else in each province is better placed to tell the province and the federal government where those priorities should be.

As it stands right now, with these bilateral agreements in education between the federal government and the provinces, the provinces are free to make up their own priorities as to where that funding is allocated. Often, when it is revealed where that funding went—because that's not always the case, as Daniel just said—we realize that the funding went to places that were absolutely useless with regard to the vitality of communities.

[Daniel Bourgeois]

I'll add an anecdote.

In Prince Edward Island, the OLEP is served by the province to fund 13.75 teachers. That's supposed to be a primary provincial responsibility. It shouldn't be using OLEP funding to fund the salaries of 13.75 teachers, but it does. The French-language school board has told the province it can't do that. Canadian Heritage is fully aware of that and does nothing to correct that.

[Stéphanie Chouinard]

Unless, in some provinces, like Newfoundland and Labrador, someone in the community decides to take PCH to court, which is what's happening right now. The funding by the PLOE-OLEP is deemed to be supplementary funding to what the province should be putting forward. Right now, that is not how that funding is used a large number of times.